Starship Krupa

In the event of a sudden apocalypse that somehow nukes the internet but leaves the power grid intact, CbB will work as it always has for 6 months. At which point, all you need to do to continue working with it is set your computer's clock back a year. And you can even leave it that way, because, remember no internet, therefore no internet time servers for Windows to contact. @scook would probably create a script to set the system clock back, start Cakewalk, then upon exiting, set the system clock forward again. Assuming phone lines still work, we could get this script via the revived Cakewalk dial-up BBS. Not to worry!

There's no call for forcing yourself to warp your head around any piece of software when there are so many great alternatives. You have a powerful enough computer to run any DAW on the market. Of the other two, Cakewalk will surely satisfy the needs of a singer/songwriter and then some. For that kind of thing, you want something with good tools for comping and mixing. I can record in anything, but give me Cakewalk when it comes to mixing time. As far as comping, Cakewalk has a full set of tools. It has a learning curve for comping, to be sure, but I don't know of a DAW that doesn't. I've never run into a comping task that I couldn't accomplish with Cakewalk's tools and workflow, but I still from time to time get into "flurry of Ctrl-Z's" trouble when using the Smart Tool and turned out it wasn't in the mode I thought it was. My more confident workflow with editing is to switch to the Edit or Draw Tool I need rather than relying on my memorization of what the Smart Tool is supposed to do in a given situation. That's my caveat: Cakewalk is great for comping if you remember to loosen your grip on the Smart Tool. Although I have a license for Reason Lite, I'm much less familiar with it because I couldn't get my head around it. I never even got as far as recording anything, so I don't know about their comping tools. No software, regardless of licensing model, is immune to abandonment. Sonar was payware up until 5 years ago, Cakewalk, Inc. had been around for 30 years and was owned by a much larger company. Then, poof. You're old enough to remember when WordStar, then Word Perfect absolutely owned the word processing market. The mighty may fall. A program like Cakewalk or Chrome that's not expected to earn its parent company revenue in the form of license fees isn't necessarily less "safe" than one that must constantly keep its user base updating in order to earn a profit and justify its existence. For that reason, I encourage people to remain at least familiar with one DAW other than their primary. At least familiar enough that if DAW A breaks for whatever reason, you can at least get tracks down with DAW B when inspiration hits rather than struggling to get it into record mode. There's some FUD about "will Cakewalk keep working if BandLab and its validation server goes away?" I have faith in both the Cakewalk devs, and then if there are legal issues, the world of hackers, that if that ever happens, a solution will be found.

If your motherboard can take it, I'd be tempted to drop an i7-4770 in there (about $50 on eBay). That's a faster processor than the DAW I was using up until a couple of months ago (i7 3770) that will handle pretty much anything I throw at it. Cakewalk loves having 8 virtual cores to play with. I'm a frugal guy who tends to run my stuff until the wheels fall off. Cakewalk runs like a bat out of Hades on that i7 3770 system. Also, don't know what graphics you're running, but I recently bought an nVidia GT 1030 (passively cooled for quietness) for $70. It even runs the 5-year-old games I play in top graphic quality. Cakewalk and Vegas love it.

Well done, sir. The themes I'm currently working on include efforts to use more pixels in the images. I like what you've done in the Mix Module. And of course the rest has the usual M-Excellence. You a truly a Lord of the .STH. Also, that's a pretty impressive project to be running on 4 cores!

Les Pauls are way too heavy for me. I have a couple of Gibson-made Epiphones from the 60's though. More Melody Makerish than Les Paul-ish. I'll go with "set neck with P90 or humbucker" in place of "LP."

Hot. At some point every guitar player must get one. Resistance is futile.

