Hi all!-
After watching the new Webinar for X2- I'm stunned at how few of the improvements would be at all useful for my commercial recording studio! They seem to be more designed for individuals who want to edit virtual software instruments than live musicians who are recording real instruments. 

That's great for guys who want to tweak synth music- and there's nothing wrong with that, but most of the paying-by-the-hour work that I get in the studio is actual HUMANS trying to get good takes in front of microphones!

Here's some of the things that I'd REALLY like to see in an X3 update- that I don't see in X2-

Locates and better Transport control. 9 out of 10 button pushes that I do are: press record> guy stinks up the iso> stop! (sigh)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> (ask myself why I still do this)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> rinse and repeat... hours fly by... get a check from the guy... schedule the next time... 

That's studio life, it seems to me- has been for decades. What would help for the Bakers to improve are things that make this process better. For example, in addition to "Go to Now" (of the selection) or scroll through the Markers one at a time- would be having a current, one-button-updateable Locate point that can be gotten to with one button. It's easy to locate after setting a new "Now", but every time you change the Selection while you're working, that type of Locate point is lost. I "Locate, set Punch to Selection, do Punch, change Punch to Selection, change preroll Locate a 1000 times a day. Having a dedicated "Locate" or "Go To" (independent of the Selection) would GREATLY make studio life easier! Also being able to Recall a Marker by number and set that as the Locate! If you've ever worked on an analog machine's autolocater, you probably remember how much easier this was to do! Of course, you had to wait for the rewind...

Another thing that streamlined punching in the old days was Latching Auto-Play. Which did NOT require a button push for Stop when recording! So when the client smells up the iso booth AGAIN, you just pushed Locate and the machine understood to Stop- went to the Locate- and automatically dropped into play... that would save me 200 button-pushes per day. And latching Auto-Record. 200 more buttons a day. And a much more fluid, unintrusive, effortless vibe of the session. Sure, Loop Recording can come close to doing this, but it's not as under my control, with one button, like it used to be. I want to stop- immediately- the Take when the guy messes up, not re-do the whole thing over and over. For really recording a client, better Transport controls would be a huge improvement for my paying business. 

As would be the long requested addition of Vari-Speed! Man... if the guys accordian or 12-string is a little sharp- you used to be able to tune the whole song to the current overdubbing instrument with one button. It's an essential feature for a Recording Studio that records clients who play instruments! Incidentally- a far cheaper and less sophisticated app- Reaper- has both Vari-Speed AND one-button-by-number Locates. So it's not at all technically impossible. I'm BEGGING FOR VARI-SPEED!!!

Another thing that we used to have that was great too- Record-in-Reverse. Man, I miss seeing the band's eyes light up when they'd hear the rush of "Pre-Verb" leading into a vocal! Flip the tape, record it, and get PAID! I'd think it would be not impossible in a computer-based recording system... you can reverse a sample and scoot it I guess, but it's not as simple.

And the other thing that would really improve Sonar for the paying studio is GIVING US BACK OUR COLOR CHOICES! 50 shades of gray is cool for your woman to read- but for seeing tiny little buttons at 6 feet in the control room- gray sucks! Very hard to discern legibly- compared to high-contrast colors, blacks and whites. I have dual 26" monitors and the clients really appreciate being able to clearly see from THEIR chair what's going on. But that's because I have to stick with 8.5- where I can have the option to set up a clear, non-cloudy, non 50-shades-of-gray GUI!

OK... that's a couple of things that I think would help Sonar in the paying, commercial studio. More than a ton of tweakable software, which is good, sure... but an easier interface for recording CLIENTS would sure be worth some money to me. What do you guys think? Thanks for listening!-
Ev 

Here's some of the things that I'd REALLY like to see in an X3 update- that I don't see in X2- 


Locates and better Transport control. 9 out of 10 button pushes that I do are: press record> guy stinks up the iso> stop! (sigh)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> (ask myself why I still do this)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> rinse and repeat... hours fly by... get a check from the guy... schedule the next time...  

Just get a control surface. I have a Euphonics controller and its great for all things you listed.  All "Pro' Studio that i have seen, including mine, will have some sort of controller for these things.

Great appeal for some added features. Feature request?

Why would you ever need to record in reverse? This is a DAW = non linear.

Just print a clip with reverb, and go to Process > Apply Effect > Reverse.
 
Edit: I also don't get the color comment. I've never had a client comment about the colors on my DAW. They've always been focused on the music and rightfully so. 
 
