John Vere

If you have been here long enough you would know the the op has good reasons to stay with 8.5 as she uses an app that speaks when you hold the mouse over stuff and it apparently only works with 8.5. Anyway, Annabelle I’m thinking you should see if you can just stay with the older VST2 version. I use old systems for my live shows ( W7) and I mostly just stay with the apps of the same vintage.

I totally agree. I was thinking yesterday that generally most of us Sonar/ Cakewalk users tend to stay away from the whole Bandlab culture. The original app was much despised as our way to install Cakewalk. So you see how clever these folks are. I think they are very top notch marketing experts at work. Not only have they created a huge user base with the free software. Now with this Backstage pass they will draw those of us who have basically ignored that whole part of the company in. As I’ve been saying Bandlab is now a full featured Music Business including not only software but music management and distribution. A one stop shop. I also heard they make gear but haven’t checked that out yet.

Exactly and why it should have cost around $500 all along. That’s what the average price of a full featured DAW has always been This was a simple marketing ploy they used and I think worked brilliantly. I have no clue what the actual numbers are but since Cakewalk was made free my guess is the user base grew from thousands to multi millions. So to simplify the math. 2017 - 1 user 2024- 100 users So even half of that is a huge increase in users. And then we will see another increase as Sonar hopefully gains respect from the DAW community in general. Believe it or not a lot of people avoid free software.

@Duncan Stitt You can most certainly set up Cakewalk with playlist and then you will definitely have to purchase Sonar in the future. There’s lots of info spread all over this forum but I’ll just state the basic facts for you. Cakewalk uses a authorization system that Bandlab can deactivate any time they choose. They are going to keep it active only so people can transition to Sonar. The end date is unknown but will come. You need to have installed the very latest version to take advantage of the borrowed time. Sonar is now available as a early access version watch this video for info https://youtu.be/7CfkcisYtLI?si=h2iD8_teOHIV__uC It most certainly has the playlist and we are hoping in the future they upgrade it. The TTS-1 has become old and unstable and Roland asked Cakewalk to remove it so they did. There’s lots of alternatives to GM players. Watch this. https://youtu.be/kF3tEttGdIQ?si=fE2pYVduYk_EwoeA or better yet use better VST instruments watch this https://youtu.be/LI040J9apwU?si=ZlhSrJeLQ7QxFx5D

I did a bunch of research which really only scratched the surface of what is out there. I made a video explaining about the topic. https://youtu.be/kF3tEttGdIQ?si=fE2pYVduYk_EwoeA But just today I tried to open a project that I know for sure I had added the TTS-1 later in the game being after the steel drum patch. and it crashed the minute I hit playback. I now have Coyote player so I swapped for that and it stopped crashing. Note: I’m using CbB as I was having issues with Sonar midi editing. Anyhow Coyote even sounds better to me so it’s good riddance TTS-1 for me.

That’s because they are?I actually own a whole drum kit but it’s a lot of work making that happen. And in the end I get real drums that both sound bad and are played badly too! I just totally reworked this with a Mandolin as the focus. I decided it works better as a bluegrass song.

Why are people so dang worried about the cost? Please everyone, the day is coming soon when you will know the answer so why waist brain cells even thinking about it. Cakewalk is still free, Use it. If you want to try Sonar create a Bandlab Backstage pass and use it. The Backstage pass for Bandlab membership is just like all the other Music delivery sites. You pay monthly or annually they are all like that. I think I paid $30 for an annual Membership to Distrokid.

This is highly unlikely as well. Those few users who refuse to pay will not be a financial risk to the company. Nobody ever said Cakewalk would be free forever so if you used it, then it was your choice. There’s a few fee DAWs out there but they have very limited features. But that's an option for people with no money and a $2,000 gaming laptop ?. . The developers have said they will be offering inexpensive versions of Sonar in the future. Example I like to use -- Sonar Home Studio was only $50. I have it still installed and I could easily produce a high quality recording with it. Remember the staff that work at Cakewalk are not the owners, Bandlab is. And the Cakewalk staff need to make a living from this. Already lots of people have switched to other DAW’s. So what. It’s your money, go ahead and spend it. Doesn’t hurt to own other software if you can afford it. I have Cubase 7 and the upgrade alone is $400. Most of Cakewalk’s competitors cost well over $500. So please don’t complain or waist brain cells worrying about what it will cost. We will know soon.

Actually the price of the Backstage pass is on par with what other music delivery service charge. Take a look at what is available to you as other services. This is no different than DistroKid or CD baby. These delivery services are making big bucks on the backs of the millions of wannabe “creators”. ( notice I didn’t say musician). Seems every week a new one pops up. Even Sound Click just changed into one. Anyhow the backstage pass is worth more than just admitting you to Sonar.

Do you have Melodyne license?

What is actually very cool is you can flip between Cakewalk and Sonar seamlessly. or even have them both open. I’ve totally gotten over the theme issues by applying the colours to the track strips. I’ve gotten used to the icons etc. It’s just like anything else that changes. After a given amount of time it becomes normal. The only thing I can’t get used to is a dark PRV!!