Looks like they fixed the browsing presets crash in MSoundFactory. Details here: https://www.meldaproduction.com/changes/#changes-16.01

Indeed, this. I have to confess to being confused as heck at this point regarding PA discounts. I think I was trying to stack SHMC-A and B15N. I did take a pass on the Neoverb. Nice-sounding 'verb, but I have more reverbs than I need anyway. Dang, that's a nice thing to be able to say in good confidence. To me, reverb (and saturation/distortion) is the only category of effect where its inherent character is critical to my producing a mix that I like. Compression, EQ, delay, flavors of modulation, it's more about how the controls are presented and how intuitive/flexible they are. And that is important as it affects my enjoyment of and enthusiasm for using a given processor. But they don't sound as qualitatively different as reverbs do to me.

Sheesh, I tried entering the code for "any plug-in $29.99" and it spit it back saying that I needed a certain number of products in my cart or something. Whatever, I snagged the B15N for free and it is definitely ALL THAT as bass amps go. Got me much closer to the War B.B. Dickerson growl. Clicking on the plexi glow panel is a nice surprise, a noise gate and power soak, choice of cabs.

True. Stratus seems to be a surround reverb? When I got my first Exponential reverbs Phoenix and R2 were the only ones available at $9.99 a pop. Single-seaters, so 2 of each. Then a while later PB put Nimbus and R4 on sale for $9.99, and I couldn't resist those modulated tails. 2 of each again. Of course, now my 2 licenses apiece for Phoenix and R2 are superfluous and due to the iLok transfer fees, it doesn't even make sense to give them away. Since the only reverb I've heard that can touch the Exponential stuff is MturboReverble, I don't mind the licensing stuff. It is what it is, and the fact that they're single-seaters that require an iLok 2 probably contributes to the peanuts prices.

Okay, I answered my own question about Neoverb. Maybe I'll get it 5 years from now in a $12 PB sale when my computers have been further upgraded, but for now, pass. Using Cakewalk's Performance module: Pianissimo in a 2 bar loop. With FX bypassed, engine load is 4-7%. A single instance of Nimbus on the track, load is 8-11%. A single instance of Neoverb, load is 17-25%. Using PlugIn Doctor's "performance" graph (which I don't completely understand) concurs. Neoverb's preset collection of "over 100 inspiring presets" is much smaller than the massive lists in the Exponential reverbs. Not that big a deal since I tend to stick with about 3 of the Exponential presets. The auto EQ thing is pretty nice, though. It seems like Shadow Hills Class A (which I want for its M/S functionality) will see more action around here. The ad copy, though. 🙄 "....hand-wiring each compressor with Mogami Cable, an important factor when Brainworx Audio modeled one of these...." Yeah, I can hear the Belden in the green version, it just doesn't have that characteristic Mogami smoothness. "With the gain set to identical values on both versions of the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor, the Class A hardware version clocks in roughly 1-3 dB hotter, delivering a thicker and richer tone to whatever is running through it." Really? REALLY? I guess they took Marty DiBergi's "why not just make 10 louder?" to heart.

Question for the Neoverb-equipped: Phoenix leveled my mixes up so much that I wound up buying about $80 in $10 PB licenses for R2, R4, Nimbus....I get that the algos are probably the same, because, y'know, it would be very difficult to improve on them. I'm interested to see what iZotope have added to the party, but I have concern that they also added the notorious iZotope hunger for CPU cycles. What's the experience with that? I'll be downloading it for testing, but an hour or so might not reveal everything. Weighing the choice between this or the aforementioned SHMC-A/B15N combo.

How do I get Neoverb for $9.99? I have the monthly $25 voucher, the $20 no limit voucher, but Neoverb is listed as being $245. By my calculations, though, I should be able to get B15N and Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor Class A for $9.99.

Krep. Missed it. I want that B15N. In my quest for the "World Is A Ghetto" growl.

It's pretty cool if you're into things like MRhythmizer, Stutter Edit, Gross Beat, Tactic.

MONSTER Drums is a really nice multi drum machine.

😆 A little gasoline on the fire. If anyone actually tries the analogy, the way I'd approach it would be with something more humble, "I dunno, sweetie, I guess it's like clothes. Different outfits for different occasions? Each one sounds different and feels different and plays different." Or you could snap "You just can't stand the idea that I have something I enjoy!" No. Don't do that.

https://www.audacityteam.org/audacity-3-2-is-out-now/ How far off is VSTi support and a piano roll? 😄 (also future CLAP support?)

