AxlBrutality

One thing I want to mention just in general is that there is often an unwillingness on the part of plugin manufacturers to dig into problems that involve Cakewalk, when we contact them directly. I really much prefer to go directly to you/CbB and have you deal with them these days. I've had Slate (and the various manufacturers they partner with), MeldaProductions, and JST all very flatly point the finger back at Cakewalk and refuse to dig further into issues, even without having been given much information. It is what it is. I'm not sure what y'all's standing with some of these manufacturers/publishers is, but it doesn't always seem to be good. I don't like getting stuck in the middle of a three-way finger-pointing session (It's particularly frustrating when you guys can't figure something out or believe it's an issue on the plugin companies' end, but they all vehemently state that it's an issue on CbB's end), and ending up having to do all the diagnostics on my own and just throw it at everyone and hope someone can solve it. Particularly when it's not my job and I'm not being paid for my troubles. As mentioned, there are some manufacturers that don't seem to hold Cakewalk (or the previous Sonar iterations) in high regard. In fact, JST (a pretty big player in the scene now, especially among rock/metal engineers and musicians) has flat out recently told me to switch DAWs (not just for troubleshooting purposes, but permanently) and that they don't recommend Cakewalk. (So at that point, I end up just getting frustrated/mad at everybody, which admittedly doesn't help.) Lastly, there are a lot of instances where it's not easy to identify whether it's the plugin or the host, so often I push concerns to you guys by default (for the above reasons and more). I realize coming to you guys with everything may be cumbersome, but it really is better and easier that way on our end...and I'm quite sure that less experienced/knowledgeable users don't know any better or have any idea what they're doing. As CbB continues to be free and expand into new userbases, you're going to deal with that much more often.

I don't mean to nitpick, but these two statements seem contradictory. Unless you do specifically mean that what drive it's on doesn't matter, but what folder it's in does (for specific reasons)? Also, I actually wasn't aware of the second part of your statement. Are you suggesting it's better for VSTs to go in a top-level or desktop folder or something? I have an awful lot of migrating to do if that's the case...something I'm not particularly looking forward to. Lol.

