David Baay

In general I try not to question the validity of a user's methodology when something isn't working as expected, but I am curious... what's the use case for being able to toggle Input Echo on after the transport is running? I don't think I've ever had much occasion to do this myself, except maybe in the case that I just set up a new track and forgot to enable it, in which case I would probably be stopping and rewinding before enabling it anyway.

D'oh! ln all my decades of computer use, I never realized this was possible. I have always 'escaped' by finding a place in the UI where it's disallowed to drop the object. Thanks for the 'pro tip'. 😎

As I've never heard of this occurring with any external audio source connected via a conventional analog or digital input, I have to suspect it's something to do with the way this interface is routing audio data. My first guess would be that it's not honoring Cakewalk's request to open the input port when the transport is running. You might try enabling 'Always Open All Devices' in Audio preferences if it isn't already. And check the iConnectivity documentation or online sources for relevant information. Is Patterning 2 being driven by MIDI from Cakewalk, or is it playing an internal pattern and synced/slaved by MIDI to Cakewalk or...? Some clarification of the setup might help find a workaround if not a fix.

Hence why I suggested splitting the 'Instrument' track to check functionality of both parts. Glad you got it figured in any case. Thanks for letting us know.

+1 to just treat the Mac like a hardware synth. Good write-up, Kenny. Pro tip for those not used to working with hardware synths: On the audio track that hosts the input from the Mac, Shift+click the solo button to enable Solo Override so you can solo the MIDI track(s) driving MainStage without losing input monitoring of the incoming audio.

You'll need to convert audio to MIDI first. Melodyne Essential can do a monophonic line, but Editor or Studio are needed to get polyphonic detection.

New machine or just a new O/S on the old machine? If a new machine, I would start by checking DPC latency: https://www.resplendence.com/latencymon And what do CPU and disk usage look like on the Performance tab of the Task Manager (or Resource Monitor linked at the bottom of that view)?

The question is where exactly in the MIDI/Audio data chain is the break; is it in the MIDI or audio portion of the Instrument track or is it the synth itself not generating audio output? I'd start by splitting the instrument track, and looking at the MIDI and Audio track setups separately. Are you echoing live MIDI input or playing back existing MIDI clips? If you're playing live, do you depend on Always Echo Current MIDI track, or do you manually enable input echo?

Adding via the Synth Rack continues to work fine here. Are you inserting as a Simple Instrument or separate audio and MIDI tracks? In any case, check the MIDI/Audio I/O routing of the track(s) being created when you insert the synth, and all the usual stuff (input echo is enabled on the MIDI track, keyboard/audition function in the synth UI shows output signal, etc.).

Double-clicking on a track header maximizes the track height, effectively pushing other tracks off screen. Double-click again to return it to the original height, or hit F to fit all tracks vertically. If they really got hidden somehow, hit Shift+H to show all tracks.

Yes, I can see how that might be both helpful and fun. I'm a pretty decent self-taught keyboard player, but I still can't solo fast without hitting lots of 'wrong' notes.

+1 to just bringing a copy of the project over the new machine. But to answer the question... the effect of FX inserted directly in the FX bin of each track should be applied to the exported track so long as the Track FX and Automation boxes are checked in the export dialogue. But FX on buses to which the track is sending or outputting won't be included. To get those, you would need to solo the track, export with Source = Buses, and select the Master or some upstream bus that collects all the output from that track and its sends. But keep in mind that many FX (especially dynamic FX like compression) won't behave the same when only one track is active. Typically you would either export tracks without bus FX or export buses as 'stems' that include all the tracks and send FX that route that bus. Trying to do anything in between will not generally give the desired end result of having the sum of the exports sound like the Master bus.

I've always thought the way 'Threshold' controls typically work is counter-intuitive, and not usually helped by the way the functionality is described. A simple way to think about it is that the Threshold is simply an input gain control, and by lowering it, you're amplifying the signal until the peaks start to run into the Ceiling. So by setting the threshold to -10dB, you're essentially boosting the whole signal by 10dB right off the bat. Here's how the Adaptive Limiter's help file puts it: "Only the signal above the Threshold is limited; all signal below the Threshold has a constant gain change that is controlled by the difference between the Threshold and Ceiling." So if you just want to limit the peaks without boosting, leave the Threshold at 0, and lower the ceiling into the existing peaks. If you want a little boost (typically the goal of Limiting), start with a less aggressive threshold. The way I typically use a limiter for a final Master is to set the Ceiling it at -0.3dB (as suggested earlier to void overs with MP3 compression or problems with D/A converters in consumer devices that behave badly at the limit), and push the Threshold down until the reduction meter shows the peaks are getting knocked down by maybe 3-5dB, and not continuously. Depending on the source material, and your loudness goals, you can push it harder, of course, but I usually just want to be able to bring the level up as high as possible without noticeably losing dynamic range or having the peaks sound 'crunchy'. If I were sending a mix to a mastering engineer, I might take the same approach, but set the Ceiling at -6dB, and only lower the Threshold to where the very highest loudest peaks are getting knocked down a couple of dB.

Hey Chuck, FWIW, any time you run into sync problems like that, it can help to have 'Set Now Time with Full Restart' enabled in Track View Options. The trade-off is that moving the Now time during playback will sound a little glitchy (i.e. not 'gapless'). Basically, it's the equivalent of quickly stopping and restarting the transport when you move the Now time.

