Craig Reeves

Track duplication is a very useful and time-saving feature. Duplicating busses would be a really nice addition!

On 12/15/2020 at 12:57 AM, jono grant said:

Does anyone have the problem: Cakewalk sticks around in Task Manager after closing? 

Any reason this would happen? (quite often)

Thanks

JG

This occasionally happens to me as well. Although not as often as it used to.

11 hours ago, Bristol_Jonesey said:

Craig, when you did it by Copy + Paste ,you didn't select a track before pasting

When you used cut, you selected track 8 - why? What happens when you don't select a track?

The same thing occurs whether the track is first selected or not.

On 12/21/2020 at 11:18 AM, lapasoa said:

Why don't you use Ripple Edit for that?

There are workarounds, sure, such as just copying and deleting, but the point is that it's a bug.

6 minutes ago, murat k. said:

Hi Craig,
You can do the same thing with Alt+Shift in Cakewalk.

You're absolutely right, murat. I stand corrected then!

You guys KILLED it with this update! Just came back from the studio recording with an upcoming star and Cakewalk was what we used and it didn't miss a beat, even on a laptop that isn't the best in the world. For some reason it seems like this version of Cakewalk is faster.

This update is SO good!

It seems like the performance is better in this version. I can load more VST's and more audio, even on a laptop that's not very fast and Cakewalk can easily handle it, whereas it seems like before it would (as well as some other DAWs) struggle. It seems like for whatever reason this version is faster and performs better.

Ahhh I see. Thanks.

Ableton 11's beta is out and it said something about MPE support. It seems like all the other major DAWS (Ableton, Cubase, Logic Pro X and Studio One) all have this except Cakewalk. But what exactly is it? All I'm finding on it is something about the Roli Seaboard.

EDIT: Years ago I used a Roli Seaboard with Cakewalk and didn't remember having issues. 

Articulation maps are a feature I never even knew I needed!

The problem I was having was that I wasn't aware that you could switch from clip mode to clip automation mode as quickly. So that's why I was under the impression that this couldn't be done easily so my apologies everybody. Not only that but I was under a tremendous amount of stress earlier this week and was already in a bad mood. Like I said I shouldn't have taken it out on you guys so I'm sorry for that.

10 hours ago, Lord Tim said:

Is this what you're after, @Craig Reeves ?  (Genuine question )

That is a valid workaround for my specific issue, but clip automation shouldn't have to be used for something as simple as adjusting the gain on a clip, seeing as to how often it is done.

13 hours ago, Will_Kaydo said:

LOL! By trying to enforce the word "Professional" down on me does not help your case. 

But hold your horsey, no one said you were stupid. No one said you didn't know what a "De-esser" is. All i meant was you can ride one in automation. 

Anyway . . . 

If you were such a "professional" you would've known that what I said, still stand firm. The "Gain" knob for each channel - Meaning, each clip -- allows you to automate each clip individually. You also would've known that clip gain automation has been possible in cakewalk for years. 

FWIW: There is also a thing called "Shift" on the keyboard too. When in clip mode, hold down on that shift thing and drag down on the selected area you want to "de-ess." 

Why are you so angry. 

First of all, YOU'RE the one that first called into question my expertise on matters like this, so I then identified myself as a professional who is not a beginner in production, nor in Cakewalk. Do I know everything there is to know as far as Cakewalk goes? No I don't which is why when I am mistaken about a feature I will correct myself.

But this gaslighting anybody who criticizes Cakewalk from a place of genuinely wanting Cakewalk to be the best it can be, both for our own sake and for Cakewalk's sake as well, is a turnoff and has been mentioned even here why some have gotten fed up and just left for another DAW altogether. 

And riding a De-esser in automation is still using a De-esser when I mentioned before that a De-esser plugin is not always the best or easiest solution. And I am aware of clip automation which I mentioned in my very first post. Bringing down the level of multiple clips on multiple tracks at different bars of the project would be far more difficult than if the feature I suggested were implemented. 

Technically, you could fade clips using clip automation as well. But you don't because it is much easier and quicker to do it by grabbing the top corner of the clip and dragging left or right. That's my point.

Clip automation takes longer to set up and is more cumbersome to use than the feature I suggested. That is the very reason other DAWs have this feature along with clip automation.

