John Sandlin

Excellent !

One think I think is missing from the Cakewalk workflow is the ability to move more than one track at a time to reorder them. We can move one track at a time now, up and down in the track list. If you select several tracks, when you try to move the group, only the one you got the up/down arrow for actually moves. All the rest stay put. We need a modifier, like CTRL or ALT to move all the selected tracks together. They would maintain their relative order of the selected tracks, but you could then slide the set as needed, up or down.

So I did find a partial solution - Control-Shift while drawing the automation will hold the amplitude constant. Of course you have to draw to that amplitude first before pressing Control-Shift - so there is a short bit that is going from 0 to the amplitude you want (like the beginning of my picture in the previous post), but it will hold constant from then on. Another reason to have blank space at the beginning of a track so there is room for that.

I've been learning to create automations for adjusting a VST instrument parameter. I open the automation lane for the instrument and can draw in a nice curve (saw, triangle, sine, etc.) and have the automation nodes map to snap to points. I want to add other constraints to my curve such as the amplitude of the effect, or a range of the amplitude. As an example, modifying the pitch (for vibrato) or volume (for tremolo), I can use a sine curve snapping to a nice 1/8th or 1/16th note and get a really cool sounding effect (this would be for a VST that doesn't offer these effects - this is a rather hypothetical example I chose to teach myself how to do these automations). But my curve has a rather freehand looking amplitude - I can't seem to draw a straight line. So my question is, does Cakewalk have a way to constrain my curve to a specific peak values (positive and negative). I'm suspecting not but hoping for a pleasant surprise. I've searched the Cakewalk Reference Guide and tried to search the discussions here (and got 140+ pages of results). I do actually like the results I'm getting with the freehand wanderings, but I can envision a time when I want a clean or exact result. I'd consider an LFO, but I don't think that ties directly to the tempo map the way locking the automation nodes to the snap grid.

Mke, the BandLab representative at Winter NAMM 2019, stated emphatically during more than one interview that the Core product Cakewalk by BandLab will ALWAYS be free. Plans can change, but that is the corporate line as of now.

My response was always "Yes. That's the first thing I did. Then I did it twice more to be sure. Then I unplugged all the cables and plugged them back in again. Five times. Then I did a Google Search for it. And read through fifty supposed solutions. Now I'm calling you.

That one is kind of critical. Yeah. Use Chrome for sure.

What I've read is that using Chrome instead of other browsers for the BandLab Cloud DAW is that they are using features of Chrome to do things that the other browsers do not have.

It's the primary reason I stopped using my gaming computer as my DAW workstation ages ago. Turning on the entire DAW experience to hear in game sound was a bit overkill and clunky, actually.

Would a tempo map like this do what you want (use Alt-Shift-5):

Would this be similar to what you're looking for: http://forum.cakewalk.com/tm.aspx?m=1965558

Big screens and dual screens are fine and dandy. But when they get so big that I forget why I was looking at that side of the screen (or other monitor), they've gone too far. What were we talking about... ?

Some older versions of SONAR did have an initial authorization setup. But if you kept the email you got with the code and the serial number, you'll be good. Those with hard copy Floppy or CD-ROM will probably have that pair of numbers in the packaging. If you have a version that needs the authorization number and wrote down that number (if it didn't come with one), you can install it. If you don't have the original serial number or authorization number for those that need one, you will have troubles. Look in the www.cakewalk.com pages for your account information. Some of the newer packages kept that information for you. I made it a habit to keep all my registration emails for various software packages "just in case" I needed them again.

Yeah, and that would be the older SONAR (at least the X3 and Platinum) experience too. Here is X3 after closing the start screen:

I do miss having PCI slots. My gaming pc has a nice gaming PCIe audio card - but that isn't the same as a proper audio interface for music work. My DAW workstation doesn't even have PCIe slots (it is an Intel NUC). So a good USB Audio Interface is where I'm at now. The good news is this looks like a nearly future proof setup. The bad news is the bucket of PCI and soon PCIe cards that I have that have nowhere to live!