Mark Morgon-Shaw

This seems to be a bug. When I moved a Track Folder in order to position adjacent to another track folder ( which contained nested folders ) the Folder I was moving popped itself inside of the Folder above instead of next to/below it.

100% with you on that one - Cakewalk used to be one of the top DAWs when things like Fruity Loops were just toys, and it's still a fantastic DAW but just doesn't appeal to the Gen Y crowd so much as it doesn't facilitate the way they expect to make music these days. Most people will use whatever is easiest to get the job done.

I agree and this is part of the reason why I think one of the most popular requests for the last number of years has been for an integrated sampler instrument too as you could include a lot of these kind of features to make it easier to build beats from samples. Whilst there are a number of good 3rd party options I don't think you can beat this kind of workflow being an integral part of the DAW. I also believe this is why Cakewalk isn't as popular as in it's heyday because the workflow doesn't really cater for the Hip Hop crowd which is now the most popular genre.

Cool. Usually there's multiple ways to do the same thing in Cakewalk. Personally I now use a project length Arranger section and move it with that as I also use it to set my export selection.

Cakewalk doesn't use labels, I've not seen them in other major DAWs I've used either ( not that I've looked to be fair) . We have Markers ( keyboard shortcut M ) and you can also use Arranger sections ( Shortcut A ). There will be a dedicated chord track in a later release I believe so you'll have that too. You are talking about 2 or 3 different things here A- Fixing a recording error..by that I take it that you mean overdubbing a part. In CW we can do this in several ways , my method is to set up loop points and do multiple takes which go into the ' take lanes' and then I comp in the best one. It's highly efficient and flexible. It's not the only way though. B - Adding a count in at the start of a track - If you need to make space just select all ( Cntrl A ) and drag everything to the right i.e. by a bar C - To set record levels you just press record butt on the selected track , choose you input from the input selector dropdown, then you should get some signal and can do a level test and adjust D - To export you just make a section - then file - export. There is a hugely comprehensive set of export options , but you can just use the export presets too. It's not that Cakewalk is slow , it's that you are slow at using it because you are new. Yes it's a lot more complex thank Audacity because it does way more. A lot of folks here have been using it 20+ years and still discover things they didn't know. You have to go through a learning curve. Some compressors will show you this in the plugin itself but many don't . One wouldn't normally expect to see an altered waveform in a non-destructive editor..unless you comitted to it and used track freeze..then the waveform would change as it's been altered. Just quickly on the other points... "In Audacity there is an Amplify effect. I highlight the note and apply the effect with a percentage and I see the note that is too quiet have its wave increase in size to match the other notes. I know it is the same volume just by looking at it. I play it and it gets confirmed. Fast, easy. " Again multiple ways to tackle this, you have a lot more options in CW. Adding some gain is the obvious one. ( Process..Apply Effect ..Gain ) but a bit old fashioned. I use the clip gain feature ( Press Ctrl and left click near the top of the Waveform to drag the red clip gain bar ) and you will see / hear the selection change gain Or use volume or gain automation instead "Creating a click track in Audacity is far simpler. Audacity is free. I recommend getting it and seeing for yourself. Creating a click track in Cakewalk is slower than creating it in Audacity and importing it into Cakewalk." CW has a decent built in metronome - no click track required..you can record the metronome if you like to have a wav of it. You can tell it play a midi instrument as the click if you prefer "Cakewalk could use a button to maximize the track window to full screen size (toggle it in and out). I like seeing the larger size. " You can do this already " maybe your loop button needs to be an option group (loop, stop, off). My use would be stop." I don't think there is , you would just press stop ( spacebar ) . A cool tip is that you can ply just a selected clip ( or clips ) by selecting and pressing shift+space...they will still loop though until stopped. Not sure if you can alter that default behaviour. "Audacity having the volume on the track itself on the left is nice. Cakewalk has room. I can compare volumes at a glance in Audacity, In Cakewalk I have to expose more console and loose track window real-estate. Cakewalk needs a toggle in and out for the console and remember its last setting." You can toggle the console with a keypress so it pops up at the bottom of the screen..I can't remember if I have changed my key binding but mine is one the D key. I don't tend to need it though as I run 3 monitors and the console has it's own. But if you wre working on one screen that's probably the best way. In summary Cakewalk is very much more comprehesive and flexible DAW. Audacity looks like Cakewalk did in the mid 90s but things have moved on. It takes a lot longer to learn something as deep as Cakewalk, and that fact that it is free with no strings still amazes me. I use it daily in my TV work. There is no way I could do what I needed with Audacity ( or any other free DAW )

From Google " VCA stands for Voltage-Controlled Amplifier. VCA faders were originally found on hardware mixing desks. They allowed the user to control the volume levels of several mixer channels with only one fader. To assign channel faders to a VCA fader, the respective channels must be physically connected with the VCA fader." I've never had a desk or a DAW with VCA faders so I genuinely dont get how this is any different from a bus ?

Ha...you know I never realised you could create a new Aux or Bus from that dropdown. I said earlier in the thread there should be a " create bus from secected tracks " as one of the right click options but I guess that's a moot sugestion when you know where it actually is located. My bad. Surely this gives the functionality the Op wants ?

