norfolkmastering

I will give it a try tomorrow. Thanks so much for the explanations.

That is great news! How does Sonar know how many beats to put between the points I add? Let’s say I add a point then another point 5 beats later, then another point 7 beats later, basically wherever I see a clear beat in the audio waveform. Thats the bit I don’t understand.

Rather than having to tap the tempo along with the song is there any way to set tempo points based on the waveform? I'm creating a tempo map from a CD track right now and I can see where the 'beat' points are. If I could somehow use these as anchor points (say every 5 bars) and then get the tempo map gizmo to calculate the correct temp between the anchor points then it would be really easy to do. I tried the two automatic methods and found them pretty poor.

How about the Soundcraft Ui24R? I realise you are mixing on a tablet but if it's mostly about setting record levels then maybe it has some advantages. It would also make monitoring in another room a lot simpler.

Yes the Tascam Model 2400 ticks a lot of boxes. The lack of metering per channel alongside the faders is for me the biggest issue. Yes you can use tiny onboard screen (not really!) or the app, but nothing beats channel metering next to the faders when you are trying to keep an eye on recording levels. Nevertheless, food for thought! Are there any other mixer based contenders apart from the Model 24 which can record to an SDXC card?

The location recording is a bit of a mixed bag; Last week I recorded a folk-punk group in the pianists front room. Mixture of acoustic and electric instruments. Yes I was in the front room too! I had a mixture of DI and mic'd sources. Some percussion but no drum kit! Typically no more than 8 to 10 sources. Some fan noise was okay in that situation but if it had been an all acoustic folk group (which I've done as well) then a laptop fan would have been a problem. Occasionally it's possible to get the recording gear set up in a different room but it makes comms difficult when there is so much going on. I usually have to do a fair amount of 'herding sheep' as is often the way with musicians (surely not??) I would never use VST type effects when recording, so its just getting the audio recorded. If a singer must have a little reverb on their voice then I would do that using the DSP in the audio interface, so no load on the computer. I like the idea of the MeLE Quieter PC 4C. Am I right that it can mount to the back of a monitor via the VESA system? And does it have an internal SSD or do you need to use a USB connected hard drive?

I’m putting together a mobile recording set up. Ideally, it would be great to find a fanless Windows laptop but it doesn’t look like they exist at the moment. Next best is a low fan noise machine. So if you have recently bought a laptop for use with Sonar and it’s super/almost super quiet, can you share the spec please. many thanks

I came across this MTC to LTC converter on Amazon, https://www.amazon.co.uk/DOREMIDI-LTC-MIDI-Timecode-MTC-20-synchronize/dp/B0CSFGCYZV It's reasonably priced so I will probably get one and see helps with the issue.

1. Yes the Windows Audio settings are the same as Sonar/Cakewalk 2. I have disabled the Realtek audio in device manager. HDMI audio doesn't appear on the list. 3. Windows 11 doesn't have exactly the same options (that I can find anyway) but all the 'Audio, Allows apps and Windows to use this device for audio' are set to Don't allow'. I don't think the problem is timing variations in the Sonar external insert sends. I've tested these extensively today and they are very consistent. I've done some more testing and think the problem may be slight timing variations in my sync system. I use Sonar's MTC output as the timing master. This gets converted to LTC using the Show Cockpit MTC to LTC convertor app. Sadly this PC based convertor only supports native Windows audio drivers (so not ASIO). I've been using my PC's Realtek digital audio output via a D/A convertor to get the LTC in analogue format. It's been okay up till now and tight enough 'timing wise' for my use. So I'm not sure why I'm getting this variation now, although I did update to Windows 11 recently. So what I'm saying is that the path from Sonar MTC output to Show Cockpit's MTC input (happens inside the PC) to LTC conversion (still inside the PC) to LTC emerging from my PC's digital audio output, is varying in the path time delay, a little bit from session to session. That it's worked okay up till now is a miracle! I can pull 'the system' back into sync by putting a frame or two of offset into Sonar's SMPTE/MTC Offset. This (I think) slightly advances or delays Sonar playback timing compared to Sonar's MTC output. It's tedious but it works. I probably need to find a master MTC/LTC generator which I can sync the tapes machines and Sonar. That would still rely on a constant time delay getting the MTC into Sonar (so via a MIDI interface), or perhaps easier would be to find a high quality MTC/LTC unit which I can sync from Sonar (so bypassing the Show Cockpit app). All suggestions welcomed!