Sorry I was unaware of this change with version 5. Most certainly worth upgrading. I guess all my computers have older versions of Sonar and Cakewalk so they probably install version 4. I now have Studio 5 but it is only authorized on my main DAW. The midi conversation definitely was working for me on all 5 of my other systems. Some are W7. But all have latest versions of CbB. I’ll have to fire them up and check. I probably need to update to this latest version anyways.

Audio to midi doesn’t require a Melodyne license. Never did. But the dialogue box to choose percussive or melodic doesn’t appear. you can still open Melodyne and change that. So it’s a good idea not to uninstall Melodyne even though you can’t use the editor.

@Jim Stamper I think your reply is the best one so far. And it points out that there is a lot too it right now as far as attempting activation without knowing the steps. Seems for most people it's very straight forward. And that Big Green Activation successful is the sign that we are now good until the pull the plug down the road. Yes you can remove the Bandlad Assistant. It serves no purpose unless you use the Bandlab app I think. Actually I never had to install it on this new computer.

Ya to bad you are taking this so personally, we are only trying to help. And nobody notices when people "leave" it's the internet. The mistake you made was not explaining clearly what happened in your OP, It took 2 pages to find out! And now I actually see what happened, my original reply would have been totally different. But then, no excuse as it is a two fold issue. First - you made the mistake of not saving as you worked, you would have known all was lost after only 5 -10 minutes. And the activation process is "user Beware" at this point in time. A lot just changed and we are all on borrowed time with CbB. You are not to blame because only regualars to this forum would be totally aware of all of this knowledge. The activation to in app happened last fall. As well as the announcement that you had to update to the latest version to stay activated. Not everyone is aware of this but as said, there's always perils to using free software. And using CbB it's a good idea to stay up to date right now as things are changing fast.

This seems hard too believe but if so you have my partial sympathy now. Are you saying the activation showed during a sessions and not at start up?

Because that is NEVER happening. Why not be realistic about it and offer to pay.

Sorry it sounds harsh, but really, the way it works is you open Cakewalk ( Sonar) and if it needs activating it gives you a huge red notification that is impossible to ignore. You implied that you lost work which then implies you ignored the warning even though it says "You will not be able to save your work" And once again sorry if this sounds harsh but we all make mistakes and we learn from them. Working on a project for more than 10 minutes with out saving has been proven to be dangerous by many. I have set up signal keystroke to save and I hit it as often as possible. Just write it of as a lesson well received. Nobody here is being purposefully mean to you.

Thanks I'll see If I can just disable it, I have no need of this feature really. It was loud because I wasn't expecting it. And my volume level just so happened to still be on at unity as I had been mixing. I normally do most work at about -65db. or less. My wife can only listen to so many takes !

@User 905133 For some reason the Op screen shot is not showing on my phone? I opened on my laptop and I see what you are saying. Sorry. Doesn’t the metronome go directly to the Hardware outs? If so then possibly the master bus is muted.

I have a series of videos to explain most of the basic stuff. My Channel https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7YqVth30eGsURWrKGeu-fFyg3ETjF-Ox&si=rPDmAhZCOiKc1QcD

What is still a mystery to me is this new vector graphics is obviously not as clear and easy to use for a lot of people reporting so far. So in what way was it deemed to be an upgrade? I was expecting something weird and different but it actually comes across as making Sonar worse than Cakewalk not better. Didn’t the beta testers complain?

Exactly You won’t get any sympathy from anyone you should have kept this to your self.

I guess you don’t get out much. You can travel the world and every where you go, especially tourists hot spots there will be a little duo with a keyboard and guitar player pounding out Proud Mary and all those other classic rock and country songs. And guess what a lot of them are using for backing tracks? General Midi. It gets the job done. You get paid and you’re hopefully having fun. It’s live music at its lowest common denominator. But one thing you will learn as you grow older, is the punters can’t tell the difference. All they hear is Rolling, Rolling Rolling on the River . They are dancing , drunk and having fun. GM can help you be part of this with out needing a whole band. Whole bands take up table space and cost too much. I actually didn’t use GM until much later in life. I just made my own midi files. I personally can totally get by with out a GM player. I’m just making a suggestion I feel would benefit Sonar. Cakewalk has a much bigger following of old school GM users that many of you realize. This is a global community. I can tell from the names of the people who are subscribing to my YouTube channel how global we really are. My tutorial on using the TTS-1 has double the views of most of my other videos.

Is this not available yet? @Noel Borthwick @Jesse Jost I have a few questions and I opened the documentation but It seems its the Cakewalk 2022.11: version covered. First- is some of the Start screen projects have the Preview icon but most don't. It scared the heck out of me when I found the one that did and the project played at 110 db! Second- I did manage to open the spectrograph in the Pro Channel but I had to open , close it a few time before it shows in the mini view of the EQ. This is why I was confused about it's existence. It seems you have to enable the EQ. But it doesn't show unless you turn the EQ on and off a couple of times. Third- I'm finding Mix recall having trouble retaining saving . You save it and it doesn't always show on the list. As you see in the screen shot scene 1 and 2 are missing even in the folder and 3 is missing on the recall list? . This is a brand new project 100% Sonar built. I'll see if I can repro it in a different project tomorrow. Everything else is just wonderful. I'm slowly getting over not having a white PRV.