Some Guy

Since almost everyone will learn more easily by doing instead of looking at a video, which generally doesn't even present the topics in a well-organized manner and typically jumps about spastically. Additionally, lots of YouTube channels put a lot of "filler" content in their videos, and some of them simply aren't well-produced. I don't even want to start on the unskippable Ads, etc. in many of them. I get much more out of ACTUALLY USING the application with a decent Quick Start guide (PDF or Physical) at the beginning, and a Manual/Reference Guide to refer to [thereafter] than sitting in front of YouTube. Unless you're going to tell me you get more out of 10 hours of YouTube viewing than you do out of 8 hours actually using the application, I'm sticking to my guns. Everyone wants to see more "YouTube" content because it signals to them that their preferred software application or platform is growing in popularity (or simply popular), but the usefulness of such content is a completely different matter... and how effective it is, is highly questionable IMHO. There are probably still people looking at YouTube videos on the "Best DAW for beginners," 6 months after they started... and they still haven't done anything in any of them. This happens all the time, with DAWs, Video Editors, Photo Editors, Programming Languages, etc. BandLab needs to just give us the documentation so that we can go about our merry way and start using the application more effectively. They already have these documents and help files... Let us have them. Fortunately, someone sent me the Help File and Documentation from the last SONAR release, so I'm [personally] good to go 😉 That person has my thanks.

For huge VSTi I put in same folder name on second drive. I don't like filling up my NVMe system storage. I have large SATA SSDs for everything else

Honestly, time is a precious resource. I'd much rather they distribute a PDF user guide so that we can search and view while on the go. I'd much rather read the manual while I'm riding shotgun or between sessions at the training center than waste hours of my time watching YouTube videos. Not having a PDF manual, at least the old Sonar Platinum manual with the obvious caveat that some things may differ, is awful. I have time in between activities while out and about, but I'm definitely not going to sit in front of YouTube and waste that much time. I want an actual PDF user guide.

It's easy to say "Prove me Wrong", because you can always just say it sounds no different to you... Your ears are not on my head, but the plug-ins in Samplitude do sound better, and many Professional sound engineers have stated so... This is not just a case of skill being the roadblock. Someone saying iZotope RX is better than Sonitus Gate is not saying that simply because they aren't "skilled enough" to get equivalent results. Algorithms etc. differ between the two. MAGIX simply has better code. Their Audio Engine in Samplitude is also better than Cakewalk, and that has nothing to do with "skill." It's just better. Many professionals have stated that the MAGIX Plug-Ins are on par with 3rd party plugins that cost hundreds... And what is your point? Those articles were probably written several years ago, anyways 😛 The bundled effects in Resolve Fairlight are also really good (for those of us who do post-production).

Assome one who has used MAGIX's Plug-Ins (the ones bundles with VEGAS Pro and Samplitude), this statement is definitely false. But they may still be good enough for newbies. The Audio Plug-Ins in Resolve Fairlight are better, as well. Don't think the UI is a priority.

They will likely monetize components of the DAW in the future. Rapture, Dimension, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if they started selling instruments, Effects, etc. in some sort of store.

I'll try that. Thank you for the reply.

That is true, for the U-class CPUs, which are ULV Laptop CPUs. You get better performance by getting an H-Class CPU (HQ in 7th Gen); like an i7-7700HQ, which was common in Gaming Laptops. 2.8-3.5'ish GHz, 4 Core 8 Thread with DDR4-2400MHz RAM. Honestly, though, DAWs aren't as "demanding" as NLEs... It was (probably still is) pretty common to use MBAs during Live Productions, and those shipped with Dual Core CPUs. The 7600U probably will be good enough for what the OP needs. OP should look into Laptops with an i7-7700HQ and see what those options are, and how they are priced compared to the machines with the two CPUs he has listed... Also, consider Laptops with Ryzen APUs, as well... Ryzen performs pretty well, and you get pretty good Core/Thread Count and Clock Speeds at lower prices compared to i5/i7. The performance disparity is not huge enough to matter. The only thing to consider is whether or not you will be using it to edit video, if you shoot predominantly compressed formats (AVCHD, H.264, HEVC, XAVC-S, etc.). A lot of NLEs only have Decode Acceleration for QSV, not AMD UVD.

