I like the demo projects. I like to see what others are doing with Sonar.

So with the old start screen I could click New Project and could just start working away on a blank project. Now I'm forced to create a new folder and name any new project I start. I really dislike this. I liked being able to open a blank project I had no intention of saving to do testing. This just seems like a cumbersome route that will leave me with a ton of useless project folders.

@John
Maybe my english is not sufficient, because I have to translate from german.
Therefore we misunderstood us.
I don't want to see the preview of thousends of files.
I only want to see the preview of the cwp-files (the project files).
In my case the folder of "recent files" shows the preview picture of 12 projects.
If I choose "existing project" I would like to see the 25 preview pictures (icons) from my 25 projects of the disc. 
Nothing more.
 

RSMCGUITAR
So with the old start screen I could click New Project and could just start working away on a blank project. Now I'm forced to create a new folder and name any new project I start. I really dislike this. I liked being able to open a blank project I had no intention of saving to do testing. This just seems like a cumbersome route that will leave me with a ton of useless project folders.

 
SONAR needs a folder and a projectname in order to save audio and mixscenes. SONAR does not know that you never want to save your work. Otherwise SONAR has to force you to select a folder at the the first audio recording, which would be even more annoying. A project is not just a excel file that can be saved after some time. It needs an audiofolder.

THambrecht
SONAR needs a folder and a projectname in order to save audio and mixscenes. SONAR does not know that you never want to save your work. Otherwise SONAR has to force you to select a folder at the the first audio recording, which would be even more annoying.

Clearly not true since I could do it before this update.

I really wish that new features would be left out until all the known bugs and issues are sorted. I would much rather have reliability and stability with processes functioning as they should. Sonar is great but adding more features when what is there already has holes in it makes no sense to me.

RSMCGUITAR
So with the old start screen I could click New Project and could just start working away on a blank project. Now I'm forced to create a new folder and name any new project I start. I really dislike this. I liked being able to open a blank project I had no intention of saving to do testing. This just seems like a cumbersome route that will leave me with a ton of useless project folders.

I thought that too at first, but actually it's better now because typing Ctrl+N at any time, whether the start screen is showing or not, duplicates the behavior you could obtain before only by clicking on New Project while the Start Screen was open. All will be revealed in the next Tech+Music eZine . 

IanPritchett
I really wish that new features would be left out until all the known bugs and issues are sorted.

hello early access and monthly release cycle? very agile, no?

IanPritchett
I really wish that new features would be left out until all the known bugs and issues are sorted. I would much rather have reliability and stability with processes functioning as they should. Sonar is great but adding more features when what is there already has holes in it makes no sense to me.

Some people would prefer updates with new features, some people prefer updates with bug fixes. This is why there is a balance of both. If you look over the bug fixes and speed improvements that happened over the past year, many long-standing bugs have been squashed. Some months are particularly bug-fix heavy, like the 2016.12 update. But then people complain there are no new features 
 
Also bear in mind that something has to be repeatable to be considered a bug. There are a lot of threads started here about "bugs" that are actually due to pilot error, system issues, third-party plug-ins not following the VST3 spec correctly, or hardware drivers. Unfortunately, I've found that stability often has a direct correlation with a) how much you spend on your computer, and b) how much software you have on it. 
 
My background is from the days of stand-alone multitrack recorders, so it was natural for me to dedicate a computer purely for audio/video work. I think that has a lot to do with why my system is so stable, and I can use SONAR for days and even weeks on end with no issues. My last big problem was Melodyne causing intermittent crashes, but downloading the Melodyne 4.1 update solved that. Cakewalk has no control over those types of issues.

Liking the new start screen, but there used to be a link to "The Bakery" top right of the start screen . . . does this mean "The Bakery" is gone ? . . . or just moved somewhere else ?