Maybe I should paint my black outboard gear hunter orange so they can see the settings from across the room.

Locates and better Transport control. 9 out of 10 button pushes that I do are: press record> guy stinks up the iso> stop! (sigh)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> (ask myself why I still do this)> go to preroll locate for ANOTHER, ONE MORE punch> press play> record at punch-in> guy stinks up the iso> stop> rinse and repeat... hours fly by... get a check from the guy... schedule the next time... 

So... you press Record before your singer is even inside the booth? What are you recording - the sound of approaching feet?

You probably need to address your workflow/methodology

?????

I'm all in for a varispeed.  I love the one in Vegas, although doesn't "stick".  Still useful, and not just on video.

@

 I agree with the ability to move to a named marker is a must have if Reaper has this I may have to use reaper thanks for informing me of this. I can rewire that into sonar. Someone requested this feature yesterday and I did so myself about a month ago and I think CJ even thought of it and commented about it in the thread I started about that idea. If a $1500 piece of gear is needed then I need to use some other product.

This is a must have feature and all it takes is for someone in programming to add it in the act button options so we can make any button go to a preset marker. I suggested the ability to create up to ten but more is cool as well. DUH how hard can that be probably takes them 10 minutes to program if they know what they are doing. Of course we don't have a list that explains all the options in ACT for programming a button now so maybe they don't have the time since they can't even write an explanation of all the options that we can use to make a button do things with act.

Some of them are obvious but a lot of them really are not and we could sure use some context tips inside the act options page even the help file is confusing and needs a major rewrite so it makes more sense. at least link to a page were they are located in the manual so we can find them if they are there I sent in a comment to cake about this the other day and either they don't know what I'm talking about which means they don't know the ACT preset options worth a damn.

I have a pcr 500 and would like to know about all the cool things I can remote control. The ability to move from marker X to marker Y and ABC even would be extremely cool and needed why they don't already have this is really messed up. I'm a rookie DIY producer and this was the first thing I could thing of off the top of my head. Come on cake guys get er done

Hey CJ and everyone! Thanks for your thoughts!
I HAVE a control surface, for sure... of course! Still auto-play latch doesn't exist in Sonar, nor does a dedicated Locate. Nor an Auto-Record Latch. (Does your controller let you do any of that? If so- I'm buying one! Thanks for the tip!) But I don't think Sonar has any of those functions in the app (as far as I know), so I'd be surprised if your controller could be mapped to do them?

Just "Go to Now" which I use all the time from my control surface, of course. But that's not what I'm talking about! "Go to Now" doubles the difficulty in editing by selection a precise area and being able to instantly go again and again to a preroll point before the selected area. You can always set a marker there, but I don't want a marker, just a temporary Locate point. Or I'd have hundreds of markers all over the place by the time I'm done mixing a song! I'll bet you've worked on a 24 track with a superb autolocater- they have all these basic functions. Including Vari-speed! 

The changes I'm requesting don't seem all that complex- easy for me to say! And beatzmidiot (sorry if I misspelled!)- you may be right about Record-in-Reverse, but there is something to be said for it. Used to be standard on the ol' $100,000 Sony 3324's and 3348's! Also, if we had a truly non-linear app- wouldn't it be awesome to have standard J-K-L functionality?!!! If you've ever worked in Avid Media Composer, you know how awesome J-K-L is! By various key touches and combos you get 2x speed playback, 4x speed playback- both in forward and reverse. And slow-mo and frame-by-frame. In forward and reverse. J-K-L rules!

And the feature of defining the colors of the GUI was of course REMOVED from Sonar... and I object!!! If you don't want clearer fonts than various grays, fine! Everyone around HERE likes to be able to see clearly and legibly. I find shades of grays less visually clear from a distance than navy and white- just MY preference. Please don't paint anything orange... that's MY exclusive trademark.

Bristol- I was apprenticed to always keep the machine in record, especially when there's a band meeting about the studio bill! No I DON'T! of course not... just talking about button pushes, not the entire process of getting ready to record!

Well, I appreciate your guys' thoughts. You really got "auto-play latch upon locate"- one button from record, and vari-speed on your controller, CJ? That'd be awesome.

I would like the Locate functions as described above and have even brought that up on another thread (although I did not explain them as well as the OP here).  When I am recording vocals (myslef or someone else), 10-12 locate points would be great.  We do have markers, but using them is slower than just scrolling.

I have a V-Studio 700.  Since that is obviously Cakewalk's recommended Control Surface/Interface, I think the functions should exist in Sonar and be supported by the V-Studio.