Noel Borthwick

This is unlikely to be a redist issue. The membership screen should always be shown only when the app is visible in the background. Start a new thread and attach a video to show the problem.

On 6/28/2025 at 10:48 AM, Wayne Bangert said:

I miss the feature that Cakewalk / Bandlab has in the startup screen. The ability to show PLAT LIST SET files. This is very handy for grouping projects together and for live performance.

This has been addressed for the next release.

39 minutes ago, Larry T. said:

So, you think my current PC with the I7-4770 CPU at 3.40GHz with only 8GB ram will run a full Sonar install ok?? 

Thanks again 👍

If its already running Cbb then its a very good chance it will work as well or better.
You can easily verify for yourself by downloading Sonar and running the Free tier with your largest project.

6 minutes ago, Jim Fogle said:

    On 6/29/2025 at 9:38 AM, Noel Borthwick said:

    Post August Cbb will cease to activate which means you will no longer be able to save projects from there which is the normal behavior when the app is not activated. It will probably continue to load projects and playback.

@Noel Borthwick Once Cakewalk by Bandlab ceases to activate will the program be able to export any audio files such as individual tracks, sub mixes and main out?

No without activation the program cannot save or export.

On 6/29/2025 at 4:56 PM, Tez said:

Start Screen Issue:

When Sonar is opened for the first time in a windows session the Start Screen is non-functional, Sonar has to be closed & reopened before the Start Screen functions normally. This maybe system related I wouldn't know.  

This is most likely system related where Windows is delaying access to something. If you can reproduce it capture a dump file of Sonar in that state from task manager using "create memory dump" and send a link. That will pinpoint whats causing the delay/hang.

On 6/29/2025 at 7:47 PM, Tez said:

Once again thanks for the explanation, but closing the project without saving should get rid of all bounce generated files,  only the bounce gets deleted while the "preview" lingers, that can't be right and as I stated "This did not happen  with a single instrument midi track test project so it's not typical behavior" this is an anomalous glitch and the cause is a mystery to me...

Please keep this thread specific to issues related to this release. As others have explained generated files are not deleted by design because they can be reused or shared by other elements or even used as part of undoing an operation. Its normal operation of the program. Use Clean audio folder periodically.

9 hours ago, OeAi said:

Can you put the <Free License \\ Get Membership> into menu bar or make it +one more menu
it takes 40px but has no sense
for example you can show it on the start, but slide out after loading project
if you can put it in the default windows bar - it's alright too 

the different way - is to put the spectrum analyzer between those <licn> [..''''',,,;;;;;'''' ] <memb>
with 4-6 strings inside, with ability to make it biger with membership for example
and you can put there instrument names for red dots of whole track - kinda clipping analyzer
can be vertical string - track1 track2 or usual text with pointers

maybe you will be also alright to consider start the <evaluation> window first with logo screen ?
there is only the Cakewalk.Sonar and membership button is shown anyway all the time

For example - when you press - get membership  - this screen features should reappear first
everybody happy
and you can put few more screens to browse there, just with pics of features
maybe linked with manual for prochannel for example

Also for templates - it looses picture from Notes, while it shows it on start screen after saving,
and for that Artist + Name + Picture etc - it should be exported in Audio file tags

And for mp3 for example there are more param keys, than just bitrate,
this can work not only for mp3s so - the export string can be quite sophisticated
-> not availabe - or just as a screen with param switches \ presets
-m s f j -q -X

For some reason - start screen - is not shown on start ( ? because of evaluaton screen ? )
and if it is shown - close app window - is not working

One of the major problems i have - is a difference with realtime and offline render,
even for freezing some instruments . thiis means - some params or preset changes missused

If you have feature requests post it in the appropriate feature requests section. Obviously feature requests for the free version aren't prioritized

1 hour ago, Larry T. said:

Thanks so much Noel. My plan is to download the Free Tier, get a new PC with 64GB ram and a Graphics card in a few months and then upgrade to Sonar. Appreciate all the free years! 

Sounds good. Note that the current upgrade promo is the lowest its ever been so it may not be around when you do upgrade

1 hour ago, Max Arwood said:

When recycle is on plugins just use the same window. With it off I could single click on 2 plugins and the would have  separate windows no pinning needed. This was in Cakewalk  and Sonar no ctrl and no double click required. I’m going to go check it in Cakewalk. 

Its working exactly that way here. None of us can reproduce any issue. Recycle off means auto pinning so any new plugin windows will be pinned. This is exactly how it has worked before. No changes to this area. I suspect you are misunderstanding the feature or its project specific. Post a video. 

36 minutes ago, Larry T. said:

Question:

CWBB has worked great for me the last three years. I have an I7-4770 CPU at 3.40GHz with only 8GB ram.

If I download and install the Free Tier can my PC run it? TIA.

It will run a lot better! Sonar has massive optimizations compared to CbB especially when running at lower latencies. I tested workloads that would completely glitch out in Cbb but played clean in Sonar.

1 hour ago, Max Arwood said:

It seems that recycle plugin windows is stuck on. PLEASE fix this. I can barely work without several plugins open at the same time.

