Russell

As a singer / songwriter my use of Cakewalk is almost completely live recording. The only synth instrument I ever use is Session Drummer 3 or Addictive Drums. And even that is using MIDI loops I bought from somewhere else. I use Guitar Rig and and Amplitube but don't think that's the same thing. I record live Vox, electric and acoustic guitars, bass, mandolin and a wee bit of banjo. I have really been wanting to add some pedal steel or resonator slide guitar to some tunes. I tried my hand at something called Momentum which had some cool audio samples but I have not been able to make it sound right or good. Pretty sure it's just me and my inexperience with synths. Is anyone here using these instruments successfully? Lame question but, is there one that's *really* user friendly and easy to learn that truly captures the sliding aspect of these instruments? Any recommendations, advice or directions to beginner tutorials would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks @Alan Tubbs - That's the kind of info and advice I was looking for! I'll probably go the paid version and see if my old brain can start figuring out how to actually use synths in my projects. Never used them before but have been wanting to pick that skill up for a while!

I have seen some instrument plugins (free) I was interested in but that say they require N/I Komplete or Kontact. I was looking through the stuff they (N/I) have to see if it was something I wanted to mess with. I have Guitar Rig 4 Pro from N/I installed already and I saw that a Guitar Rig 6 "Player" (free) is included in the free Kontact player download. I'm guessing a bunch of y'all here are using this stuff so can you tell me . . . Will it break my (paid) version of Guitar Rig if I install all the free stuff? Is it worth using to begin with. I've picked up so many plugins over the many years of using Sonar / Cake that I'm not using or didn't like and not sure I want to clutter up mu system with more stuff. But . . . I also don't want to miss out on something useful that maybe takes advantage of newer technology. What are the feelings and advice from those of you using the N/I stuff? Use it a lot? Hardly use it? Any specific modules that stand out as "must have"? Where do I start? What do I *need* to have to installed? So many questions! And what's with all the freakin' K's . . . ? LoL

Hi All! On the old Sonar site there were a handful of Pro Channel modules available for sale - Obviously those links (Below) are no longer valid. http://www.cakewalk.com/products/by-category/prochannel-modules I had (have) Sonar X3 Platinum but don't believe these were included. If they are - Where would I find them? If they were not included, Is there a new place to find / download / purchase these? Or was that functionality added to CakeByBLab? If it was how do I access them. Thanks in advance for getting me straight on these!

OK First, don't judge the recording. It's from years ago done with a cheap kids Casio keyboard, one acoustic guitar and a 4 Track TASCAM PortaStudio. I'm trying to recreate this song from years ago and one of the things i had done and need to recreate is a speed / pitch effect. The entire song was recorded at the same speed but when mixing down to a stereo track I set the tape speed up higher to make it faster and sound different then as I got to the actual "song" part of the song, over 4 hard beats I slowly brought the speed back to the normal one. You can hear what I'm talking about with the attached sample of just that part of the tape. Is there a way to do this digitally in CbB? Can I change BPM and pitch for part of a song then use bring it back down to normal? Hopefully this all makes sense. BPM Change - Exit Inn BPM Change Exit Inn.wav

OK lot of new info here . . . thanks to all of you for the input and testing. I will be back in the studio tonight and see what I can make use of all the shared info and get them both working

Anybody using two control surfaces? I finally got both detected correctly and setup. I can assign slider/pan/mute/solo to all nine on the first Nano but can't figure out how to set the second. I select it in the ACT but it changes the same 9 tracks I already have the first set to.

Back 30 some years ago I was taught to, and still do, set the intonation at OPEN and 12th fret . . . I do this for all my guitars and basses.

From True Blood . . . Never watched the show but my daughter did and I even got my cover band to do a version of the theme

OK you may have gotten me closer - When I open the KORG USB-MIDI Driver window, the "Device List" button is greyed out so there is an issue there. Any idea what I need to do to get the KORG software to see the two devices?

Here's what I'm seeing in Windows and Cakewalk

Finally got a chance to look at this - My driver is set to MME and in fact that is the only choice in the drop down. Any other suggestions?

I can't answer that until I get home this afternoon haha. Actually MIDI Driver mode isn't something I remember seeing anywhere. Is this under "Preferences"?

I have a couple of KORG NANOKontrol1 controllers that I had used fairly successfully in X3. Now that I'm using CbB I'd like to use them again. They show up as controllers in Windows and I have the latest drivers but they don't show up under MIDI Devices or Control Surfaces in CbB. I was sure they showed up when I first went to CbB but no longer It's entirely possible that I did something wrong or stupid. Is there a way to "reset" detected devices or manually add these to Cake? I really prefer having sliders / panning knobs / mute / solo / and arm right at my fingertips and not have to grab the mouse. Anybody using these or know what I may have done / not done . . . ?

My Sonar installation is on C: and the VST files and Shared files for Sonar are on F: and have been since the original install of Sonar 8 Producer. Never had an issue with any of the Sonar upgrades so have to question that scook. I've always used the same structure - Program on C: Data (songs) on D: Extras (like Melodyne, Dimension, Guitar Rig, Session Drummer, VSTs) on F: Runs faster and allows me to have more simultaneous tracks. All the Sonar upgrades have always followed that structure so why would Cakewalk see it differently?

OK I decided to go ahead and try Cakewalk instead of continuing to use my old Sonar X3 Producer installation. Trying to do a Custom install and it will not let me change the location of the VST or Shared files. I keep all that on a separate drive and want to continue to do that. What do I need to do to get this to change the location for shared file and VST files?

Well then . . . that sounds just to easy haha! Thanks for the info boys - when I get home tonight I'll download and install the current BandLab version and see about moving some existing WIP songs over.

OK I've been using Cakewalk Sonar X3 Producer since it came out. It has been working fine and I didn't switch to the new free BandLab version partly because I didn't want to lose all the stuff I had and paid for and partly because I was concerned about losing / not being able to transfer all the music I have recorded over the years and partly I'm lazy and since I already had it installed why change? This Covid shutdown has given me a bit more free time and I really started getting back into writing and recording new music. Well I'm starting to have a few issues with X3 and am thinking about jumping on the new (?) version here. What am I in for? How's the learning curve? Can I keep all my olkd plugins and VSTs? How about Session Drummer and Guitar Rig? What am I getting into and what are the pros and cons of this "free" BandLab version of Sonar?