Yes, I understood that. Just tried it, and the issue is readily reproduced here as well. I'm guessing the Bakers will get on this pronto.

Try increasing your ASIO buffer size. By default, Cakewalk uses this buffer size for offline processing (i.e. non-realtime), and some synths don't render properly with very small buffer sizes. If it works to increase the real-time buffer, you can set a non-zero value for BounceBufSizeMsec=0 in AUD.INI, and Cakewalk will use that value for all offline processing. I keep mine at 20 (960 samples at 48kHz).

Interesting that Melodyne are able to reproduce it. I would have thought there would be many reports of this on the forum if it affects all installations. I use Melodyne mainly for MIDI extraction, and have probably never tried to record with pitch-correction enabled; I'll have to give it a try.

A similar thing has been known to happen with both audio and MIDI recording... new clips are laid down a measure late in the timeline when count-in is enabled. I've never experienced it myself so have always suspected it was related to interoperability of certain audio interface drivers with Cakewalk. If you're using WDM driver mode, maybe try switching to ASIO or vice versa. BTW, what sample rate are you running? If it's 88.2 or 96kHz, possibly some subroutine is not accounting for the doubled number of samples in a measure vs. more common 44.1 and 48...? Just a thought.

Are there any that you use in every project? Related to this, it also occurs to me that if you're using project templates that originated in some ancient version of SONAR, you might want to build some new ones from scratch starting with the Blank or Basic project template. The same might go for old track templates that you use frequently, especially anything complex like a drum template that includes the synth, multiple outputs, aux track with routing and plugin for parallel compression, etc. The fact that you've experienced this so consistently across many versions of Cakewalk/SONAR and (presumably) many PCs with different O/S and interfaces, while many others experience it rarely or not at all suggests you're consistently doing something procedurally or with project content that precipitates the problem.

I've generally only encountered this kind of thing with specific soft synths or FX plugins that don't 'play nice' with Fast Bounce. Sometimes it can be fixed by increasing the real-time ASIO buffer size which is used as the default 'chunk' size for offline rendering when BounceBufSizeMsec=0 in AUD.INI. Or you can set a non-zero BounceBufSizeMsec= value (I keep mine at 20). In other cases, the synth/FX plugin may have an offline render mode that has to be set in its UI. Another problem I've encountered in the past involved FX plugins that don't clear their own internal buffers on stop, and 'spit' some noise when playback is restarted. This would sometimes manifest in exports as well. I haven't run into that issue for a while, but one setting that might be relevant would be "Always Stream Audio Through FX' in audio Playback and Recording preferences. You might also look into enabling Plugin Upsampling (or disabling it if already enabled) for any plugins that you find are consistently causing a problem. Bottom line: If you have a project that does this consistently, save a copy of it and start removing things until to find the trigger - most likely a plugin.

Sounds like conversion to Groove Clip didn't happen for whatever reason. Does the clip have beveled/rounded corners? Check the Groove Clip section of the Clip tab in the Inspector with the clip selected to see if 'looping' is enabled, and make sure the 'Beats in Clip' value is correct (should be 4 for a single measure of 4/4).

FWIW, I almost never lock anything. I add descriptive filename suffixes to periodically saved copies of a project as it evolves so that original recordings and progressive edits can always be recovered from an earlier version.

Others who upgrade their machines frequently and/or have a long history with Cakewalk and do extensive customization of their configurations might have more involved processes, but here's the simplified version: - Install drivers for audio and MIDI interfaces. - Install any legacy SONAR plugins/content you might have access to through the old Cakewalk Command Center that isn't part of CbB. - Install CbB. - Install and authorize all 3rd-party plugins (this is typically the most time-consuming and painful part) - Copy your projects folder to the corresponding location on the new machine. - Make music. If you've done a lot of customization of the configuration on your old machine, you can consider copying some things over (e.g. aud.ini, cakewalk.ini, ttsseq.ini, master.ins), but for optimal performance and stability, it's probably best to go forward with a default setup, and reset preferences as you encounter them. I usually only transfer some very specific aud-ini settings, and migrate my master.ins (MIDI Instrument Definitions for hardware synths). I also bring over the Cakewalk Content folder because it contains decades of custom and archived content. I keep it in a non-default location so I also copy the relevant branch of the Windows registry to the new machine, but that probably wouldn't apply to you. There are also procedures for migrating plug-in layouts and presets; I don't generally do a lot of customization in that area so I don't bother. So long as you keep the old machine around, you can always refer back to it, and migrate additional content/customizations as needed when you find things are missing or not working as expected in the new environment.

I've always enabled LinkPFSendMute for more intuitive behavior since the performance space and control room are one and the same for me, as is probably the case for the majority of users. But since changing the default would foul up users who have come to depend on it being disabled, giving access to it from the UI would be helpful, if only to help make users aware that the option exists. It might also be helpful to explain the use case for having it disabled in the Ref. Guide.

Like me, I think Klaus thought you were talking about locking the PRV. Clip-locking is a property of clips, and clip properties are only accessible from the clips pane and the Inspector. So, no, you cannot change clip-locking status from the PRV.