Noel Borthwick

11 hours ago, Matthew Carr said:

Does anyone else find that the Stop button on the transport (or by pressing spacebar) is now really quite laggy?

Playback starts instantly, but after pressing stop icon (or spacebar)

a) Playback stops instantly
b) The green play icon remains green, the stop icon remains grey
c) There is a delay of around 50ms. During this time it's possible to click on the start button again, but playback doesn't start until the delay reaches an end.
d) After the delay finishes, it's possible to press play again and playback starts immediately.

This means if I'm using spacebar to review a hit or short section of playback pressing spacebar works the first time with immediate playback. But after pressing spacebar to stop playback, I can't immediately press the spacebar to listen again - the delay kicks in.

No-one else is reporting this, so maybe it's specific to me - if anyone sees the same, pls chime in and will raise as bug.

Behaviour is the same for the pause button.

Using latest version of Sonar (build 84) with an XR18 interface in ASIO mode with a buffer of 128 samples (changing buffer size has no effect on this transport delay)

EDIT 1: Tested this on same project / hardware in CbB , and there is no delay when stopping playback.

EDIT 2: Tested this on same project / hardware in Sonar (31.06.0.048) , and there is a delay

Ensure that fade on stop is set to zero.

If you don't want it linked to Google you can do that via the BandLab settings. Support should be able to guide you on that. We have nothing to do with that setting.

1 hour ago, Stewart Kingsley said:

There is a miniDump file in Roaming\Cakewalk\Sonar\MiniDumps but its too big to attach (6.8Mb).

This is all described in the FAQ here that I mentioned earlier.

Sending the dump file to Cakewalk for analysis
Once you have the dump file you can put it on a share like dropbox, google drive etc. Next, log a problem report case with Cakewalk and include the link to the dump file. If a Cakewalk staff member has requested info you may also PM the dump file link to them directly this way.  Note: Dump files may include personally identifiable data so please do not post links to them publicly in the forums or elsewhere to protect your privacy.

@Stewart Kingsley Send me a PM and we can try and assist you next week. 

On 7/10/2025 at 3:51 PM, rayray said:

yes a guy with a brain.  sorry other guy but kinda critical mass for me right now,  i'm gonna wait until the last week in july to jump.,  that way i have everything done for ECO/BMI/MLC as far as mp3 exports. they will be close enough.  

i love CW and now gonna love SONAR most likely.  i need to take a look at the interface somehow before i actually load it up to see what i still recognize.

the most concern when jumping platforms is will all settings follow and such.

i hope the nags to buy premium are not too intrusive. i will buy it eventually - i don't need to be nagged to death to do it.

i am readin the forums to see what issues are being found.  they are doing builds so i may as well just wait.

 

Please read the FAQ on the Sonar website. These questions have been also asked and answered in scores of threads. Sonar is 100% compatible with Cbb projects themselves and will load them perfectly, often much faster than Cbb.

If you choose to use the free tier, only core application features are available for use. This is described in the FAQ.
Any other rare compatibility problems if found are addressed rapidly. If you intend to use Sonar its in your best interest to install it and check your projects ASAP. The app installs alongside CbB seamlessly.

@Stewart Kingsley did you check the crash dump folder and check timestamps? Even if there was no visible crash dialog it often saves the file there.

Sorry for the sign in troubles with CPC folks. I've identified the problem with the sign in for CPC.

It's caused because we cache state related to the sign in for the current product. However, if you change the product and exit the next time it fails to auto sign in.
We'll be releasing an update for CPC momentarily. Please update it asap and check if your sign in problem is resolved. 
 

Here is a link to the update if you want to try it before its posted.

Note: that the first time you run the update, it may force you to sign in but on subsequent launches it should now work correctly.

Please let me know if this solves your sign in problems asap.

Its all in the main post release notes. Its a ton of changes - read the entire thread.

15 hours ago, Stewart Kingsley said:

minidumps of what? The program crashes silently and does not provide any indication of what is happening.

Read the sticky FAQ on how to capture crash dumps. Have you looked in the crash dump folder? Sometimes even if the app disappears the dump file has indeed been saved.
In cases where the application has no chance to capture the crash state, you can run Microsoft’s WinDbg tool and run Sonar from within the tool to intercept the crash. Its a more technical process however.

13 hours ago, gmp said:

It works perfectly. I long had wished CbB had this feature. 

 

Thanks

There are numerous other workflow improvements like this in Sonar compared to CbB, particular for those using lots of instruments in a project. For example you can choose to archive related tracks when disconnecting synths, which saves some more cpu since the track data wont get processed. See the same menu for that option.

Additionally clicking on an instrument track will now highlight the active synth in the rack.

Updated docked Synth Rack and new bypass functionality

There are several improvements to the synth rack to allow managing large synth projects more efficiently. This allows you to quickly bypass and free memory and CPU resources allocated to synths, or create templates with bypassed synths and bring them online on demand.

The docked version of the Synth Rack now shows a synth Bypass button. By default, the Bypass button unloads the synth when the instrument is bypassed, and also archives all related tracks to save CPU. The synth will be reloaded again and tracks unarchived when the synth is unbypassed.

The preset picker has been removed from the docked Synth Rack to save space (the preset picker is shown when undocked or when docked in the MultiDock). This control is largely obsolete because most instruments handle preset management inside the synth UI.

The Synth Rack menu and the synth strip context menus have been redesigned to show the relevant functions:

Replace Synth is now available via the synth context menu.

Bypass All Synths and Unbypass All Synths can be used to quickly bypass all instruments in the Synth Rack. Note that bypass/unbypass can take a while on projects with large numbers of synths if they are big. The progress is shown in the Control Bar Transport module. You may cancel a long bypass/unbypass operation by pressing the ESC key.

