Craig Anderton

I hate to see spam deleted. I come to the Cakewalk forums specifically to learn about granite countertop epoxy, custom kitchen cabinets, and how to improve my SEO with "verified user" review farms in Bengladesh. How can we possibly expect to get the most out of Cakewalk without this vitally important information?

I don't think it's designed to be universal, but to enable taking advantage of a DAW's feature that may not be available in your main DAW. For example, it wouldn't surprise me if people did tracking and proprietary forms of editing (e.g., audio chord tracks, algorithmic composition tools) in one DAW, then moved it over to Cakewalk to mix due to its fluid mixing environment. Or, created a project in Cakewalk, then moved it over to Bitwig to do the inter-track modulation tricks that make Bitwig seem more like a modular synth. Or, transferred a Cakewalk project temporarily to Digital Performer to do notation, then back to Cakewalk to do everything else. You can pretty much do all those things now with import/export, but it would be faster to just open up the project in another DAW, do what you want to do, and then go back to where you started (or finish off in the other DAW, e.g., likein the example of moving to Cakewalk and mixing). At least I think that's how it would work in theory

They didn't make the commitment. They bought intellectual property, not a business model.

The concept of having a free trial so you can check out a program, and then paying for it if you like it, is not exactly new. The only difference here is that the free trial lasted a really long time

Probably in the minority here, but I find programs like Native Access, Waves Central, and IK's Authorization Manager an improvement over physical media and weird key codes. They keep track of my authorizations, let me know about updates, and Waves Central has useful utilities for cleaning up or repairing installs. I also appreciate that the way these manager programs are set up, getting everything back up after a hard drive crash or upgrading to a new computer is simple. Some of the download sizes are brutal, but with something like Komplete, that's better than looking for various CDs, DVDs, and authorization codes accumulated over the years. The technology giveth, and the technology taketh away

Indeed, and it's shame because WASAPI is closing in on the Mac's Core Audio drivers for performance and low latency. Cakewalk has always been at the front of the pack for supporting Windows improvements (not just WASAPI, but things like the pen). And credit where credit is due, Mixcraft was also quick to support WASAPI. Cross-platform programs don't seem as interested. Sometimes I think their official attitude is "We support the Mac. Oh yeah, right...glad you asked...Windows, too." I understand from an anonymous Microsoft source that they fully expect to meet or exceed the Mac's Core Audio specs in the future, but we're not there yet.

What Lord Tim says is correct. An audio interface (like a Focusrite 2i2 or whatever) with ASIO drivers designed for that interface will improve the overall performance dramatically. He's also right about WASAPI and RealTek. However, if you use multiple programs, not all of them support WASAPI properly. So, following is a fallback approach, I assume you want to use the FL Studio driver because it doesn't shut down other audio on your computer, like ASIO4ALL does. So, uninstall ASIO4ALL completely. But FL Studio's driver was designed specifically for FL Studio. In theory, for other programs the performance isn't as good as ASIO4ALL in terms of latency and CPU load. If you have to use one or the other, ASIO4ALL may give you better performance with Cakewalk. But, that's a big if. Although some people have had success with ASIO4ALL, I know others who had a real interface with drivers for it, but had problems if ASIO4ALL was even just installed on their system. It's a kludge and while it's clever, it's still trying to fool your program into thinking Windows' native drivers are something other than what they are. With FL Studio, note that when you install or update, you have the option to check or uncheck the FL Studio driver. So here's the summary: Your best option is to get a quality audio interface with drivers designed for it. If you don't want to buy an interface, want to run multiple audio programs, and the Windows native drivers don't do the job for you, use the FL Studio driver. However, this will likely give worse performance with Cakewalk than ASIO4ALL. Use ASIO4ALL with Cakewalk and uninstall the FL Studio driver if you're willing not to use several programs at the same time, want better Cakewalk performance than with the FL Studio driver, and ASIO4ALL works in your system. Hope this helps...

Tesla owners, for starters. Anyone who is not aware that cars are recalled periodically, and fairly often, to fix issues is not an inhabitant of this planet who drives a car.

Noel, my bigger question is why people don't understand that you can't go into a supermarket and say "I should get my groceries for free because some guy on an internet forum says I should work for free." Call me crazy, but making more resources available for the new Sonar can only result in it continuing to improve. In any event, whatever it ends up costing, it beats spending $245 for a reel of 2" tape on which you can record 22 minutes of music at 30 ips.

If you're thinking of the free, "lite" versions of software, no. They can't do the same work.