Your experience may not mirror that of other users, including myself...and thus isn't any more or less valid than another's. That's the problem with anecdotal evidence. Also, just because something is free does not mean that one should not expect a functional product, e.g., the one that was advertised or represented to them. Especially a product which can obliterate hours of work with a single hang or crash (even with autosave enabled). Lastly, I'd like to point out that there are many of us who would gladly go back to paying for the product if it would increase the resources available to Noel and the team to get things done in more volume, with more speed, and with fewer problems. ____________________________________________________________________ @Starship Krupa -I will say that Cakewalk is more stable than it/SPLAT used to be, but it's still, in my experience (and others I know and work with IRL), far more instable than most other major DAWs. It's still a source of frustration for many of us, and that doesn't help with the program's reputation-rebuilding. Cakewalk/Sonar has a decade+ history of instability, memory leaks and corruption, etc., so when those issues still hang around for plenty of users...well, it is what it is. And I totally understand that. But when users like myself have had some of the same issues for months or even years on multiple machines and configurations, it gets a little frustrating to hear "well it works fine here" and "we need you to do allk the legwork and troubleshooting". I also know that if a user is particularly frustrated and venting, some of the people that pull out the "well it works fine here" are not necessarily using that as a troubleshooting mechanism. They're firing back at said user, and that's not fair. Admittedly, I was much more active on the old forums years ago, and am much more of a lurker these days. However, yes, if a problem gets big enough, I do (and have) run it by here. Having said that, I much prefer to go straight to tech support. Over the last 16+ years, I've been jaded a bit by the community (as we've kinda discussed)...not just by the attitudes of some of the regulars, but I've also found that the amount of speculation, guesswork, and generally unhelpful and elementary advice far outweighs actual solutions. I'll admit, however, that visibility to the general public is important for other reasons, and not being more active here may be a bit selfish. Another factor, though, is that usually when stuff goes wrong for me, it's big. You, and everyone else, don't want me posting here when I've just lost 3 hours of work on a major project or something. Lol. There's a very thin line that separates people like me from people like the OP, which was kindof the point of my original comment and something I was trying to address. Yea, it is. A few of them (includingMAutoPitch) actually have the exact same problem, and I've been trying to find or receive a solution for nearly a year. (And yes, this is one of the ones I have posted about.) Additionally, communications with customer/tech support have been disjointed and frustrating at times. So yea, a bit frustrated. It seems that recently we have begun to make headway on a possible cause, but no resolution as of yet. Others are recently purchased plugins from fairly established and reputable companies that work fine in other DAWs, but have massive problems in Cakewalk. Now, keep in mind, I'm not just frustrated with Bandlab/Cakewalk...there are some plugin manufacturers (*cough* JST *cough*) that seem to look down on Sonar/Cakewalk and always have, and don't really prioritize us. Apparently Cakewalk isn't a "real" DAW to them or something. JST actually told me this morning " we recommend ProTools, Studio One, Cubase, Reaper, Ableton, and Logic". I've never had a plugin manufacturer until today straight up tell me I need to permanently switch DAWs because one of their plugins has an issue in cakewalk. So yea....Cakewalk isn't the only target of my frustration, lol. Having said that, other plugin companies have much more eloquently suggested that problems are on Cakewalk's end, and it does say something when 5 different manufacturers are pointing at Cakewalk, but you get Noel coming in here saying "nuh uh" or "doubtful" for the 600th time just because he can't reproduce it on his end after an hour and seems to want everyone else...including the end user...to do all the leg work for him. Yea, I recall seeing that, and declined to jump in because I saw no point in stirring the pot even more...considering I was basically witnessing the same old nonsense from many users, as we've discussed. Lol. I wanted no part of that. Addressing the whole last part of your comment, here's my problem: It shouldn't take a bona fide Youtube celebrity of some level to get a problem fixed, and we as users shouldn't have to state our credentials to get priority. I use Cakewalk on a daily basis, both for personal and professional purposes. I'm an actual engineer that dropped thousands on an audio education. I've been with this program in its various iterations for nearly two decades. And as mentioned, I was somewhat active on the old forums many years ago. And I have a LOT of time and money invested in this DAW, and I have several friends who until recently were also longtime loyalists. But I don't usually lead off with any of that in emails to tech support or in posts here, nor do I rant about it in my sigs. Because conversely to your point, I don't want to be "that guy"....the self-important ***** that wants to swing his weight around to get prioritized. But it seems that....or having a Youtube channel...is what gets attention around here these days. So idk, lol. With regard to the "freeware" bit...I'll reiterate what I said to a previous commentator: "just because something is free does not mean that one should not expect a functional product, e.g., the one that was advertised or represented to them. Especially a product which can obliterate hours of work with a single hang or crash (even with autosave enabled). Lastly, I'd like to point out that there are many of us who would gladly go back to paying for the product if it would increase the resources available to Noel and the team to get things done in more volume, with more speed, and with fewer problems." I'll never be as active as some of you, and I try not to post if I don't actually have something to say or contribute....I'm one of those "don't pipe up if you don't really have a solution or a really big problem". Haha. But if I do choose to stay with Cakewalk, I suppose I will make more of an attempt to speak up here. Hey now, that mic got me through some tough times early on. Lmao. Everybody's gotta start somewhere. Does threatening to take my Rode NT2A home carry a bit more weight? Or do I have to own a Neumann for that to work? Thanks for the civil discussion, btw.

