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Then get out, LOL!!! ?

Yup. Weird. ?

Talent. The best DAW is the one you know. I have looked at the Reason DAW in the past and I never saw any reason to learn yet another DAW. But the rack and rack instruments made it special, with an edge. Now I am glad that they are doing away with ReWire, and making the rack available as a plugin. ?

The simplest way to start out with synth tracks is to insert them as a simple instrument track. One way (and there are several) is to simply go to the Cakewalk top menu bar and select Insert> Soft Synth > choose any synth from the pulldown menu. Then when greeted by the "Insert Soft Synth Options" panel, simply select "Simple Instrument Track" and click OK. The simple instrument track automatically sets up your MIDI & audio track as one combined instrument track, with all the MIDI & audio routing taken care of. Eventually you may want them as separate tracks , but for starters I do recommend this method first! A synth requires both tracks if used separately.

I would stay away from 32-bit plugins as much as possible. Especially ones that are no longer maintained or supported. When they quit working properly on a modern computer, then it's time to move on and find a replacement. Since BandLab has not been selling the former Cakewalk plugins yet, 3rd party options are the best bet for now. I'll just throw this deal out there... buy any plugin at Plugin Boutique and get this Reason Rack Lite plugin for FREE with any purchase! Plugin Boutique is currently selling iZoptope Iris 2 for $10. Just saying... https://www.pluginboutique.com/product/1-Instruments/4-Synth/1303-Iris-2 Or get AIR Xpand!2 for $14.99, an all around ROMpler with 2400+ instrument sounds. https://www.pluginboutique.com/product/1-Instruments/64-Virtual-Instrument/1560-Xpand-2 So for $25 you get a spectral filtering sampler with 10GB of extra sample content, and a ROMpler, plus the Reason Rack Lite plugin. ?

I see from your screen capture that you have Sonar Professional. I believe Loopmasters was only included with Platinum.

https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/jrrshop.com

Any standard USB audio interface will work. If your hardware tone generators have stereo audio outputs then you will need at least a module with 2 inputs. Run your hardware audio outputs into the audio interface. Once an audio interface is installed on your PC, Cakewalk will recognize those inputs as available to assign to audio tracks. Enable record on them and you're good to go.

Laughed at "already have cool stuff lol".

TTS-1 is really the only solution in the box for opening up multi-timbral General Midi (GM) song files... And it usually does that quite well. However, I would use other sound sources if I was creating something from scratch though... AIR Xpand!2 is a good budget starting point for sketching a new composition. Quite a variety of instruments, and the quality usually exceeds that of TTS-1. It even offers 4 part multi-timbral use. Not GM, though. But insert 4 instances, and you have 16 channels of MIDI to work with.

Agreed. I think I will finish the learning v4 from the courses I bought for that, before upgrading to v5. Patience is a virtue!

Yes, the 10GB extra samples are not locked to Iris 2. Use them anywhere!

That's a lot of what Luftrum, the sound designer does. This was just an example of his work and it shows off nicely the capability of spectral filtering, which is Iris unique skill set. But you can make any type of sounds that your samples will accommodate, plus the standard analog oscillator waveforms are included: sine, saw, triangle, square, pulse, and noise. You have four wave slots to work with so you could mix and match osc and samples to make a hybrid of your samples and standard osc. Plus in addition to the core factory presets, Iris 2 comes with a 10 GB sample library (without presets) that you can use any way you want to create your own sounds. It's an interesting sound design toolbox. ?

Just do it! LOL! Then get this sound pack from Luftrum, https://www.luftrum.com/luftrum10 For $23, that is an amazing upgrade!

Check your email for 'sent from' "jrrshop.com - sales". I did and everything that I have bought from them has been successfully registered with the vendors. But I really hope that Plugin Boutique doesn't ever go away. I have a crap ton of installer instructions and download links in there... ?

Studio One v5 looks promising, but think I will wait for the first update before messing with it... ?

You have to de-authorize an activation from your old machine with the vendor using their process BEFORE uninstalling or decommissioning the old install on the previous machine. Process varies by vendor. This frees up the used number of activations with the vendor. But then you will have to run the plugin installer again from scratch on the new machine and authorize it all over again. No copying files and registry keys... if only it were that simple!

They install side by side so no loss of DAW. But back up copies of your v4 projects because once saved in v5, they cannot be used in v4 again.

Just to be clear, Rapture and Rapture Session/Pro are completely different products. The fist Rapture (classic) was available in Sonar 7 thru X1 as an LE version (the full version was available for sale as a standalone), and then the full version was bundled with X2 thru Platinum. Rapture Pro was a completely reworked product that combined Dimension Pro and Rapture. It was never bundled with Sonar, but the Rapture Session was. Session was intended to be a step up freebie that would import your Dimension Pro, Rapture (classic), and Sound Center presets. Session is still a nice player/librarian for those sounds.

I believe Rapture Session was included to replace the aging Sound Center...

The easiest thing would probably be to just run the installer for Sonar X3 and use the selective install (I forgot the exact name, advanced or something) so that you can set it for just the plugins you want, and not the Sonar application. That way you can avoid uninstalling and reinstalling CbB.

One thing in this discussion that is not entirely clear to me is whether you are trying to record a MIDI track, or the audio output from the drum VST to an audio track? Both are possible, but the recording methods are each unique in their approach.