ptheisen

Do you have version 1.6.1 installed? That version fixed a lot of those problems, but maybe not for everyone. I wouldn't give up on Luna too quickly if that is the only reason.

V1.6.1 released June 4th fixed the Kontakt issue and a number of others. Give it a try, it worked for me. I don't know about VSL, I don't have any of their products. I also uninstalled Luna, I've decided not to let it distract me any further ?.

Additionally, Bandlab obviously purchased the rights to the Cakewalk brand, and hired a number of the employees, so I agree that saying they just bought the Sonar product intellectual property is not entirely accurate.

Master Tracks Pro on an Atari 1040ST was how I started out.

I tried Luna and basically liked it, partly because the look is very professional and appealing to me. The new Sonar is the opposite for me, so I won't be spending any money on that. The Luna dealbreaker is that one of the main selling points for me, the Neve summing extension, is not only an expensive option ($149 on a half price sale), but UAD will only allow it to be purchased if you also have a UAD interface registered with them. Since I don't have that, I'd have to spend another $400 minimum to get a bare-bones UAD interface that I probably wouldn't use. About 6 months ago, I decided to switch to Studio One. Nothing is perfect, but there are so many things I do like about it, including the look.

I must be in an agreeable mood today. Misha, I agree with you that Bandlab should be giving clear answers to their long-term Sonar users, and that their lack of response dampens their reputation. However, you are assuming that their eventual answers will be what you are hoping for. Bandlab is probably in a position where they've known the answers for quite a while, and the answers are not what a lot of people are hoping for, so they think it is better to just not say anything. In that respect, I agree with Jimbob. If the answers were what you are hoping for, they would have given them by now. Which leads me to agreeing with John Vere, you probably need to start not just thinking about, but acting upon, your plan B. I started on my plan B about 6 months ago.

I have no UAD plugins, but am only interested in the Neve summing, so I was just doing a search that taught me the Neve summing is the only outlier that requires UAD2 hardware. It's due to solely licensing agreements, not functional capability. They won't let you buy the Neve summing unless you have registered some UAD2 hardware.

At least three of the items addressed above were ones that I experienced and hoped for them to fix, so this is a great update!

That is only half true, and one of the reasons why there is some confusion. A bunch of users are still participating in the official BETA program, which is ongoing . The BETA version is a build or two ahead of the Backstage Pass version, and the BETA testers are not allowed to mention anything that is not yet in the Backstage Pass version in any thread other than the official private BETA thread.

It is very odd, unless the explanation is that the pricing plan is in place: the Backstage Pass subscription. The very few responses received from people like Noel have been carefully worded. They said they are considering "other purchase options", but did not specifically mention perpetual licenses, so the other purchase options might be different forms of subscriptions. For example, just for a specific product (Sonar or Next) not the whole Bandlab ecosystem. Unfortunately, for those who are averse to subscriptions, including myself, it is definitely the trend. Most companies are trying to steer their customers in that direction to one degree or another. Some companies are giving incentives for going subscription so that the customers feel like it is their choice, instead of feeling like they are being forced into it. But the end result is the same.

As others have been more or less saying, NKS integration is mostly something that plugins and hardware controllers implement, not DAWs. Another thing to consider is that NI wants you to buy their controllers, not someone else's. So Komplete Kontrol has been programmed to allow only NI controllers to use their endless encoders as endless encoders. Endless encoders on competitors' controllers are treated like ordinary potentiometers by Komplete Kontrol. And to make it worse, the Takeover function that they offer to help with potentiometers (or endless encoders) on competitors' controllers only works when Komplete Kontrol is in stand-alone mode. When using Komplete Kontrol as a plugin in a DAW, the Takeover function is lost, leaving only the dreaded jumping parameter behavior when using a non-NI controller. These kinds of things have turned me off of Komplete Kontrol.

If you use Kontakt libraries, you may want to see if you can successfully add a Kontakt instance to Luna. It has been reported by some that this crashes Luna. It certainly crashed when I tried it! Luna is appealing in some ways, and in some ways seems to be trying to emulate Studio One, but Studio One is a much more mature product that already has just about everything most people would want, so I'll be sticking with that.

