Craig Anderton

A few comments, from someone who has engineered many Pro Tools sessions... Efficiency: Pro Tools started life on the Mac, Cakewalk on Windows. Because Cakewalk didn't have to go cross-platform, it could optimize performance with Windows. Audio engine: IIRC Cakewalk was the first to employ a 64-bit audio engine. The days of DAWs using 16- or 24-bit engines are (thankfully) well behind us. AFAIC, audio engines have more or less reached parity; any differences will likely be due to plugins in use, pan laws, etc. Hardware I/O is where the variables occur. But also, Cakewalk has an upsampling feature. Although not quite as relevant as when it first introduced due to computers getting faster and many plugins including internal oversampling, it can still make a significant improvement in sound quality under some conditions. Fader size: Hold shift to move the fader with more resolution. The mouse scroll wheel, with shift held, is also good for fine adjustments. For a control service, nothing has the same tight integration as the late, great V-Studio, but Mackie Control-compatible devices do all the important stuff (faders, mute, record, transport, etc.). I use the PreSonus Faderport 8, whose dedicated Sonar mode is compatible with Cakewalk by BandLab (however, the Faderport must have at least the 3.51 firmware). "Christmas Tree" Look: +1000 to Lord Tim's and Noel's comments. Cakewalk's user interface is highly customizable. In addition to Themes, Workspace Manager can not only simplify the "look and feel," but optimize the user interface for specific DAW-related tasks. Compared to Pro Tools, Cakewalk's show/hide and docking functionality is more developed. PT does have multi-mono mode for plugins, which is great for mid-side processing or independent processing of left and right channels. However, it's easy enough to do the same functionality in Cakewalk by splitting into buses. FWIW also check out Patch Points, which allow for highly useful routing possibilities. Hope this helps!

Thanks for the link! I didn't scroll down far enough.

Does Elements include spectral de-noise, only only Standard?

Yes, but I'm not sure the choice of frequencies is optimum. I've had better luck choosing odd harmonics, because sometimes the 60 Hz harmonics go up to 540 Hz. Doing additional notches at the even harmonics takes out more of the audio without providing (at least to my ears) the same benefits as doing odd harmonics only. (FWIW the hum reduction preset in Pro Tools uses odd harmonics only.) As to the Multiband, that's always been my secret weapon in Cakewalk! It allows for much narrower bands than many (most?) other multiband dynamics processors, which makes it super-useful for de-essing - just solo a band, and adjust the frequency range to cover the "s" sounds you want to reduce. Multiband also has a knee parameter, which most de-essers don't. That can be useful for giving a more natural de-essing effect. But speaking of Multiband...allow me to be an advocate for a minute. I wrote a tutorial on how to use the Multiband as a frequency splitter, frequency isolator, and if you set the compression ratio to 1.0, a five-band graphic equalizer with variable bands. It also makes a good crossover for multiband processing. And - it does upward expansion, which again is something you don't find in most multiband compressors. One good application is emphasizing drum or guitar strum transients in the upper band while compressing lower bands. It's a really useful plugin. (FWIW I'm not sure iZotope Elements has spectral de-noise, only voice de-noise as an adaptive process. To get noiseprint-type noise reduction, I think you have to move up to iZotope Standard. Maybe someone who has Elements can confirm.)

I got the sense from the OP that only a full mix was available, but that might have been an incorrect assumption. The best option by far is to go back to the original multitracks and nuke the noise at the source. You can often remove hum with super-steep notch filters. Start with 60 Hz, then add filters for odd harmonics if needed (180 Hz, 300 Hz, etc.). I wrote a blog post for how to do this in Studio One, but the same principle applies to any DAW. Cakewalk certainly has the filtering horsepower that's needed.

If there's a section with hiss that's isolated, there are tools that can take a "noiseprint" of the hiss, and subtract it from the file. The best ones (e.g., iZotope Rx) aren't cheap, but one of these free options might do the job for you.

Having had the opportunity to work with Noel, I can attest to the fact that what you see is what you get. His passion for what he does is what makes the difference. If he had a passion for running a restaurant, the food would be awesome

FWIW the Magix versions of Vegas and Sound Forge also include the Elastique Timestretch plugin.

Replace the track with a sampler. Load the audio file into the sampler, and apply pitch bend. Then, render the track to convert it to audio. I used this technique to pitch-correct vocals with an Emulator II in the days before Auto-Tune ?

Or any software: Master Tracks Pro, Studio Vision, MOTU FreeStyle, Temper, Project 5, Bars and Pipes, etc. Software has a lifecycle, like everything else. Personally, I'm not worried about Cakewalk. I'm sure Meng knows that if he wanted to make money with Cakewalk by selling add-ons, VIs, etc. in a Cakewalk store, he could. The fact that he doesn't perhaps implies that making bucks from Cakewalk is not a priority. There are plenty of reasons to keep it going, and few reasons to shut it down. [No inside knowledge, just how it looks to me.]

Past experience shows that the longer the time between updates, the more stuff (or the more in-depth stuff) the update includes.

