Darion

I think the file converter program I was using was producing corrupted files because I got a different one and the FLACs it made worked fine.

While trying to load some stems into Cakewalk, I was given a message saying "Cannot play back the file. The format is not supported." This happened with a FLAC file which is weird because I know that FLACs usually work in Cakewalk. These FLACs in particular had been run through my file converter in order to reduce their file size from their previous WAV format. I'm wondering if there is a way to fix this issue or if maybe I should find another file converter. The one I've been using usually works really well though so...

I rolled back from V Collection X to V Collection 9 and it no longer freezes and is much more usable. I also installed the VST3 instead of the .dll in case this was somehow the issue. CPU usage also doesn't appear as high anymore. I'm still not comfortable with the CPU usage but it isn't broken like before. I may get a more powerful laptop soon anyways.

Thanks for your reply. It seems to only happen with my Arturia synths from the V Collection X. I only have like three other synths that aren't Arturia and they don't seem to have this problem. They're also not as graphically intense. Cakewalk doesn't die until I actually click on the icon for it to display the GUI of the synths. Because I haven't always had this issue, I thought it may have happened because I upgraded/updated my Arturia synths to the newest versions a few months back and that that may be what caused the issue. Still not sure... Even without the GUI open, Cakewalk still hovers at around 55-60% while playing the audio from the synths. I was mixing a song earlier that was about 60 tracks of audio and my CPU was only hovering at around 30%. Once GUI is opened and midi is playing, CPU usage on Cakewalk goes up to about 60-70% and GPU goes from about 5% to 15%. Is it possible that the CPU is doing some of the GPU's job and that I could change a setting somewhere that would offload some of that work? I've had this laptop for two years and use it frequently for this kind of stuff so is it likely that my CPU just doesn't work as well as it used to or could it be that the newer Arturia versions are just more CPU heavy? Maybe both? I feel like it's a fixable issue without having to buy a new laptop or processor or anything because that doesn't seem to be the culprit to me. Also could memory usage play a factor? I only have about 3 GB left on my storage. If you need specs for a better idea let me know.

Whenever I load a soft synth into cakewalk it works fine with midi information and all but as soon as I click on it and actually open it up everything slows down and eventually becomes unusable. This doesn't happen with plugins. I don't know why it's doing this or how to prevent it. My laptop doesn't have the strongest processor but this hasn't been an issue for the past two years I've been using Cakewalk so I don't know why it is now. When I have a synth opened up and am playing audio through it, Cakewalk freezes and Task Manager is telling me that Cakewalk is using 60% cpu and 500 mb of memory on a project with seven midi tracks with just one in use.

It would just so happen that I figured it out right before you posted your reply. But you were correct! It had to do with an issue outside of Cakewalk; the setting "Audio Enhancements" in my computer's main audio settings was set to "Device Default Effects" instead of "Off" which was the culprit for the change in tone. All I had to do was turn it off. Cakewalk must have some way of bypassing it because after turning off the setting, everything outside of Cakewalk began to have the same tone and sound. Thanks for your reply though!

In the process of mastering a song, I've noticed that the audio sounds a bit different when it's played live in Cakewalk then when it does outside of the program. If I play the song outside of Cakewalk through Media Player or Youtube for example, it sounds a bit cleaner and bassier whereas in Cakewalk the midrange pops out a lot more. I thought this may have been the result of exporting from Cakewalk and something to do with my bit depth but no. This difference is noticeable before the audio is even modified by Cakewalk. I think it might be something to do with the playback settings in Cakewalk but not sure about any of that technical stuff. Any explanations?

It worked! I just had to create a send on the audio bus of sounds and put a send to the separate reverb bus. Thanks!

I have a group of tracks routed to a single bus and wanted to use a reverb plugin of mine on the bus instead of having to for each individual track. Usually with single tracks, I just duplicate the track and put the FX on one track with only the wet signal activated. This helps me to mix the dry and wet signals. I obviously can't duplicate the audio bus and was wondering how I should go about this.

Thanks!

I know this is silly but I accidentally moved the multidock to appear above the tracks. I don't how I did it but I can't get it back down to the bottom of the screen to where I originally had it. It's really throwing me off too.

Ok. It took me a minute to figure how to get Mix Recall to pop up but I did that and was able to view the raw mix. I created two scenes of my mixed tracks and then reset one of them to the raw version. So now, I can easily flip between them. I could also use this as a tool for making multiple mixes which is cool. Thank you all so much for your help!

I have gotten the multitracks for some songs off of the internet and have been mixing those songs for practice. After mixing, I've been wondering if there's any way that I can view my projects in their raw state without having to turn all the faders back to 0 and having to strip away all the FX plug-ins manually. I don't even know if this is possible but it would be nice.