Noel Borthwick

10 hours ago, Colin Nicholls said:

You should probably render a mix from each application and then compare by inverting the phase of one of them - that is the only objective way to identify differences.

I don't recall reading or hearing about any engine changes that would affect the sound apart from what I will mention below. If you're hearing a qualitative difference, it pretty much has to be a difference in plugins (plug-in versions?) or choice of sculpting in ProChannel, etc.

One difference you might notice is that, under stress, you may get pops, crackles, drop-outs. With an improved multithreading engine or otherwise optimized, you might no longer hear such artifacts. But I suspect that isn't what you're referring to.

Always compare applications with no other apps running, eg. don't have a web browser open in the background with the Cakewalk Forum open :-). Browsers can use unpredictable amounts of memory as they cache stuff (by design). So you want to make sure as much of the machines resources are available to CbB or Sonar as possible.

In addition to this some plugins attempt to throttle DSP based on workload so it's conceivable that it could change the quality when it's more efficient . This doesn't apply to rendered audio obviously.

9 hours ago, Helios.G said:

Hey Colin, Null test confirmed you were right.  Probably should've done that from the get go.   Thanks for he help.

A null test won't catch playback related issues caused by dropouts that i mentioned above. The dropouts will null too lol

Ah easy test to show the effect of dropouts is to lower your latency as low as it can go on a heavy project. You will start to hear distortion as it gets too much for the CPU.

11 hours ago, Helios.G said:

.  What surprised me the most was that on playback, the sonar version of the product had better fidelity.  Is that a placebo effect in my head?  Am I hearing things? Or does new sonar legitimately process audio "better" than CBB/Cakewalk?  Any thoughts?

While there are no direct fidelity changes other than plug-in up sampling (assuming that is enabled), if you were driving a very loaded project you may be getting missed buffers in cbb that no longer happen in sonar thanks to the major performance enhancements. Missed buffers or small dropouts can lead to distribution in the audio. Is possible that this is what you are hearing different. 

That's odd, when you see it again post a screenshot. What version of windows are you running?

It's now migrated if it was on in cbb, however the new default is off. Is not a good default to be on because it doesn't work well in every color theme.

On 6/30/2025 at 2:40 PM, Colin Nicholls said:

Preferences > Colors

In the latest build Show strip colors is now migrated from CBB settings if you choose to migrate. The new default is off that's all.

Correct that's likely what you saw. If you purchased a license you have access to mastering in the BandLab studio Web app. Just upload your mixes and you can use it there.

On 7/1/2025 at 8:13 AM, Tommy Byrnes said:

The first is with the External Insert. In previous versions I could toggle the On/Off to check the external effect in real time. In new Sonar there is a 1.5 to 2 second pause in the audio engine before playback resumes. This is unacceptable. In fact, the whole audio engine now seems, well, clunky. 

 

I think you might be reading too much into your initial observations. I'll look into your external inside issue. We made massive improvements and bug fixes to external inserts in sonar. Have you read the release notes for it? And the audio engine itself is demonstrably faster and more efficient at low latency large workloads. Give it a bit of time and of course feel free to report any issues. We acknowledge that users have  varying workflows and sometimes see problems others don't see. 

If you had it from an existing install it will work fine. The free tier doesn't include that plug-in and neither did CBB 

Hi Scott, 

If you are using elastic pro and have a BandLab sub it's available. If you use sonar with free tier then yes it will fallback to elastique efficient. While it's still very good for most content, it may sound different in certain scenarios. If so bounce the track or freeze it and it will obviously sound the same in that case. 

The free tier is not intended for users who are professionals using the app for commercial purposes. While you can do so you will have to live with those banners. Given that the feature set for a free product is extremely generous covered to the competition it's a small price to pay. CBB is not going to be made available and the services required to support it are not sustainable.

1 hour ago, Tim Elmore said:

Regarding the issue of plug-ins disappearing under the CV:

Open the Help module. The standard shortcut for this is "y". When the Help module is open, plug-ins that are displayed over CV will stay visible even after you click on CV.

If the Help module is fully closed (not just minimized), then clicking CV will put any plug-ins underneath CV (not visible). To keep them on top, the Help module must be open.

Since I don't want to have the Help module displayed all the time, I save screen space by docking it to the Browser, and then keep the Browser minimized when not needed. This keeps plug-ins visible even after clicking on CV. This costs a small bit of screen space where the Browser is shown as minimized, but it is the only workaround I have found.

Great observation! Fix for this is coming in next update.

1 hour ago, Matthew Carr said:

RESOLVED: Default Driver mode was set to WASAPI on new install, instead of ASIO

Hi by chance did you choose to not migrate settings when going from CbB to Sonar? If so that might explain why it went to WASAPI. However typically default to ASIO unless its not available. If your device was offline when you installed it may have gone to WASAPI.

This is a textbook example of an environmental problem that manifests as a problem/bug in Sonar. 
In this case the AV program is actively trying to do something to terminate the app, resulting in this mysterious issue.