Unload and Archive preferences can be set in the synth rack menu.

Performance optimizations for projects with many synths and effects

Sonar has been greatly optimized to handle high virtual instrument counts, managing the load more efficiently and using minimal CPU resources. In a real-world orchestral template with 250 Kontakt instances, the base template will now run efficiently at 128 samples with very few late buffers. In prior versions such a project would only run at 1024 samples or higher.

General plugin performance in FX racks has been improved, allowing you to run workloads with high plugin counts more efficiently.

Sidechaining for VST instruments in the Synth Rack

Sonar has supported side-chaining for effects plugins, satisfying the traditional and primary use case for sidechaining. However, a growing number of VST instruments now support sidechaining, therefore support has been extended to support such instruments, in addition to effects.
 

To specify the sidechain input for a VST instrument:

Open the VST instrument's property page.

Click the VST2/VST3 drop-down menu  in the VST plug-in toolbar, point to Sidechain Sources, then select the desired input source:

Choosing a source creates a send from the chosen track/bus source to the instrument's sidechain input

Choosing a checked menu item removes that send to the instrument sidechain

Support for instruments with a single aux input

Sonar can now handle synths with a single aux input and expose it as a sidechain.

Plugin Browser drag and drop enhancements

You can insert or replace synth, and convert regular audio and MIDI tracks to instrument tracks with the following drag and drop gestures:

To insert a synth:

In the Plugins Browser, select the Instruments tab , then drag a synth to a blank area in the Track pane or Clips pane. 

To convert an audio or MIDI track to a simple instrument track:

In the Plugins Browser, select the Instruments tab , then drag a synth to an audio or MIDI track to convert the track to a simple instrument track.

Note: Audio tracks will only be converted if empty.

To replace a synth:

To replace the synth in a simple instrument track with a different synth, drag a synth from the Plugin Browser to the existing instrument track.

In the synth rack menu there is an option to disconnect all synths at once.

Looks like you have an old version of windows 10. Min requirements for that API are build 1709 of win 10

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/wow64apiset/nf-wow64apiset-iswow64process2

The free version is the same application as the paid version so will receive all fixes that premium tier gets. This is one of the major reasons why we are unifying it to a single application. 

However any new major non core features or plugins will be exclusive to premium.  

The only thing useful to devs are minidumps not wer files.

There is nothing “fishy” about having a promo screen in free software. Its extremely common for all companies which offer a free version to have some sort of adware in it. In this case the popup is for our own products. I think if anything Cakewalk is extremely lenient about what is being offered in the free version compared to the competition.

Performance differences can be very system or project specific. If you are seeing a demonstrable difference, try and pare down your project and find out which elements cause the difference. Then you can send a project to analyze and I can look into it more closely.

7 hours ago, Sergei Pilin said:

Okay, then it appears that I have two absolutely different but somehow anomalous computers  who always show in Task Manager that Sonar uses more CPU for each of my projects using the same settings in both Sonar and CbB. Quite well may be I'm an absolute minority here but I don't really believe I'm the one and only with such behavior. 

Here are screenshots of  playback in the both programs at the same time stamp, 9% vs 12% CPU, it's about the same for any other of my projects.

P.S. I just noticed on the OP's screenshots that during playback CbB runs at  3.91 Ghz and Sonar plays back at 2.40 Ghz. Might mean something, that's a substantial difference

Product center has a different version number from Sonar so thats normal.

On 7/10/2025 at 12:56 AM, Sergei Pilin said:

It's just Sonar uses more CPU than Cakewalk for the same project. If a complex project in Cakewalk is on the verge of crackling but still plays fine, it may not play well in Sonar and start to dropout there. No settings could change that.

Sonar uses less CPU than CbB

On 7/10/2025 at 5:21 PM, Jan said:

I think I might have found the likely culprit - when the ProChannel is unchecked the glitch does NOT seem to occur. This would explain why it wasn't happening on MIDI tracks and when in "MIDI" view of Instrument track (they have no ProChannel to display). So I guess this is potentially a temporary fix for me, although that's still a bug and regression from 2019.09...

@Jan Can you share a simple project that exhibits this issue?

This was a back end issue. Its fixed in today’s update of product center.

Awesome thanks for checking it.

@Steve Moddelmog Please try the latest version of Product Center that just dropped. There are fixes that address problems that were preventing it from correctly identifying Sonar premium users. Let me know if this addresses your issue.

Sonar has been updated to  31.07.0.084. Please read the release notes and update as soon as possible since this update contains fixes and optimizations for some important user reported issues.

Please note that Cakewalk Product Center has also been updated. CPC is a forced update due to breaking back-end changes that were preventing it from properly installing add-ons for Sonar Premium users. It also correctly tracks previously installed addons for some additional installers.

3 minutes ago, Steve Moddelmog said:

So I tried uninstalling Cakewalk Product Center completely (using Revo) and reinstalling.  Still no luck.  Yet when I open Sonar and click "About Sonar," I see "License type: Membership." But I can't install any Membership-only features such as TH-U. Getting a little sour on this whole thing.

Pm me your user ID and we can look at your account. Ideally you should contact support with account questions.

22 hours ago, Anders Svensson said:

Hey!

I'm experiencing the same problem as @Cyril Johnson. If I try to add the LP-64 Multiband effect, Sonar crashes.
Strangely enough, the effect loads in existing projects, but there is no sound output from the plugin until I flick the plugin power button off and on again. Then it works for existing projects, but I can't make it work for new projects.

I've used this effect extensively in previous projects and would love to see a solution to this.

Send a dump file and we can see what's crashing