Rather than make a rant thread of my own (which I was considering before stumbling across this thread), I figured I'd hop in here and piggyback with some thoughts. Firstly, language barriers are easy to spot, but also easily misinterpreted and mistakenly attacked if one is in a "mood" and the poster in question is also in a "mood". That doesn't make that user a "troll" or their thoughts and feelings any less valid. Have some patience. Some of you have exercised great patience and understanding ( @Robert Bone being one such character for the most part). Others, not so much. Having said that, once in a while there are going to be users that come in here and vent that are genuinely at their wits' end. I have been at that point and somehow held back. At one point a few months ago, I actually came here and had a several-paragraph-long rant all typed out and ready to go, and for some reason thought better of it at the last minute. Some users go through with it and hit that "post" button though. And you know what? I think some members of this community, as well as the developers, could be more understanding at times. As for me, and why I'm here posting this...I sympathize with the OP a bit, and am ready to hit the post button in my own right. I was at my wits' end a few months ago and was nearly ready to walk away from Cakewalk. I finished the project I was on (limping through it) and took a couple of months off from making music. I've recently come back to the same problems and frustrations, plus a few more.....and you know what? My frustrations are at a boiling point again. I can probably vent a little more eloquently than OP, but there are a few things that occur to me within this community: A) Users and developers both here tend to push back instinctively...and hard... against any criticism of themselves or the product B) Cakewalk representatives and developers, in my personal experience, are far too quick to say "Okay, bye" when someone says they're abandoning Cakewalk...rather than digging deeper into the problems and actually trying to fix them. C) Nobody wants to actually admit that Cakewalk has a LOT of problems compared to other DAWs, and always has. There are many, many things Cakewalk does well, don't get me wrong...there's a reason I've stuck with it over the years even while tearing my hair out...but it's not the best functioning DAW overall. I've known many Cakewalk loyalists of several years that were finally forced to move on. Personally, I have two reasons for not having done so yet...firstly, I'm not made of money, and can't afford hundreds of dollars for another full-service DAW right now. Secondly, having been with Cakewalk/Sonar for 16 years and counting, I've been willing to give it 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th chances because I hate change and I'm comfortable with the nuances of Cakewalk....and I don't want to invest a shitton of cash into another product that ends up having that one little stupid thing or another that I need be different or missing. But as I said, I sympathize with the OP. I get it (the frustration). I've lost countless hours of work thanks to stability issues, memory leaks, general crashes, and more (which Cakewalk is famous for, outside of y'all's little bubble here). So yea, I get it. I've also not been able to use probably about half of my favorite plugins in Cakewalk for months now. Slate VTM, Eliosis DeEsser, MeldaProductions MAutoPitch, and now most recently, Toneforge Jason Richardson to name a few. VTM, Eliosis, and Toneforge are particularly work-stoppage level problems. I also couldn't use LP MB or LP EQ for many months, until another user on here finally gave me the solution they had figured out (that the devs never addressed over the years). That solution required having me go in and edit language in the coding that, as an end-user, shouldn't have been my responsibility (or place) in the first place. So yea, I get it. I've spent weeks going back and forth between Cakewalk and various plugin manufacturers, caught in the middle of the "everybody point the finger at everyone else" game. Though, it's pretty interesting when established companies like Slate, JST, and Meldaproductions all vehemently state Cakewalk is the issue, and their plugins do indeed work fine in other DAWs I test them in. So yea, I get it. I've spent hours trying to work with Cakewalk tracking down major bugs, only to have them never resolved...or resolved maybe a year later. So yea, I get it. I've repeatedly been the one to come across bugs that seemingly no one else has experienced or reported, ended up getting brushed off as a corner case that is never really given many resources, and had to just "live with it"....no matter how much functionality is affected. So yea, I get it. I've seen the "tolerant" at best, dismissive and/or deflective tone at worst...that @Noel Borthwick and others at Cakewalk can take at times. So yea, I get it. And last but not least, I've also been on the receiving end of the apathetic "okay, bye" from users, customer service reps, and developers when I mentioned looking at leaving for another DAW. So yea, I get it. So before people just jump down the throat of people like OP, just remember...there are always a LOT more like him out there (and it might be wise to hear them out when they do speak up...even if they're in a frustrated/angry state and need to vent). Some of us just usually keep our mouth shut and try to tough it out for longer. Some of us have a bit of an understanding of how some things work, and we do try give Cakewalk and the devs a little bit more leeway. And contrary to popular belief, when we threaten to leave Cakewalk...some of us don't actually want to. But we're being backed into a corner where it seems we don't have a choice, and all too often it seems Cakewalk either just doesn't care, or doesn't have the ability or resources to keep up (or both). Bandlab may have given Cakewalk a new face, but it's the same community, the same program, the same everything. For better...and, more to the point...for worse. @chuckebaby As mentioned earlier in my post...all due respect, I disagree and feel that @Some Guy is pretty spot on in his assessment of the community at times. Painting a royally warm and fuzzy picture of it doesn't make it so. I may not post much, but I've lurked these and the old forums for many years...it's amazing how defensive regulars can get. It has gotten much better since the migration, but the underlying tension, unhelpfulness, and unnecessary hostility is definitely still there at times...and this thread is a perfect example of it.