Massive List of VEGAS Pro Effects show up, with tons of duplication. How do I stop these from showing up? They don't even seem to function right in the DAW, so there is no point in having them there cluttering up the effects list. The Plug-In Manager isn't very intuitive. I can't figure out how to disable them in Cakewalk (and hopefully it doesn't affect other applications on my system, for obvious reasons).

You don't need ridiculous amounts of RAM, but 8GB is pretty much a practical minimum. Windows 10 uses 2.5-3GB RAM after booting. So I severely doubt you see "zero difference" going to 8/16GB RAM from 4GB. You have to ignore the differences to come to that conclusion. Windows 10 will swap all day with 4GB RAM if a running application is using 1.5GB of RAM. macOS has the same memory footprint, and Apple had to move the base SKU MacBook Airs up to 8GB RAM from 4GB for the same reason. Additionally, some people run more than just one specific application on their machines. Cakewalk isn't exactly known for being the Studios' Choice, so it's used by a lot of people running home studios or making music on their personal laptops and desktops. If you also edit video or do photography, 4GB RAM is laughable and simply won't work well. It's a huge bottleneck. 4GB RAM only works for Netbooks and Chromebooks. 4GB Surface Tablets with weak GPUs are basically netbooks in a different form factor.

It seems like BandLab wants Cakewalk by BandLab to be comparable to something like Studio One Artist, so that they can sell some things as Add-Ons in a store, later on, to monetize Cakewalk.

The only thing the DAW needs to do is play back video. That's about it. You render out a low resolution reference video to load in the DAW for timing, but the AAF is used for moving the Audio Timeline between DAWs, NLEs, etc. Cakewalk plays back the video fine 😉 Adding AAF support has literally nothing to do with the video capabilities, because the current video capabilities are more than sufficient and - therefore - non-factor in regards to film post production. The problem is that it's impossible to get the Audio Timeline from most NLEs to Cakewalk because it has no AAF support, and NLE developers aren't going to waste resources implementing OMF support - as it's a practically dead interchange format. That's why AAF is needed... because OMF simply isn't usable for most people. The only NLE that seems to work well with OMF is Premiere Pro CC, and most of those users will just use Audition (unless they're working on something higher budget, where Pro Tools is fairly de facto). Outside of that, the need to round trip to a DAW is lessening as more NLEs are incorporating the functionality needed for Audio Post. VEGAS Pro was way ahead of the curve, by virtue of its heritage. Resolve 14 added Fairlight to that DAW. MAGIX's NLEs are also pretty good with Audio, in addition to round-tripping natively with their DAWs (i.e. Video Pro X <-> Samplitude Pro). AAF is necessary, otherwise the time you waste trying to move things around manually is going to cost more than the retail price of a DAW that actually does support AAF; and you'll eventually start losing money doing it "the hard way."

Awesome. Thanks!

Can I *not* install the Studio Instruments package and still get things like Breverb? What about other effects? Or is that in the Studio Instruments Package? I will never use the default instruments, Theme Editor, or Drum Replacer, so I'd like to avoid installing those bits...

Does Samplitude Pro X4 have Context Sensitive Help and ship with a PDF User Manual? These things are, increasingly, worth paying for - to me. I'll probably pay as much buying equivalently-good effects and instruments to make this usable, anyways... Some SONAR Platinum users say they have these from the latest version of that "version," but they act like they're a pot of gold and won't make them available for others. This software is full of marketing-speak, and without convenient, practically usable documentation it just isn't worth it to me. It feels like reading a foreign language book with Google Translate in another window.

Can anyone upload the PDF Reference Guide and the CHM Help File from the latest version of SONAR Platinum ? Would be nice to have an offline help file, and the PDF reference guide to look through when out and about and away from the PC... The "last 8 months of features" is not that important to people who are learning to use the program. That is only a very, very minute fraction of the application's functionality!