I work with people everyday who do not use Cakewalk and this is a feature which I'm suggesting is one almost every one of them use all the time. So this is not some pointless feature nobody would use, especially seeing as to how I literally see people doing this in ProTools all the time. I promise you if any of them decided to try Cakewalk and found that the only way they could achieve the same task was through Clip automation, they would be disappointed.

So yeah, one may be able to come up with a workaround for something Cakewalk is lacking in, but if said task is 10x easier to do in another DAW, that reflects poorly.

Like I said, if people keep leaving Cakewalk to go elsewhere, there ain't gonna be no more Cakewalk. I don't want that and I'm sure you don't either.

1 hour ago, Will_Kaydo said:

How new are you to cakewalk? How new are you to mixing? 

Every De-esser has an adjustable gain fader. Grouping the vocals will allow you to treat them as one track. 

FWIW! Right at the top of every channel in the console view -- there's a little knob called "Gain" (aka clip gain) and in track view it's a slider.

Why so angry if you don't fully know something? 

That's the difference. I'm a professional which is why I'm bringing up issues a professional would bring up using this DAW. And I've been using Cakewalk since 2000. And I'm not stupid, I know what a De-esser is, but very often you want to De-ess vocals by actually lowering the gain of the areas in which there are harsh consonants because a De-esser can only do so much. There is a reason why every other major DAW has this feature and has had it for quite some time. Professionals adjust clip gain all the time.

And yes, each track has a gain knob, but we're talking about PER CLIP. So don't talk down to me when it is clear you don't know what you're talking about. And who said I'm angry? I'm just pointing out areas in which Cakewalk can improve because I am always looking for ways the DAW I've been using my whole career can get better.

On 10/19/2020 at 7:25 PM, Maestro said:

There is no way Gibson would have shut them down if this was the case.

Probably second only to FL Studio, meaning it was selling more than:

• Pro Tools
• Ableton Live
• Cubase
• Studio One
• REAPER

???

I don't think so, and I'm not even sure how one could make that assumption given the product was summarily killed off, and none of the bigger developers/software vendors were jumping at the opportunity to snatch it up.  At least it wasn't acquired by MAGIX or Corel, though.  That's definitely a silver lining!

That's ignoring the fact that no developer of music production software performing that well on Windows (90% of the desktop market, mind you, and probably over half of the music production market) would just kill the product off.  It it were selling that well, it would still be SONAR Platinum, and being sold for $$$ by Gibson.

No.  There are more "Professional Recording and Mix Engineers, and Recording Studios" using Pro Tools than anything else.  Pro Tools also dominates the Film Post industry, as well (i.e. Hollywood).

However, it is largely absent among Composers and Producers of many other genres of music - the same way Ableton Live is largely absent in Recording Studios and the Film Post industry.

At the upper end of the market (Professional Use, not Hobbyist/Enthusiasts), these DAWs settle into different niches where they don't really compete against most other DAWs in the market.  The DAWs that Pro Tools is competing against - in the market segment where Avid extracts the most profit for it - cost thousands of dollars.   DAWs like Cubase Pro and Samplitude Pro X are literally unusable for high end Film Post work, for example.  The software has limitations that prevent it from being used for this type of work, so that the companies selling them can upsell those users to Nuendo ($1,800+) and Sequoia ($2,900+).  Pyramix and SaDIE are also not cheap, at all.

People producing on Ableton are largely not going to consider Pro Tools an option unless Avid does some ridiculous overhaul or massive feature updates to the software - and they aren't inclined to do that as long as they are as strong as they are in the niche in which they have settled.  Avid is not going there.  The DAWs that are moving in that direction are those like DP, Logic Pro X, and Studio One.  SONAR was sort of moving in that direction, as well - I'd probably say it still is.

That's how these things work in the market.

IMO, SONAR was never really competing against Pro Tools.  They were competing against the likes of Cubase and its ilk (DP is a latecomer to the Windows platform).  I think Studio One was more disruptive to SONAR than a lot of other DAWs, though, since it marketed to the same core market that SONAR had settled on (Smaller/Home Studios and Singer/Songwriter types).

Emagic went out of business despite the fact that Logic was selling very well and was highly rated by reviewers. Finally, Gibson killed off Cakewalk after they filed for bankruptcy so it isn't like they said "you know what, Cakewalk isn't selling so well" and they just killed it off. You can't compare this to a highly profitable company like Apple who isn't even looking to profit off Logic because if they were, they would have implemented a subscription program a long time ago.