@Robert Bone Well, apparently I celebrated too soon. It's back to doing the same thing about 80% of the time. Lol.

@Robert Bone Hey, just an update...it has apparently been fixed. JST sent me an updated version of the plugin, and the problem seems to be gone. Strange to me that they don't give you the latest updated version when they sell it to you, but oh well. Lol.

So, I just bought the JST Toneforge Jason Richardson amp sim. Was super excited about it; started playing around with it and was thrilled. Until I started encountering issues... Tried copying an instance of Toneforge to another track...parameters were obliterated (didn't copy over), and audio sounds really weird...thin and brittle and almost 8-bit-ish....even after fixing the parameters that were suddenly different. Okay, whatever....just insert a whole new instance of Toneforge and tweak to taste. Sucks that I have to do that for every track, but whatever, right? Except I then found that reopening the project does the same thing to all instances of Toneforge and I have to start all over. Every time. So basically I just blew $50 on a plugin I can't really use. Anybody had similar experiences with any plugins? I know that there were some random "plugin state recall" issues like this, particularly with VST3s, that were finally supposedly fixed recently. But here we are. Also, it does this with both the VST2 and VST3 versions of Toneforge. (Additional info: 64-bit W10; and I've confirmed I installed the 64-bit versions of the plugins.) Also important to note that I do have other JST plugins (Gain Reduction deluxe and JST Clip) and have not had the same issues. I also have other, older amp sims (Peavey Revalver) that do not have this issue, and I haven't noticed it with any other plugins of mine at all. (Having said that, I haven't used all of my plugins since the last update, so there's that.) I've sent support tickets to both JST and Cakwalk, but if anyone has any thoughts, they'd be appreciated. TL;DR: Cakewalk doesn't recall Toneforge parameters/state when a) reopening project or b) when copying plugin to another track, and causes odd plugin behavior with regard to the audio (audio sounds really weird...thin and brittle and almost 8-bit-ish) even after settings are readjusted.

Yea, as mentioned in the OP, I had already generated crash reports and filed with support. Seeing as how it happens regardless of which one I run, I'm presuming both? Lol. Unless a fault in one would affect the other as well? Idk. Edit: Cakewalk says they're investigating and will get back to me. Thanks for the input everyone, and for the solution for the LP EQ (which I use quite often)! I'll also update support with what we've learned here in case Noel doesn't catch it.

This solved both the GUI loading issue, and Cakewalk altogether freezing when closing the plugin! I will say the other two offending plugins fully load their GUIs just fine, but they still freeze Cakewalk when closing said GUIs. I would like to try maybe rolling back my video drivers (in an attempt to troubleshoot/fix the other plugins); would the edit made to the LP files affect that fix at all? Will it affect things in the future (when drivers are updated)? In others words, do I need to go back in and re-edit the value to 1 when drivers are either rolled back or updated?

I am on a 64 bit system; I only use two 32-bit plugins. I believe of the offending plugins (Cakewalk's LP EQ) itself is a 32-bit plugin (someone might need to confirm that for me; it's in my 32 bit program folders but I thought it was updated at some point). I use one other plugin which appears to be 32-bit (Youlean Loudness Meter) but a) it functions fine, and b) the issues do persist with or without that plugin in a project, and c) two of the other offending plugins are 64-bit. The Eliosis Deesser and Slate VTM are both the VST2 versions. Idk about LP EQ since the GUI is blank (and there's only one option for it in my FX Bin menu), but I would assume it defaults to VST2.