I think your attempted fixes rule out that there's a problem with the external drives, because you get the same problem with different drives. It seems perhaps there's more of a processing bottleneck that's causing Cakewalk to take a long time converting the project into an exportable set of files. This could be any one of a number of things. Once this happened to me and it was because there was a blank CD-R in my optical drive. Go figure. Another user I worked with had similar problems to you and when he removed ASIO4ALL they went away. I doubt these are the culprits in our case but it just goes to show that if your computer gets hung up doing something you don't want it to do, it can slow down seemingly unrelated processes. Perhaps your best bet is to get support from Obedia.com. They're who I use for intractable Windows problems, they do a remote desktop probe and they've never failed to fix a problem. It costs $30 for 30 minutes of consultation (i.e., you "subscribe" for one month) but it's never taken them more than 10 minutes to solve whatever was ailing my computer.

That's a great tip, to which I'd add one more variation: I often copy the vocal, and play around with Melodyne to create one or more harmony lines. Then, I learn the harmony lines, and sing them.

...which reminds me of the famous line from the movie Spice World, where the producer (IIRC) says: "That was absolutely perfect...without actually being any good."

One more thing about pitch correction. I use pitch correction (admittedly, selectively) because it adds life to my music. Say what? Here's why: I can sing with more freedom, knowing that if a part were far better than other takes but there’s one bad note, pitch correction can fix that one note. It’s not necessary to re-record or punch, and potentially lose what made that take my favorite.

I don't know what kind of keyboard controller you have, but some of them can function as a control surface.

What many people don't realize is that even the Essential version can do polyphonic MIDI guitar. Yes, polyphonic. You can't edit polyphonic parts, but Melodyne will parse the MIDI data, which you can then use to trigger virtual instruments. You will have to clean up the part unless you play very cleanly, but simply deleting all notes shorter than a particular duration, and all notes under a certain velocity, will get rid of most of the glitches caused by false triggering. Like Jacques Boileau, I also use Melodyne with electric bass but let me explain why. The pitch of electric bass strings varies considerably as a note decays. There's nothing you can do with your playing to fix this, because bass strings are freaks of nature - they should be a lot longer than they are to produce notes that low in pitch, given a proper amount of string tension. Melodyne can even out those variations. This is important because at those low frequencies, the beating of the out-of-tune pitch with other instruments is noticeable. I even use Melodyne to do envelope-controlled flanging on drums. Melodyne can also move timing around. It's pretty awesome, actually.

Are you perhaps thinking of VCA Channels? If so, perhaps the following will help. This article describes how to achieve VCA-like functionality in Cakewalk. This video describes a similar, but alternate, approach.

Mark could probably give a definitive answer, but maybe if you created a symbolic link in the folder where Cakewalk does its auto-saves, and linked to a different drive, the files would be saved there?

It's worth having a hard drive with nothing but installers, authorization codes, updates, and the like. Then you don't have to spend hours downloading. Sometimes installers still need to verify your existence onnline, but it still saves a huge amount of time and frustration.

I wonder if running a Firewire adapter with Thunderbolt would be the most foolproof option. Wouldn't that "divorce" the Firewire from the PCs innards? I have no idea...just thinking out loud.

I not only agree, but mastering within Cakewalk offers some advantages you won't have with a conventional stereo mastering program. I wrote about assembling and mastering an album using Cakewalk in this Sound on Sound column. You'll see why I think sometimes mastering in a DAW is the preferred way to go. As to peak levels, you need to consider what's called "true peak" instead of what the meters in Cakewalk show. Sometimes, the conversion from digital to analog can create levels higher than the digital signal itself (as to why, this seems like a good time to do a self-serving plug for my latest book, The Musician's Audio Handbook). True Peak meters, such as the Waves WLM or the (free) meter from Youlean, take this into account and give what the peak reading would be after digital-to-analog conversion. Streaming services have their own preferred standards for true peak values. Typically, it's -1 dB for most material, and -2 dB if the file's LUFS reading is relatively high, like -10 LUFS. Note that just because a streaming service says it wants audio that reads -14 LUFS (or whatever) doesn't mean you need to hit that level. You can master to whatever LUFS level you want, and submit it to a streaming service. They'll simply turn it down to reach their target LUFS. Hope this helps!

But to be fair, after warning everyone I would be deleting the material eventually...and to copy the material if they wanted it, before it went away Anyway, the main reason I stopped by is that if anyone bought Max Your Mix!, there will be a free update coming out soon (around the end of November 2022). It includes new material about mixing with headphones, room simulation software, data compression and file exporting, how match levels in an album or collection of songs, and added information on mid-side processing, panning laws, and mix referencing/mix analysis tools (including in-depth information on the LUFS and LRA specifications). To get the free update, just use the same download code you used to download the original copy. Also, there may be an update to the Cakewalk tips book in the works for 2023. No guarantees, but stay tuned.

If I were a plug-in developer, I'd recognize that since Cakewalk is free, it frees up more money for plug-ins. I'd pitch to the Cakewalk users as much as I could!

If they're modeled basses, no. But if they're sampled, and left to decay instead of immediately going into a loop, this kind of pitch correction may make a major difference. However, that assumes someone didn't apply this technique before assigning notes to keys. When I did the bass expansion packs for Rapture, I flatted the pitches with Melodyne. To this day, I still use those basses for almost all my keyboard bass parts because not having pitch inconsistencies really cleans up the low end. Even very slight mistunings can cause phantom beat notes, because the frequency is so low.