But what has changed for me is that the refresh seems to be required every 3 weeks or so, when it used to be 6 months. I'm not aware of any official explanation for that yet. This is a forum for CbB, by definition a place where people are invited to express their opinions about it. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, not just the people that agree with you. The attitude in the quote above is somewhat common on this forum, but even if it is well intentioned, you need to realize that it is driving some people away from CbB/Sonar in general. So they are taking the part of your advice where you tell them to switch DAWS.

This may be one of the factors. My DAW PC is offline unless I'm intentionally updating something, and I have gotten a number of the superfluous activation requests for CbB when offline,

If even one person was turned on to Yes after watching the video linked in Patrick's post, it was well worth it!

Perhaps a more accurate term would be 'non-updatable' instead of 'non-upgradable'. Here is what the PreSonus website Hybrid Q & A says (the bolding is mine): Will I get bug fix updates to my version of Studio One Pro after my Studio One+ Hybrid subscription has expired? All minor “point-point” or “sub-point” maintenance updates (X.X.1, X.X.2, etc.) will be available to you until the next major "point" release (Ex. X.1, X.2, X.5, etc.). If you are on version X.1 when your Hybrid subscription expires, you will be eligible for point-point releases X.1.1, X.1.2, etc. Your non-updating Pro license will not be eligible for a free update to version X.2. You can get access to the latest major point release by purchasing a Studio One+ Monthly plan, renewing your Studio One+ Hybrid plan, or purchasing a standalone Pro perpetual license upgrade (Pro-to-Pro) at any time. All three purchase options are available for users on non-updating Pro licenses. Prior supported versions of Studio One Pro will also remain available to you, should you need to roll back for any reason.

If I'm understanding the information on the PreSonus forum's Studio One 6.6 thread correctly, the 6.6 update more strictly enforces the standards for VST3, which caused problems for a few 3rd party plugins that did not follow the VST3 standards closely enough. So far, PreSonus is taking the stance that it is up to the affected 3rd parties to bring their VST3 plugins up to the standards. I believe at least two of them have already issued updates to their plugins which enable them to work as expected with S1 6.6.

I am aware of VI Control and the drama that sometimes exists there, though I only go on it if I'm interested in a particular product that is being discussed there. VI Control is not specific to any single DAW or any other type product, so it is not relevant to the statement I made comparing the Cakewalk forum with another DAW specific forum.

As with most things in life, there is no perfect solution. Applying the offset and exporting the new positions is good from an audio standpoint, perhaps this is the most important. From a visual standpoint, the notes in the new positions will look slightly out of place in the piano roll view, and perhaps even more so in the staff view. Also, there is no way to negatively offset a note that starts at 0:00:000, so you'll want to pad the beginning of your song with some empty time.

I will admit that it feels like there is significantly more drama on this forum than on the forum of the other DAW I use.

After you submitted the NDA, Bandlab should have given you access to an additional private thread on this forum. If that has happened, you'll see the thread named "Cakewalk Sonar Beta {Private}". The Sonar Beta version is available within that private thread. It may not be exactly the same as what is available through Backstage Pass, it may be a version or two ahead of what is available through Backstage Pass. The Backstage Pass version has a 3-day free limit or requires a monthly or annual Backstage Pass membership, the Beta version does not. If you don't see the private thread, you don't have access to the Beta version.

For what it is worth, I believe Noel called what is currently available to the public via Backstage Pass an "early access" version.

The link to the download was provided a few posts earlier. Even without that, I was just now able to get there doing a google search for "presonus studio one demo", so it can easily be found. You definitely do not have to agree to a monthly payment to get at the download. You do have to set up an account with Presonus, because they issue a serial number for the demo, which would become your serial number for the purchased product if you subsequently decide to do that. And you can definitely purchase a permanent license (no subscription) if you so choose. I know all of the above to be true because I have recently done it, as I'm sure a number of others have as well.

That's the one! That should work, if you haven't demoed version 6 or higher before on the computer in question. Looks like I was wrong about the 15 days, it is 30, even better. It's a very handy tool built right into the DAW. One of quite a few little ways that Studio One is ahead of Cakewalk/Sonar.

There used to be a free version, I think called Studio One Prime, and that technically doesn't exist anymore. But there is a time limited demo of the pro version available. When the time is up (I think 15 days) it reverts to the equivalent of the Prime version, which does not support third party VSTs. So you have to get your plugin testing done in the 15 day period.