@Noel Borthwick It does it on any project at any point in their development, including new/blank projects. If you really need me to I can upload one, but it's important to note that it does it before I've even touched settings on the compressor, lol. I usually insert the sidechain and then tweak the comp. Maybe that helps (knowing that the setting are at their default)? I should also note that once the first sidechain is implemented successfully (again, after about a half a dozen tries), there are zero problems thereafter with it or with additional sidechains. It's really bizarre, lol. The only common theme is that both machines it's done it on were MSI gaming machines, but that's where the similarities end. Different processors, SSDs, RAM, everything.

@msmcleod So my integrated Intel graphics was actually already the default. I tried running Cakewalk with my NVIDIA GPU just out of curiosity; same result. Eliosis Deesser and Slate Virtual Tape Machine both freeze Cake when you close them; LP EQ loads a blank GUI and causes the same hang when it's closed. Also, I have still not found any other plugins that cause the issue so far. Update: I also figured out that it's not just the instance of the plugin that was already in the project. Inserting a new LP EQ, VTM, or Deesser does the same thing.

Lol yea; I ninja edited my post but apparently not fast enough. Haha.

Yea, all the usual suspects have been checked. I keep all that stuff disabled when working anyway, as a rule of thumb. In reference to your previous comment, I did just recently update my NVIDIA driver, so I'll investigate that later today.

Let me preface this by saying I've already sent in a support ticket with dump files and all that; was just curious if anyone had come across something like this or had any ideas while they investigate. So I started working on stuff for the first time in a couple of months. Everything seemed fine until I opened up an instance of LP EQ in a project and the GUI was blank...just white. Wouldn't load, no matter how long I waited. So whatever; I closed it. Cakewalk instantly froze and stayed that way (no crash, just a perpetual hang). Killed and reopened the project. Repeated the issues with LP EQ a few times; gave up. Continued opening various other plugins with no issue... Until I opened Slate's Virtual Tape Machines (GUI loaded just fine)....closed it, and Cake froze again. I've since also reproduced both the GUI and freezing issues with the Slate Eliosis Deesser. Haven't gone through every single plugin yet, but there's no pattern. Some Sonar/Cake plugins do it, some don't. Some Slate plugins do it; others don't. The two JST plugs I have seem to be okay. The Blue cat plugs I have are fine. VST instruments don't have the same issue. Sometime the GUI issue occurs, sometimes it doesn't...I believe they may be separate problems. idk. Why is Cakewalk suddenly having a freakout when I close certain random plugins, and not loading the GUI (even though it does launch...it's just blank) in others? i7-8750, 8GB RAM (on the low end yes, but it happens on projects with fairly low utilization as well as projects that are pushing it), NVIDIA GTX 1080i, Windows 10. Everything (Windows, NVIDIA, Gobbler, Slate, Cakewalk, etc.) is fully updated and cleaned. I'm getting massively frustrated, as I've lost hours of work (even with auto save on plus manual saves, any work done in the session is lost for some reason when I have to kill the program) and major projects have now ground to a halt.

@Noel Borthwick Apologies for the super late response and dragging up an old thread; I didn't have email notifications turned on and haven't worked on music at all in the last two months or so. Sidechaining to the Sonitus compressor (which is the primary culprit) on a track (in my case, a simple audio [kick] track, sidechained to the compressor on a bass track) and hitting play instantly crashes Cakewalk (completely, to desktop....along with no warning, no error message, nothing). Happens probably 6 or 7 times before it will hold, so to speak. It's also occurred on two different computers, an MSI desktop with an i5 and an MSI laptop with an i7. Both running Windows 10, fully updated. Both with only 8GB RAM, but the offending projects were/are nowhere near full utilization. And for some reason no minidump files are being created. And yes, the issue is still occurring. (Among many others as of this week, but I've sent a support ticket in for those and that's a frustrating story for another thread.)