I've been using Cakewalk for a while, but trust me I am not an apologist for Cakewalk. There are very serious holes in Cakewalk's game and there are utterly embarrassing problems with it, mainly in the fact that there are basic, everyday things even GarageBand can do that Cakewalk either can't do at all (like a real clip gain adjustment feature) or is implemented poorly. This, however, was never the reason Cakewalk didn't have the market share other DAWs had as this has been an issue with Cakewalk for years even when they were far more dominant in the music world than they are now. Most of the people in the professional music world have never even used Cakewalk, and most of the people who did up until Cakewalk went out of business weren't moving to other DAWs and Cakewalk consistently was praised by critics as one of the best DAWs on Windows.

And no, clip automation doesn't suffice. Because while clip automation is fine for adjusting the gain on a single clip, it fails when trying to adjust the gain on multiple clips at once which is very often the case when having to de-ess a stack of multiple vocals by hand. 

I can't think of a single other major DAW that is missing this feature so I would imagine it would be pretty easy to implement. 

And no, adding a plugin to each clip doesn't work because again, it's a stack of 5 vocals I'm trying to de-ess manually.

And no, Process > Apply Effect > Gain doesn't work either because that is destructive and not adjustable.

I'm literally going to have to take this vocal stack to Pro Tools because Cakewalk is completely unable to do this.

I just noticed it now.

This isn't really on topic of the articulation maps, but copying and pasting multiple lanes of automation in busses is very faulty and very often does not work, only pasting the top lane rather than all of them. 

7 hours ago, Maestro said:

1. I didn't ask about Ableton, I asked what you were referring to when you stated Cakewalk does "tons of things" better than Ableton.  It's nice to write these things, but some people want something a bit more objective.   You still haven't provided any examples.  I'm sure you could rattle off a few out of those "tons of things," no?  Or did you just exaggerate that because it sounds nice and rings well in the specific environment in which you're posting these comments?
2. No, it isn't.  It's priced just right because it's the best tool at what it is designed to do, just like Pro Tools.  If competitors were as good at Ableton at producing the type of music it's dominates, and live performance, then their prices would get naturally pushed down due to competition.  As it stands, they are so dominant that they almost never even have a discount promotion.  They don't need to, either.  The fact that you are unwilling to pay $750 for Live Suite does not make Live Suite overpriced de facto. That is your opinion, so it's not exactly "plain and simple" - or anything even close to that.
3. Cakewalk used to be $400 and failed as a commercial product.  GarageBand is not a professional product.  Logic Pro X is, and I'm pretty sure there are a LOT more professional users on that DAW than SONAR or Cakewalk by BandLab.  I think you're overrating how much "Free" matters in the music production market, where a $400 DAW investment is really a drop in the bucket.  Most money is invested elsewhere.  DAWs are not the huge consideration you think they are when it comes to pricing.  That matters mostly in the Hobbyist communities, but many of those people eventually move up to industry standard solutions,  anyways (when they can afford them).
4. I think this is widely understood as fact.  Why am I being told this?
5. You're going to find out what I mean when people start replying to this point (having no issue with anything else you wrote, of course).

1. You asked me what I felt Cakewalk did better than Ableton and I answered your question by stating the various things Ableton doesn't have going for it. It would logically follow that since I'm comparing it to Cakewalk, that Cakewalk does indeed feature these things Ableton is missing and these features are important to me. And if you look at some of my other posts putting Cakewalk on blast for every single thing, you'll find that I'm not the type to say things just to be liked here.

2. And yes, it IS my opinion. This is a thread about OPINIONS. It is my opinion that Ableton is overpriced. If they're still able to be sustainable with such a price point, that's great, but in my OPINION, I am not willing to part with $800 for it.

3. I don't know what SONAR's sales numbers were compared to other DAWs on Windows, but I'm willing to bet it was one of the best-selling DAWs on the platform, probably second only to FL Studio. Gibson shut Cakewalk down mainly because Gibson went bankrupt in 2018. Emagic went out of business in 2002 as well despite Logic being one of the best-selling DAWs at the time. And yes, there have probably always been more professionals using Mac programs than Windows programs. There are more professionals using ProTools than anything else. Most professionals do not have time to try every DAW and see which one is the best. Most professionals only have experience in the DAW they started in as they are too busy to learn anything else. 

