abacab

If I was going to judge the hardware being used, I believe that it is fair to say that starting with a mobile processor at 2Ghz core frequency definitely limits the possibilities. Could be that something in Cakewalk "slightly" tilted the performance margin in such a way that someone running a DAW at 3-4 Ghz wouldn't notice.

Dimension LE was bundled with Sonar 7 only, then replaced with Dimension Pro for Sonar 8 thru Platinum. FYI, it is a 32-bit VST2. I can only see it being useful if you have old projects that include it. Dim Pro is better! Not sure why it won't install, unless maybe the installer needs Sonar 7 installed first?

Haha! I've found that you can rarely beat Larry to a deal! He has skillz!!!

I totally understand the advice about system tuning being given, as that is fundamental to good audio performance, and essential to any DAW. But I am a bit cautious to rush to blame the hardware in this case, because the OP stated in the first post that it was only happening with Cakewalk, and not the other DAW he tested with. Could something actually have changed in Cakewalk recently to affect performance? Just asking for a friend, so please don't flame me ...

Did you give LatencyMon a try yet?

You will probably need to contact support@cakewalk.com

Try checking that your Windows power scheme is set to "Performance". That is a mobile processor and the default is probably balanced or something like that. If so that would be trying to conserve power at the expense of performance.

What type of track is the source audio track? If it is multiple instruments already mixed into a stereo 2-track, that would be impossible to unmix and convert to midi. If you have audio stems for each instrument track isolated, then the rules of monophonic (bassline or melody) and polyphonic (chords) would apply to either the basic version or the upgraded version of Melodyne.

If you have a full install of Sonar Platinum with plugins BEFORE you install Cakewalk by BandLab, your plugins will be detected by the Cakewalk plugin scanner. It sounds like your issue is with getting Sonar Platinum and the related plugins installed. Maybe try contacting Steam, or sending an email to support@cakewalk.com.

Cakewalk may use multiple cores, but a virtual instrument typically only uses one core assigned, as the processing is serial, rather than parallel. To allow others to help you better, you may want to provide a bit more info about your hardware specs and settings. Clicks and pops can be due to a lot of things.

https://www.pluginguru.com/products/unify-demo/

Waves?

I recall once upon a time that a Steinberg demo installer slipped a "Generic" ASIO driver onto my machine, which prevented Cakewalk from detecting my "real" ASIO setup. That experience showed me that it is best to make sure there is only one installed, as @scook suggested.

Getting weaker...

Using BandLab Assistant, click the dropdown menu next to "Cakewalk", and you will see "Install Add-ons..."

OK, now my resistance is getting really weak...

Ok, that FORUM code works. Sorry, I thought I had tried them all. My browser keeps a list of everything I've typed in that field.

Try it now... FORUM is good, but GROUP is not. All good now!

Just logged into my account at JRR and tried it. Larry straightened me out. FORUM works, but GROUP does not.

That didn't last long ...

Not any more ... EDIT: FORUM works now, but GROUP does not.

Looks like the author has created a new site on Patreon, and is uploading clean versions of the plugins there... https://www.patreon.com/analogobsession

This usually only happens to me on occasion, such as if Cakewalk has suffered an sudden abnormal crash first, as caused by a bad plugin. In that case, it is possible that the audio driver is left in a "dirty" state, and is not released by Cakewalk, so the system won't let you kill the task. I used to reboot to fix this, until I discovered that resetting the device usually helps release it. It happens so infrequently, that I can live with it. And I am running an end of life audio device with Win 7 drivers, on the latest Win 10 update.

Which matters not one bit if some of them sound "good".

Whenever I cannot kill Cakewalk in task manager, usually I just reset my audio interface (off/on) and that fixes it. Somehow Cakewalk and the audio interface driver got "hung up".