It would have been nice if Microsoft had bought VEGAS/Sound Forge/ACID and tried to compete in that space... maybe SONAR, too :-) Hell, they could have just bundled them in with the Office 365 subscriptions!

VEGAS Pro uses all of the Sonitus stuff (not the Instruments, obviously). Additionally, all of the Audio Effects from VEGAS Pro work in Cakewalk. Software that support the DirectX Effect APIs will be able to use them. Cross platform DAWs typically don't implement their stuff as DirectX Effects, which kind of is the point I was making. DirectX Effects are the Windows Equivalent to Audio Units on macOS. VST is the Cross Platform alternative to those two. DirectX is used for some Video Effect Plug-Ins in VEGAS Pro, as well, FWIW. A lot of Pro software like VEGAS and SONAR were Windows-only, for YEARS, and designed/developed with an intentional bias for that platform; so they heavily used these libraries as it makes sense - similar to Apple heavily using their platform-specific libraries/toolkits in Final Cut and Logic Pro. A lot of developers are just less meticulous about this on Windows, for some reason, but they almost always tend to support the macOS native technologies when they port there. PCompare SOUND FORGE for Windows and macOS. The products are named the same, and perform a similar function, but the macOS is pretty much a completely different product and WAY behind the Windows version. The same can be said of software like ACDsee, which required yet another major revamp in the latest macOS version. Porting would take tons of planning, and potentially years of development before the macOS version reached feature parity with the Windows version - depending on how much money and resources BandLab chooses to throw at it. In that interim, people would - understandable - call it crippled and suggest people who want to use it just get a PC. I don't personally think it's worth it. Cakewalk is free, and that's very appealing because people love having their free choices available everywhere, but most professionals don't have an issue paying $199 for Logic Pro X and its army of Instruments, Loops, and Effects Plug-Ins. There is very little to gain from a project that will be such a huge drain on resources. People who need Pro Tools or Cubase aren't going to settle for Cakewalk because their choice of tools is driven by need, not simple preference. Right now, Cakewalk isn't really usable in a Film Post workflow, for example. It being on macOS won't change that, and it being ported to macOS can affect the timetable for the necessary features being introduced for its [potential] Windows users (i.e. it's entire user base, and then some, thus far). Reaper was written from the ground up to be cross platform. It was not written decades ago, and then revamped to be even more tightly integrated with one specific operating platform. That is a completely different situation. It also ships with almost nothing, so it having a tiny installer is not at all surprising 😛 If you use C/C++, Delphi, etc. and aren't relying on relatively heavy Libraries/Frameworks (Qt, etc.), then you're going to have tight code with a small installer when you ship barely anything beyond the actual program files 😉

Is it possible to share that help file for those of us who want offline help, which doesn't require internet when we're out and about using a disconnected laptop?

Not if they allowed you to hover over the tab to open it, similar to dragging items over yhe file explorer icon in the windows task bar allowing you to choose which window you want to drop the item into...

Why pay $200 for that when you can just buy Studio One or Samplitude for "not much more" and have a better, more robust user experience - especially if you use a DAW for audio post interchange with an NLE?

I think most people here are clueless regarding how Windows-centric this product's code base is. If you're on macOS, use GarageBand or Logic. They're cheap. It would take nearly a rewrite to get Cakewalk on macOS. All of the Sonitus stuff would have to be rewritten. A lot of the plugin framework, media subsystems, UI code, etc. would have to be rewtitten... unless they ported it with a conpatibility layer. MacOS had a platform locked option, I don't see why Cakewalk being a Windows-only option is a bad thing. Its nice to have a Windows option that is aggressive about using what the platform has to offer, instead of lowest common denominator solutions. Products like Cakewalk and Vegas are good free to cheap options for upstart creatives who like the Windows platform and ecosystem. Vegas can use Sonitus Effects, and Cakewall can use Vrgas audio effects. This would never happen with cross platform products, as they would almost assuredly avoid DirectX. I don't thing porting is worth it. It would be a massive undertaking, and Logic Pro X I'd really cheap on macOS - with GarageBand being free. They are better off investing in features for the Windows version, and making it even better.