I'm surprised that nobody else picked up on this. If you just duplicate the same take of an audio track and pan it, all you get is a louder, reinforced mono track. Which sounds kind of like what you're hearing. Is this a single take just duplicated, or are these multiple takes? If what you want is the sound of a doubled vocal coming from a single track, you need to do this with FX. iZotope Vocal Doubler is a popular free plug-in that is (obviously, from the name) intended for this use. With just one track to apply FX to, you'll find it much easier to use compression. However, if I have this wrong and you did re-record your vocal multiple times, what I do for this is route the vocals to a bus, then use compression on the bus to even them out. Taking a look at some tutorials on how to EQ vocals to sit in a mix might be helpful as well. It's amazing how much low end you can roll off, and the positive effect it has on the mix. I usually wind up rolling off my vocals around 400Hz. That way they don't step on the other instruments as much.

This is not necessarily an apples-to-apples test. Your test uses the same audio file for every track. If the issue has something to do with reading the audio data off the disk, Cakewalk streams every audio file in a project in real time. If Antre's project has 130 unique tracks, that is reading 130 different audio files at the same time, that is a very different test condition. If someone has a project with over 50 different audio tracks, check that, observe how fast it goes into Play. And please, fellow forum folks, lighten up. The issue is that Antre has observed this issue across every release of Sonar/CbB for years, on multiple PC's. The idea that a single computer he's using is somehow unique and causing a problem is spurious. He's (I am presuming gender) not threatening our favorite toy, he would like to be able to use it more effectively. Testing similar projects across multiple DAW's and computers is reasonably diligent troubleshooting. He has way more experience with Sonar/Cakewalk than I do. @Antre, do post the specs of one of the computers that's exhibiting the behavior, preferably the fastest one you have. Especially memory, video card and audio data drive. If nothing else, it'll reassure the skeptics that you have plenty of computer power.

Would really like to have a .BUN file of an offending project. That way those of us who would like to help can try it on our systems and see if we get similar results. If we don't, well, that narrows it down. For those saying that it's not all that long a delay, I'm thinking maybe you don't do a lot of comping? When in that process, I'm usually constantly starting and stopping the transport to make sure the edits line up, are inaudible, etc. Those "little" delays became really annoying, got me out of the creative flow. This is not "much ado about nothing." At the time it was happening, I had two other DAW guys looking over my shoulder, one a Pro Tools guy and the other Ableton Live. They both agreed it would drive them nuts to the point of making it unusable. I do encourage the OP to get with Windows 10 unless they know for sure that something critical to them is incompatible. Letting a system age like that is just inviting trouble.

I'd like cool new stuff to come at a faster rate, but I don't think Cakewalk is falling behind. The first couple of years were a "target-rich" environment, where they had a many-years-long list of deferred bug fixes, code optimizations, and feature additions that had already been put into the pipeline. I'll go with "working on something big." For instance, it's been made pretty clear to the devs that the best feature they could add to give the program better uptake with the dance music segment is a built-in sampler. That's a pretty big job. Or maybe it's something else like the vaunted "chord track," or one of the existing areas of the program known to need some love like Staff or Matrix. Or better UI scaling. Anyway, I think they harvested a lot of low-hanging fruit, and now it's going to be something with a longer initial development cycle.

Go here, and nominate your favorites: https://www.kvraudio.com/readers-choice-awards/2022/ As usual, they've ghettoized programs that are free licensed, but I "misunderstood the rules" and nominated Cakewalk in the categories I thought were appropriate. After all, it's been said many times that Cakewalk isn't really free because you have to register for a BandLab account to install and use it. 😄

Best place to ask that question and get answers is in the Q&A subforum. It can be done.

I totally misinterpreted your reply! Apologies. It didn't sound like you to say that about the last 5 years of development. 🤪