I strongly recommend not using AV programs on systems with a DAW because they can wreck havoc on stability by delaying load times of the DAW as well as plugins or even cause random crashes. The only thing I use is the Windows built in virus protection. Personally, I've not had any issues with it.

I understand that something is causing instability in your configuration but you are making a lot of assumptions about the software itself being the root cause of the problem before any dignosis has been done. There are numerous causes for instability that are outside of the scope of the program. We have thousands of professional users successfully using Sonar and it is far more stable than CbB was. That said, every system can be different and a problem one user sees may never be seen by others due to variations in software/plugins etc. Until we get crash dumps no determination can be made in such cases. And no it will not be possible to use CbB from Aug. Its been superceded by Sonar and thats the only product being supported going forward.

Where did you send your problem report? If it was a dump you can also PM me a link.

PM the link

Just now, Milton Sica said:

I'll try to explain better what's happening in my installation.

I inserted 2 plugins and, after opening them, I positioned them where I wanted.

If I close any of them and open them again, instead of them keeping the position on the screen where they were closed, they open in the position of the last plugin that remained or was open.

 

Yes and that has been the behavior for decades. It's nothing to do with this version of Sonar.

Read the official FAQ at the bottom of this page where everything about Cbb is explained.

https://www.cakewalk.com/sonar

This is not the post to get into that.

On 7/1/2025 at 9:07 AM, warrickhale said:

Further to the above I now have access to the paid for version of SONAR with the new features. These I believe are meant to include the Guitar FX plugins associated with THU and I believe there is meant to be backwards compatibility with TH3, the previous version which was available in SONAR before it was acquired by BandLab.

However when I open old projects which contain tracks which include the TH3 plugin SONAR simply says they are missing. Can anyone tell me how I can access the THU plugin with this compatibility please, I cannot see how to do it?
 

 

Sonar will automatically replace TH3 with THU when you open projects containing TH3 as long as you have "Replace if possible on project load" checked in VST3 migration as below. Note for this to work, you must have THU installed on the PC.

6 hours ago, Simone said:

Sonar crashes all the time for me.
I use Waves plugins and I can't load the projects I was working on on CbB.
If CbB stops working on August the 1st and I can't open my old projects in Sonar I will be stuck in the middle of the production of my new album.
It is unacceptable putting a software on the market in this broken state and forcing people to migrate to it without the necessary testing.
Good job in kicking your long time users away from you for good.

If you want help be productive and submit proper problem reports. Sarcastic comments wont help solve your problem.

Can you send a sample project that can demonstrate this difference? There are no changes I know of in Sonar that could make it worse.

Product center can only monitor products that were installed via product center. If you installed it years ago via a different installer it has no knowledge of it. Its expected behavior.

That is quite weird, the reason for no app windows is likely why it crashes.
When it pops the membership screen can youn check in task manager if Sonar is running still?
Also please try unplugging your audio interface and retry.
When it's in that state before clicking continue can you capture a dump file and PM it to me? Hopefully it can show why the app window isnt running. 
If you need help on how to capture a dump see this post.

8 hours ago, GBTBassist said:

 

Load nag screen that has a time out telling me I have an evaluation copy. I have updated to 2025.06 just in case it was pre free tier but its just the same. Is this normal behaviour? 

Yes of course, its intentional. If you are running in the free tier there is a delay on startup and popups when you try and use features that are premium. If you don't want that, take advantage of the promotional price and purchase a membership.

8 hours ago, GBTBassist said:

Latency on all controls - there is a small but significant delay in changing any setting which means I am constantly having to reset fader/knobs on the DAW as well as plugins as i overshoot or undershoot where I want to be. I have tried with/without spectrum analyzer display per track just in case that was the cause but it's just the same.

This is very likely to be something specific to your project or the presence of control surfaces possibly. Have you tried this with a new project?

8 hours ago, GBTBassist said:

The completely out of character 'File, Open' dialogue box which seems to be a windows 7 style, all square and ignoring colour preference of the main app. Really!!?

File open is a system dialog that we don't want to replace because it has windows defined functionality. Most Windows apps use it.

1 hour ago, Milton Sica said:

Yes, is this,

I had understood that the SONAR installation would take advantage of the previous Cakewalk settings

 

Something I noticed when I unchecked recycling is that it works differently from Cakewalk.

Now, even if I reposition the plugin after opening it, if I close it and it is the only open plugin, it resumes its positioning.

If I open another plugin and then open another plugin, the last one that was opened is always placed in the position of the previously opened plugin.

In my opinion, this is quite unproductive, because I have to open and position it.

I would have liked it better if the plugins respected their positions when closed and opened again.

Not seeing anything like you describe. Plugin window positions are being retained if you move them, close and reopen. If you are talking about closing one plugin and opening another, then that will definitely open in the last position. The position is global. 
If thats what you are talking about its by design and this shouldnt be posted in this thread. Its a feature request not a bug at all. All versions of Sonar do this. In any case it has nothing to do with recycling windows.

This is unlikely to be a redist issue. The membership screen should always be shown only when the app is visible in the background. Start a new thread and attach a video to show the problem.