I'm getting some inconsistency with the timing of audio being sent to the SEND side of external inserts (I don't use the return so this is not a question about external insert round trip delay compensation). I use these to feed analogue tape tracks in my hybrid studio. I'm finding that the timing of the audio being sent to the external insert sends is varying from session to session on the same project. So if I bounce a track from Sonar to an analogue tape track, then I bounce the same track from the same project on another session, I'm getting different timing (I check using an audio waveform click). It's varying by about 250ms from session to session. I have tested it with all FX switched out and so the PDC is showing as zero. Is there anything else which might be varying on a session by session which would affect the time delay from an audio waveform being replayed from Sonar to the SEND of an external insert?

Thanks for the heads up on the new option to 'Keep Plug-in Windows on top'. I didn't know about it and it works just great.

Thanks for the info and advice. Yes you are correct. The VST panels are still there but hidden behind the full screen console view. I found that the D shortcut also works on my RH screen to flip between my console view and any VSTs I have open. I'll try it that for a while.

Thanks I'll do that and try again.

I tried turning off the fast bounce function. The freeze synth started and never stopped! It went on well beyond the end of the song and I had to stop the function. Also just had a problem trying to freeze Session Drummer which I've done successfully before. With fast bounce on, it does the freeze and I get no audio. Not sure what else to try.

I usually have my VST plugin control screens sited on my right hand monitor on top of the console view, leaving the waveform view on my left hand monitor unobstructed. I click the little 'pin plug window' buttons on the top right of the plugins but I've found the plugin control screens keep disappearing when I click anywhere else on the right hand screen. Is there any way to stop this happening?

Yes the track exports audio correctly when I do an audio export of the whole song. I'll try turning off the fast bounce function as you suggest and let you know how that goes.

I often use freeze synth to reduce the load on Sonar when I have a busy mix. It usually works fine. Today I used freeze synth on an organ soft instrument and got only silence instead of the normally displayed audio waveform. Anyone know what might cause this and a fix?

I find myself using fader automation more and more in fairly busy mixes throughout the song. This means that if I want to bring the 'average' level of a track up or down in the mix, I usually do that using the input gain knob. It's got to the point where I start the mix with all faders at '0' and then do the rough mix using the Input Gain controls. I know I should probably be using the Offset mode to do this but I don't like the fact that there is limited visual information about what the offset level is. As far as know you get a change of colour of the fader setting (to orange) and if you hover on the fader knob, you get the offset amount. Is there a practical reason, when you apply offset to a fader, that you can't get the fader to show the net affect of the fader automation plus the offset? This would seem more intuitive for me. I'd be really interested in what others do re automation and offset.

Thanks Jonathan.

There used to be an option in the Console view to set the maximum number of visible sends. I can't find it anymore! Can anyone help with this please.

Good advice thank you.

Currently I have three versions of Cakewalk DAW installed on my PC: SONAR Platinum Cakewalk by Bandlab Latest Sonar Can someone tell me which of these versions I can remove without losing any VST plug-ins? Thanks

After checking the drivers and firmware were up to date, I did a factory reset of the unit and changed to one of the 'core' USB sockets which wasn't part of a plug-in USB card, in the PC. So far it's working fine again.

I was recording some piano today using Sonar and a single USB connected MOTU interface set to internal sync source. On playback I heard what could only be described as momentary speed variations, just like tape machine wow. I loaded up a test tone into Sonar and played it. Sure enough, I'm getting occasional random 'wow' so little speed variations almost as if the master clock in the MOTU is varying. Sonar clock is set to Source Audio as I always use. This is the first time I've ever come across this and I'm at a loss as to what to do.

Thanks for the explanation Mark, it's really useful to better understand this stuff. I don't want to have to use two hardware profiles but my larger hardware system (which I use when working in hybrid analogue/digital mode) uses six MOTU ultralites plus two hardware controllers, which is pretty well on the edge of what Windows/Firewire/Sonar copes with. It's a bit clunky! So for composing I use a single MOTU unit which is not practical to power at the same time as the full set up (I tried, but seven Firewire connected devices was too much for Windows to cope with). So I connect the single MOTU by USB and then only power up the MOTU units I am going to use. The work-a-round, once the desired hardware set up is powered up, is to reboot Windows before firing up Sonar. This seems to bring the Sonar boot-up time back down to normal (using the appropriate custom hardware profile). This ties in with your comments about Windows remembering the previous set up. My intention is to move to three MOTU 16As but I can't find a MIDI router to replace the MIDI ports I currently get from the ultralites. I've tried two MIDI routers but they all seem to struggle to work in multi-client mode (which I need). The ultralites do work okay in MIDI multi-client mode due to the Firewire interface. Once the new Windows 11 MIDI Services release is made public (sometime in 2025) I should have a way forward with the MIDI router issue. It promises (fingers crossed!) to offer multi-client support for any current MIDI router with Windows Class Compliant drivers. It is also going to offer what I currently have to use MIDI-OX and loopMIDI for (MIDI routing and virtual MIDI ports). I'm going to test all of that as soon as the public release is available.