I agree 100%. It's a true success story in a world where bean counters usually strip what they can from an acquisition, then throw it in the trash. Hopefully other companies will learn something from BandLab's example. You mentioned Studio One...for what it's worth, the Studio One contingent at PreSonus was pretty freaked out when it appeared Cakewalk was headed to extinction. They appreciated that Sonar was its own thing, distinct from Studio One, and respected the effort and programming that went into the software. And they also really sympathized with the user base, because they're musicians and could only imagine what it would be like to have the rug pulled out from under you (hence the serious discount for Cakewalk users who were looking for an alternative at the time). The music industry is very different from a lot of other industries, where something like MIDI - a global cooperative effort among fierce competitors - could never happen. I think there's more "competition" among the users of the DAWs than the manufacturers, who are more likely than not to be hanging out at NAMM after hours. I'd be willing to bet that most companies wish Sonar well - as long as it's not well enough to put them out of business

I think what Ms. Bombeck meant was that those who think the grass is greener on the other side might not want to dig too deep, because they might not like what they find CbB works well for me. My only complaint is that the beta version of the anti-gravity module you shared a few years ago was never developed further. But, unleashing that kind of power could have unintended consequences. You probably did the right thing.

Most X.0 programs have an X.0.1 release shortly thereafter. Cakewalk has a history of introducing hotfixes when needed. I can personally vouch for that - several years ago I alerted Noel to a problem no one else caught, and there was a public hotfix in a week. So...yes, you have 6 months to decide if you want to go to the new Sonar, but that also means you have 6 months where you can chill and check out a somewhat later version with bug fixes. You don't have to use the very first release, you can wait for one or two "point" updates if they're needed, and see how things unfold. I look forward to seeing what the Bakers come up with. I'm encouraged that it's not being rushed to market.

I use a lot of different DAWs. They all have bugs. Windows has bugs. MacOS has bugs. More complex programs have more bugs than simpler programs. Books have typos. Movies have continuity problems. Doctors misdiagnose. NASA lost the Mars Climate Orbiter in 1999 because of a miscalculation translating between metric and imperial units of measurement. And I wouldn't get into a self-driving Tesla, if you know what I mean. Although a lot of people claim to have come up with the phrase "the grass is always greener where you water it," the phrase originated with Robert Fulghum: “The grass is not, in fact, always greener on the other side of the fence. No, not at all. Fences have nothing to do with it. The grass is greenest where it is watered. When crossing over fences, carry water with you and tend the grass wherever you may be.” I don't have problems with DAWs because I live within their limitations, which all DAWs have. There will never be a perfect DAW, so the goal is to work with the one that best fits your needs. But also remember the words of Erma Bombeck: "The grass is always greener over the septic tank."

As some of you may know, my "Sound, Studio, and Stage" online forum/discussion group has been in continuous operation since 1995, so I've seen a lot of changes come and go. The "lack of activity" in a forum like this is, IMHO, a good thing. By and large the people who post here are cool, helpful, and follow decorum. The forum also has a database aspect, because you can find answers to older topics much more easily than on Facebook. The site that hosts my forum, musicplayer.com, had a huge dropoff in participation when Facebook became the behemoth it is today. BUT the end result was the "social media" aspect of the site disappeared, while the tech part remained. Also, participation in my forum keeps creeping back up as people get burned out on social media in general. I think something parallel is happening here. My participation in this forum is I scan for topics that have only a few replies, and see if I can help. For quite a while, it was common for threads to have no replies for quite a while. However, these days, I see fewer and fewer threads that don't already have multiple intelligent responses by the time I find them. Obviously I don't know what the stats are here, but it seems participation certainly isn't falling off. And so many of the people posting here are pure gold if you use Cakewalk (and even if you don't, there's a lot of useful advice). I think the quality of the people here is off the hook, so the quantity doesn't really matter.

Would it take less time just to put new users in a queue for approval, or is participation growing too fast for that to be an option?

I've had to do a lot of transfers from one DAW to another over the years, and basically use OutrageProductions' approach. My experience is that you'll want to make changes in the target program anyway that will influence the mix, so all you really need to do is export the raw tracks. OMF doesn't do much other than pan position and level. It doesn't check whether the two programs are using the same pan law, so you have to check that manually. And it gets really complicated if there are tempo changes, so having the MIDI-based tempo map available is crucial.

It's not difficult to do this in Cakewalk with delays, buses, and filters. I'm pretty sure I wrote about how to do this at some point, but I can't find it.

...with the irony being that the master gets maximized to end up with 6 dB of total dynamic range 🤣

There are two unique aspects to Sonarworks and Slate VSX. Sonarworks has a version that includes speaker calibration. Slate VSX removes a variable by including headphones designed specifically for the system, but of course, that adds to the cost. In general, the plugins that emulate studios/rooms I find to be fun for listening, but (personal bias alert!) for mixing I want a flat response, with no added binaural/spatial characteristics. However, if you don't have a decent speaker setup, they can provide reality checks for what your mixes may sound like over speakers.

Indeed, and part of that is knowing them well enough to match them with the kind of music you record. I've done a lot of classical music sessions, and you can hear the difference between something like a high-priced, linear-phase EQ and a generic minimal phase EQ. But for rock/country/EDM, a less expensive generic plugin may give the sound you want. For example, the phase shifts in minimal-phase EQs add character that a linear-phase EQ cannot. Some of the high-priced plugsins that do vintage emulations justify the price by saying that they're able to reproduce hardware's imperfections perfectly True story: Waves was emulating IIRC a channel strip, and it all measured out to be a perfect emulation. But their testers said something didn't sound quite right. The designers were sure they had nailed the emulation, the testers were sure they had not. Long story short - Waves emulated the noise and hum iherent in the hardware, and the people doing the blind testing then thought the plugin sounded right. Thankfully Waves is one of the companies that adds switches for that kind of thing, so you don't have to add that "character" if you don't want it.