And the idea that pricing is only important to "hobbyists" is laughable. MOST professional musicians are broke.  You'll be surprised how often I have been in studio sessions with professionals who are still using cracked software because they can't afford to pay for what they're using. Many professionals work day jobs to try to make ends meet. So yeah, pricing is very, very important. 

And determining which DAWs are "professional" is mostly determined by who the DAWs are marketed towards and the opinions of its users, not so much their capabilities or features.

5 hours ago, Maestro said:

MixCraft is a DAW for hobbyists and prosumers, so those people are going to be content with it - the way the vast majority of GarageBand users are content with that DAW.  Generally, it doesn't take much to please them.  When you raise the price, however, people become a lot more critical and discerning.  This is why the phrase "You can't complain about free" was coined.  Free things usually garner few complaints, because the user didn't have to invest anything to acquire and use it.  This is also true re: cheaper things vs more expensive things.

I mean, we see this retort being used on this very forum when people complain about things. People act as if they should be sending gifts to the bakers for providing them with something for free.  "Why are you complaining?"  Professionals who want a say in product development are going to, generally, bias towards paid products with reliable support channels.  That way, product development and evolution is beholden to the users - not simply the whims of the developers (because  "no users upgrading" is NOT a good thing for that business model).

As far as support goes... well,  I think "Linux on the desktop" taught us a lot about that 😉

If you pay $80 for a DAW, then a bad UI is more acceptable than if you pay $560 for a DAW.  People who use cheap DAWs are also likely to make excuses for the developers more than people who use more expensive DAWs.  This is why the Cubase user base is generally a lot more critical of Steinberg than the Cakewalk or MixCraft userbase... or the ACID Pro user base, to give another example.  People using Cakewalk are going to be okay with the feature disparities vs. other DAWs, because Cakewalk costs nothing.  If they were asked to pay $550-599 for it, they'd quickly start asking "why so much, it's missing <100 features> that <5 other DAWs> have."  Perspective is everything 😛 

DAWs like Cubase are heavy weight DAWs used by heavy weights of the industry.  Those people tend to be a lot more exacting WRT their requirements, and they tend to be a lot more vocal about their complaints.  Their patience is shorter, because the DAW costs $560 and has paid yearly upgrades.  Additionally, their livelihoods often depend ono that piece of software.  They want return on investment.

There is no such thing as return on investment for a free product.  There is no risk in trying it, or using it (except maybe it disappearing with no way to continue using it - since online validation is apparently A.O.K., even for "Free" software).

MixCraft's Audio Engine was complete garbage up until at least v8, but their user base was more than okay with it.  They'd say it was totally fine, up until MixCraft improved it.  Then, suddenly, they could all hear the difference and how much better it had become.

Polls for <best anything> are nothing more than a view of which DAW's online community cares enough to waste their time going around reddit, gearslutz, and other forums rounding up votes for their preferred DAW.  Everyone knows LMMS is garbage compared to Pro Tools.  The results expose just how worthless those polls (always) are.  It basically polls which DAW's communities are most activist on the internet.

A few things...

First off, since in an earlier post you asked about Ableton I will offer a few areas but I'm not really one to bash other DAWs too much, plus I think Ableton is a great DAW.
But Ableton is vastly overpriced, simple and plain. There is no justification as to why the top version should be $800. Ableton's piano roll isn't as robust or as smooth, step recording is rudimentary compared to Cakewalk, no ARA 2 support, MIDI controls like velocity and expression can't be automated, no comping, limited support for .rex files, no mix recall are a few areas. Are there areas in which Ableton is better? Of course there is, so to each his own...

And keep in mind, Cakewalk used to be $400 and many of the people still using Cakewalk today were people who were using it then. So compared to the other free DAWs out there, there are way more professionals using Cakewalk than Garage Band. If there were other DAWs that were truly better or if Cakewalk just simply couldn't deliver what I needed anymore, I would switch to something else, but there really isn't much Cakewalk isn't able to do. 

Every DAW has bugs their community hates, including Cakewalk. Logic Pro X has bugs, Ableton, Cubase, FL Studio, Reason, they all have bugs. 

Cakewalk is unstable and crashes too much....just like pretty much every other major DAW in existence.

You're absolutely right Lord Tim. Oftentimes when I compare Cakewalk to other DAWS it might sound like I like those other DAWS better, but the DAWS I compare Cakewalk to are DAWS that I left FOR Cakewalk. And I left for a reason. There are TONS of things I wish Ableton, for instance, did as well as Cakewalk.