Yes, Noel was asking for users to say how they thought it should work a little while ago.

I'm sure there's already a staff view ? I seem to recall I looked at it once in the 90s..it had all these squiggly lines and symbols on it and stuff.

This is great, love the nested folders...finally ! Thanks team. I will test them to destruction on the next couple of tracks. I think someone else mentioned it but a visual indication that a folder contains sub folders would be a nice to have when the folder is collapsed.

Ha - When did that appear ? Using CBB daily and I've not had a notification yet

If you read through all of them , most Feature Requests tend to be small and fairly specific to a certain user's workflow or personal preferences. A lot of them don't serve the wider user base and never get implemented. However there are certain requests that appear time after time, some going way back in the old forums. 1. Built in Sampler 2. Chord Track 3. Nested / Sub Folders Due in next release ! ? Are there any other features that have been requested on a regular basis ? And is there likely to be progress on the above ?

Whatever's easiest. Quicker to buy another screen or two than wait for a feature that may never be made

That's fine but you were complaining about not having enough screen space - more screens is the solution in that scenario I would still recommend a 2nd because a 2 screen setup is far more ergonomic and will speed up your workflow. Track view on one screen, console on another.

I reccommend buying at least a 2nd one for serious DAW work, they are so cheap nowadays. I'm not sure how much work you do but I write, mix and master at least 100 tracks per year for TV so I am all about workflow and producivity.

I have a 3 screen setup so screen space is not an issue for me. It's just easier to show everything closed for clarity. I understand I just don't think it's needed. YMMV

Closed ? Do you mean the Pro-Channel ? I never have it open because I don't really use it very much. All I use is the HP & LP filter from the EQ. I normally do that in the Inspector on the track view because I do it when I add the instrument. I mix as I write as it's quicker and I do most of the mixing in the track view. Cakewalk never had a Pro-Channel when I started using it more seriously, so I have my own preferred plugins for everything. But you can open and close all Pro-Channels simultaneously using the quick groups.

You dont need to open another window. They are right there on the same screen if you want them to be.

Not at all - I'm just putting forward a reasoned counter argument as someone who uses Cakewalk a lot more than most. Any bus created is automatically routed to the Master bus by default.....where else do you want it routed ? I see no extra steps here ? As mentioned I've never used Cubase. I've tried S1 - Reaper - Bitwig - DP - Logic - PT - Garageband - Mixcraft - Samplitude and was long time Music X user, so no I don't know the advantages of a Group Track as offered in Cubase..the guy in the video called it a bus ...so I presume it's very similar. If it isn't you haven't exapined how or why it's different and what the percieved advantages are. New track types are rarely introduced into mature DAWs and there's good reason for it. I don't think there are any more steps..maybe one step at most, which could be elimintated by adding a right click option to create new bus from selected tracks. Faster still would be using a project template with everything bussed the way you want it. So ulitmately you have a lot less steps over the course of multiple projects. The layout of channels and busses follows the paradigm of harware mixer topology, so it makes sense from that perspective.

It's not really a one click process according to the video. Once the selection is made... Right Click on one of the selected..that's one Choose Add Group Channel to Selected Chanels ...two Choose Stereo or Mono...three Name it and press OK...four clicks...you could argue it's maybe 3 if it defaults to stereo and you don't need to select it. .....VS CBB Insert Buss...one Make track selection ( we don't count this step in either example ) Click Tracks from the header menu...two Click Selected Track Outputs..three Select buss from dropdown and click OK ..four...so it's maybe 1 click more at most. If you have a template with busses already set up ( like I have ) then it's only 3 steps. Seems to me that the steps are pretty similar in both DAWs, they are just in a different order so I'm not sure it warrants a whole new breed of track types being introduced. If you feel the above is too many steps then something that doesn't involve any major changes to the DAW but would endhance the workflow in this scenario would simply be to add a new entry to the right click menu in the track area. " Add Selected Tracks To New Buss " then it would simplify the process without adding more complexity.

I've never used Cubase as it requires a dongle even for a trial. Although I gather that might be changing going forward.Is this what you mean ? I mean that's pretty much the same as creating a buss in CBB . The only difference I can see is it creates the buss from the selection instead of how you would do it in CBB by creating the buss first and then assigning which ever tracks you want to it. The number of steps required looks about the same , you just do them in a different order. My busses are in my default template so I never need to create them anyway. Just select my tracks the exact same way as the Cubase guy, go to tracks - selected track outputs and it's done. I don't see much difference betwen the two workflows.

I am not sure we need more than the tools already available. You can already create Quick Groups and easily route audio through Busses or Aux Tracks like you say, and you can also assign tracks to Folders. How would a Group Track make this already simple process easier ?

I never use the Pro Channel. Except for the EQ HP & LP filters - I wish you could access them without opening the PC ( like on 8.5 ) - you can adjust the other 4 bands from the mini plot but for some reason the filters !! Yet the filters would be very easy to use even from the mini EQ plot. Annoying,

I suppose you could argue that's what the Track Manager is for but I agree it's a more ergonomic way of working although I might want a better visual indication that it's a folder. I'm sure someone could design a decent graphic.