VSX asnd Sonarworks are quite different. VSX is designed to emulate the experience of listening on speakers in a physical studio (like the Waves NX series of plugins). Sonarworks comes with curves for a ton of different headphones that flatten the headphone response. It's not a perfect process because of manufacturing tolerances on headphones, but with a quality set of headphones, that's not an issue. VSX includes headphones, so that eliminates one variable. However, I've found you need a decent headphone amp to get the best performance from the VSX. A lot of the headphone amps in audio interfaces are underpowered, and I the VSX was a disappointment until I hooked it up with a good headphone amp. It made a huge difference. The VSX system emulates several different rooms, but it also emulates a flat response and a Sennheiser 650, which is really close to flat. It also has some emulations of cell phone, car, etc. although the Audified Mixchecker plugin does a good job of emulating real-world music butchering systems . The full Sonarworks version can also tune your speakers, which is a useful addition. I have Sonarworks and VSX, and wrote a review of the previous version of Sonarworks (Reference 4, which is quite similar to the newer ID version). It's in the Library section of craiganderton.org. One other VERY important aspect I forget to mention: mixing at low volume for the bulk of your mixing time is the best approach. Your ears have a natural limiting effect at high levels, and there's the Fletcher-Munson curve to contend with. If the sound is a little bass- and treble-shy at low volumes, and a little too hot at higher levels, then you've done the best you can. After mixing at low volumes, turn up the level as a reality check. If the bass and treble are too loud, go back and trim them a bit. You have no idea about the levels of the playback system over which your music will play. The one thing I can guarantee is that every single listener will hear a different mix--and it won't be the one you did!

The real problem isn't headphones or speakers, it's that every playback system will be different. These days, the differences are even more radical then they were a few decades ago - earbuds, sound bars, traditional speakers, portable bluetooth speakers, etc. Sadly, one of the main ways people listen to music is through computer speakers and even (the horror!) laptop/tablet/smartphone speakers. I believe earbuds are the next most common. No matter what the music sounds like to you, it won't sound that way to others. I used to mix on speakers and do a reality check on headphones. These days, I mix on headphones and do a reality check on speakers because I believe more listeners will be listening on headphones, or otherwise compromised playback systems. If you mix on headphones, I feel the Sonarworks system is essential. Most headphones "hype" the sound in one way or another. When you flatten the response, whether with Sonarworks or something like the Slate VSX, the sound will seem flat and dull. This is as it should be. Aim for a high quality, balanced, accurate mix. The consumer playback system will add the hype. The best you can hope for is a mix that sounds a little bit bad on everything haha, rather than superb on some playback systems and like crap on others. One trick I use to help rock mixes translate is tape saturation on bass. The added harmonics allow the bass to be heard better on systems that can't reproduce the fundamental frequencies. Psychoacoustically, your ear fills in the missing fundamental when it hears the harmonics. Because bass lines are usually single notes, you don't get unpleasant intermodulation distortion. When I "finish" a mix after using speakers and headphones, the reality is that it's not finished. I check it out on a Samsung S23, IK Multimedia iLoud, MacBook Pro, YouTube's nasty data compression, and a Honda car stereo. If I can hear all the elements I want to hear on those systems, then the mix is truly finished. (P.S. If you want to hear a mix that translates well over just about anything, set the time machine for 1979 and check out Tom Petty's "Damn the Torpedoes." It doesn't matter whether you like the music or not, just listen to how it uses the audio spectrum to create something eminently translatable.)

Personal bias alert: I try to use the minimal number of plugins, not because I'm an elitist or think I record such cool tracks I don't need them, but because I find that each plugin obscures the underlying sound to some degree. Sometimes it's an improvement, and sometimes it isn't. There's a famous story about Sound on Sound doing an installment of their Mix Rescue series, where they go to someone's house and write an article about what they did to improve the mix. In one instance, the owner asked if they wanted tea, and went off into the kitchen. While he was making tea, the SOS folks bypassed all the plugins so they could hear what the raw tracks sounded like. When the owner returned, he was shocked. "Wow! What did you do? It sounds so much better!" So, I'd recommend starting a mix with no plugins, unless they're essential (e.g., amp sims for an amp sound, or a dotted eighth-note delay on an instrument that forms part of the overall rhythm). Get as good a balance of the instruments as possible. Then, think strategically about which tracks are lacking in one way or another. Start with adding EQ where necessary, and then move on to dynamics. Once those are squared away, you can start thinking about ear candy effects.

Does Reaper install some kind of generic ASIO driver, like ASIO4ALL? I've experienced issues with playback on some systems if a generic ASIO driver is simply installed, even if Cakewalk isn't selecting it as a driver.