Thanks

It works perfectly here. How are you doing it. You have to CTRL-double click to open a plugin if you want it pinned. After that opening other plugin windows will leave that window open.

Read this:
http://legacy.cakewalk.com/Documentation?product=CakewalkSonar&language=3&help=Mixing.07.html

9 hours ago, warrickhale said:

I have just changed over from SONAR professional to the new Cakewalk SONAR after my laptop crashed. I have a number of SONAR projects created in SONAR professional  which used the plugin TH3 for guitar amp effects but when I open one of those projects in the new SONAR the plug-ins are missing. Can anyone suggest how I can proceed with these old projects? Do I have to find another guitar sim plug-in and use that to replace all of the instances of tracks where I was using TH3, or is there a way to access this old plug-in? I'd be grateful for any advice. Thank you.

If you get there membership version of Sonar, it includes THU which is backwards compatible with th3. Any projects containing th3 will be automatically migrated to thu

The fix is to contact izotope to fix their dpi bugs

No difference between membership tiers. The same frequency applies.

Hi Rob, this implies to me that your windows install is somehow compromised. What driver mode are you using in Sonar?
The kernel streaming components are typically loaded when the audio device is loaded in WDM mode (and perhaps WASAPI) but I dont believe its used in ASIO mode. I’ve not seen this component crash ever.
 

This is expected behavior and is how it works from the prior version. The browser now auto focuses the currently selected tab and minimizes the other docked views. This is to make better use of the limited real estate available in the vertical docked section. You can now double click the header of the synth rack to restore it.

All cakewalk projects are backwards compatible down to versions of our software from 2003.
Of course if you are utilizing newer features in the software those parts of the project wont be visible but the basics should still load.
Re CbB its moot since there will be only a single version of Sonar maintained going forward.

On 6/27/2025 at 10:19 AM, Canopus said:

The Sonar application is based on Cakewalk by BandLab, which in turn was based on Cakewalk SONAR Platinum, which in turn was based on Cakewalk SONAR X3, X2 and X1 in decending order. I’ve had them all. Hence, the codebase is not something new, although recent code maintenance, as well as new features, of course, are. Microsoft's C++ runtime library is indeed an integral part of Sonar, but, as I'm sure you know, the same goes for most Windows applications. 

Bottom line: the free version of Sonar is not a new piece of software. 

Its not a new piece of software but compared to Cbb there are vast areas of the code that have been optimized and reworked to be more modern.
Cakewalk Next on the other hand was built from the ground up over the last 7 years.

On 6/27/2025 at 9:47 AM, Bruce Gavin said:

I might be interested IF the Free Sonar edition makes full use of multi-core processors.

I'm 51 years in the computer business this year.
Rest assured there is a whole new crop of bugs in Free Sonar, just like EVERY other new piece of software.

The various Microsoft runtime libraries are constantly updated due to the endless bugs found in them.
The failure of Object Oriented code is a bug in the runtime is a bug for every user of that run time.

Those who write their apps to the latest and greatest runtimes are subject to the bugs in those latest and greatest runtimes.

It has vastly improved multi-core support and optimizations. Many users have reported vastly improved performance with Sonar compared to Cbb when running large workloads.
Here are some notes about multi-core low latency improvements and Plugin load balancing improvements. 
You are mistaken about newer runtimes making things worse. We use lots of tools and they are being frequently updated with bug fixes. We stay on top of it when we can to support current versions of the OS and also resolve known issues.

4 hours ago, Wayne Bangert said:

I miss the feature that Cakewalk / Bandlab has in the startup screen. The ability to show PLAT LIST SET files. This is very handy for grouping projects together and for live performance.

We can add the ability to view set lists in a future update.

Are you signed in to BandLab? BandLab sounds require an account to work. Also if you don't have a membership you currently can only preview sounds and not use then in your project.

On 6/22/2025 at 5:35 PM, Under A Mile said:

Debugging this : In the project where I first saw the problem, I had a MIDI track with >100 unflattened take lanes - set this to Archive and playback started instantly. Then I began culling the take lanes:  I am pretty sure the delay in starting playback is proportional to the number of MIDI take lanes, as the delay got shorter as I removed more. The instrument happened to be Cakewalk SI Electric Piano.  But I think it will occur with other instruments.

On another project, the delay was maybe only 1sec, and the same thing happened. I also think flattening the comp helped.

But, what I think could be an actual bug, is that when freezing a midi instrument, the number of takes lanes is still affecting the p/b start time. I would have thought that while frozen, the midi events on that track are irrelevant as we are just playing back a bounced audio track?

And I am fairly sure this got worse with 2025.06

 

Can you share a project that exhibits this?

On 6/22/2025 at 5:26 AM, TracingArcs said:

If I have any critisicm it is that having worked in Market Research for two decades. The launch could be better focussed and implemented. 

This is initially a soft launch. More formal launch will follow with website updates etc.

ARM64 support is now available in Sonar 2025.06. If you have an ARM PC Sonar will automatically install an ARM optimized version rather than an X64 version. Read more about it here.