I'm having an increasingly common problem where inserting a send on a track for sidechaining immediately crashes Cakewalk upon subsequent playback...often half a dozen times in a row before it will work. There's often no rhyme or reason, it happens with various sidechainable plugins, and happens even with little to no CPU load in both small and large projects. Further research has discovered that this has been a problem for several people for at least two years; no one has found a sure fire solution and no investigation or fix has ever been mentioned. Tl:dr: Inserting sidechains crashes Cakewalk, and it's been a known issue for some for years. Anyone else have this issue or a solution?

I actually seem to have figured out the problem, after a lot of headaches, trial and error, and a lot of searching. I have stumbled across a weird bug with Slate's Verbsuite Classics, where that plugin will randomly cause massive feedback loops and wreak havoc with everything. I've come across one other instance of this: http://forum.cakewalk.com/Weird-problem-with-Slate-Verb-Suite-Classics-m3586469.aspx In my case, it seems to be the VSC on my snare tracks. There's no issue on my strings or piano tracks, which I also use VSC on. As with the other poster, there seems to be no rhyme or reason for the feedback loops. As the other person did, I replaced VSC with another reverb plugin on those tracks, and the problem is no more. Sucks, because I really like the VSC 'verbs. CJ, out of curiosity, I double-checked, and I'm actually at 1024 already because I'm no longer recording, just mixing. I appreciate the response in any case.

Bear with me here; this is an interesting one. So this morning I'm mixing this project that I've been working on for weeks. No issues, made no major changes (just parameters on plugins, volume, etc. No new plugins, no deletion of old plugins, no new recording, no alteration of existing clips). It's playing just fine. I then go to export the project, as I've done a hundred times before. The export is screwed...it's ten seconds of mangled feedback and noise, and then silence for the rest of the project (roughly 15 minutes or so). I try exporting again, same issue. I then try simply playing my project...and suddenly, I have no audio whatsoever. The meters are moving, but there is no sound. I closed and reopen Cakewalk;, no dice. I restart my computer; no dice. I check that my interface is working with other programs; it is. So then I figure it's gotta be a plugin issue. Sure enough, I bypass all FX bins on the tracks themselves, and bypass my master bus chain. Suddenly, I have audio (albeit unprocessed of course). Leaving the FX bins on the tracks bypassed, I enable my master bus FX bin and have zero audio again. Cool; so now we know it's a plugin that's on my master bus (makes it easier to isolate, because I only have a handful of plugins on my master). Find that, and disable it there and anywhere in the tracks I also have it, and we'll go from there, right? So I disable the plugins one-by-one until suddenly, my audio comes back. Seems JST Clip is the culprit. Kind of annoying, but something I can do without if need be. Except that I disable it again to test, and my audio is still playing and now being processed by that plugin, as if nothing's wrong. So I start reenabling plugins in reverse...one, two, three, everything's good until the random 4th one (happens to be LP EQ the first time). But if I start at the beginning of the process, it'll pick a different plugin to have a problem with each time. You can see where this is going. I cannot isolate a specific problem plugin. Frustrated, I uninstalled my entire FX chain and reinstalled. Viola, it works! Go to export....and the entire situation repeats. Also, now every time I reopen the project, there's insane feedback for about 10 seconds, and then it's gone (and then of course I have no audio). Out of curiosity, I've gone through other elimination processes...there's no commonalities. It's not a "Slate" thing, it's not a "JST" thing, it's not a "Voxengo", it's not a "Sonitus" thing, etc... and it doesn't appear to be any of my synths (Addictive Drums 2, TruePianos and SI Strings). Cakewalk is fully updated, as is W10 and my interface drivers. And again, this problem quite suddenly appeared out of the blue today. Anyone have any ideas? I am literally at a standstill right now and quite frustrated. I guess just for additional info, my Master Bus FX Chain is currently: LP EQ>Slate Virtual Mix Rack (FG Bomber and CS Lift)>Slate Virtual Tape Machines>Slate Virtual Buss Compressor FG-Grey [x2]>JST Clip>Boost11>Voxengo Span. But again, none of these appear to consistently be "THE" problem, as it seems to vary. Also, obviously I have other plugins on various tracks...but there's definitely a problem with something on my master chain specifically, so I'm trying to start there. Unless there's a bigger, overall problem with Cakewalk itself.