Lord Tim

Yeah, this would almost certainly be a grounding issue. Check your pickups, your wires connected to your pickups, your guitar cable, etc. Whatever noise TH3 is hearing will be amplified massively by the distortion in a metal preset, so even if you can't ordinarily hear this interference, if you turn it up enough through an amp sim, you'll definitely hear it then.

While this may be true to a point, I doubt the OP will be doing any long, sample-accurate recordings where sync drift will actually be an issue. Even the big no-no of using multiple interfaces without a wordclock connecting them isn't actually terrible in certain circumstances (certainly not recommending doing this, mind you, but you'd be surprised how usable it is if you're stuck in a bind and need the inputs). In both circumstances, it might be necessary to nudge the start time of newly recorded tracks, however. YMMV though, you'll get better results on some interfaces than others. But I do completely agree that dropping the $150 or so on an interface with good ASIO drivers will end up in far less angst down the track, whether it be sync, clicks and pops, poor latency or just better converters in general. A Focusrite Scarlett Solo is dead cheap and their drivers are great. If the OP can't get any joy out if the UM2 and all of the workarounds necessary to use that (which, again, is going to be far better than the other alternative ideas he was looking at) then the Solo is a great choice for someone on a budget.

Agree, but it's still MUCH better than a $26 "interface" or using a guitar multi-fx pedal, at least. With WASAPI he should get acceptable performance out of this, least for playback with a safe buffer size, and maybe even decent latency with WASAPI Exclusive, but I'd start with the safer option I mentioned earlier first, just to get up and running.

Connect it to your USB port, let Windows detect the device. Do NOT install their ASIO4ALL software they have listed on the Behringer site, and if you have, uninstall it. Open Cakewalk, if it hasn't done so already, it should detect your interface. Go to Preferences and in Audio > Playback and Recording, choose WASAPI Shared. Then in Audio > Devices, make sure there's a tick in anything that lists your UM2 USB Audio. Then in Audio > Driver Settings, make sure you have the UM2 selected in both the Playback and Record Timing Masters. Click OK. You should now be able to use it to record in Cakewalk.

Just to be clear with my earlier post where I mentioned it was a naming issue more than anything else, I still stand by that, but I think my point was lost that the desired outcome of "press this button, it gives you the entire project as you hear it playing back" doesn't yet exist and it should, and the existing "Entire Mix" preset should be renamed to something less ambiguous ("Route Audio through Entire Project" or something? I'm sure Someone Smarter Than Me could figure out a much better name). I think that we're all pretty much on the same page here with what we're after, if we're not trying to split hairs. Personally, I'm fine with what @OutrageProductions suggested and it's second nature now to how I work too, but that doesn't mean it should be the only option for doing it. The more clear the outcome, the less "hey why is my mix export silent?!!" posts we'll get on the forum, and that's a good thing.

KnobMan really is the worst superhero... ?

I don't think anyone is opposed to the idea of there being a way to just go "gimme everything" and it's really just a case of lousy naming more than anything else. Entire Mix, from the point of view of routing, does exactly what it says on the tin - everything selected goes through all of the routing in the project and spits out whatever was selected (or everything if nothing or all is selected). The big key word here is "selected." Absolutely agree this should be renamed to avoid confusion and give a simple way to just export the "Wot U Hear" version of the project, where everything is just selected by default during the export.

The answer is the source. Find the right guitar sound first, and if you can't get anything better then multiband compression and EQ will help. If you add more gain, you'll just lose definition.

Start a new thread and give us a much information as possible about what audio hardware you're running, any control surfaces, etc and I'd say this will be resolved fast. This is obviously not the experience of most of us here, the current Cakewalk can happily open projects from 30 years ago with no issue.

It's funny, my first exposure to Cakewalk was a non-starter. I'd just bought a Roland MC500 MkII sequencer and really bought into the hype that it was 'the most powerful MIDI sequencer in the world" (which, to be fair, at the time it was pretty impressive). A couple of years later I was in a music store chatting to the sales dude and he's telling me about this computer program called "Cakewalk" that was more powerful than any hardware sequencer - this would likely be one of the DOS editions. Well, me - who knew it all, clearly - put my fingers in my ears, went "la la la not listening, you're wrong" and entirely wrote this "Cakewalk" thing off until the late 90s, instead sticking with the 2 line LCD display and sloppy MIDI jitter of my rapidly aging hardware unit. Needless to say, when I eventually actually used it, I clicked with CWPA and weirdly started working at studios that were running it - surprisingly quite a few - and never really looked back. Thankfully the years have taught me to be much more open-minded than that dumb kid I used to be back in the day...! ?

Just for additional reference (not necessarily related to this topic - the replies here are on the mark already), but uninstalling and reinstalling rarely is the solution to fixing these kinds of problems. Sometimes a clean install can help things, but sluggish responsiveness is almost certainly due to something else causing it (plugin CPU load, bad driver, something else on the system bogging it down, etc.) rather than something in Cakewalk itself that's gotten broken.

If you're trying to download via Bandlab Assistant, don't - use the Cakewalk Installer instead.

The listener generally doesn't know if you've done 3 takes or 300 takes. As far as most people assume, the artist goes out and sings the song once and then collects their bags of money. Additionally, if you think this is about talent rather than 2 artists with particularly vocal and devoted fan-bases, then I think you might be missing a big piece of the puzzle here. I've been on both sides of the aisle, as a signed artist, running a label, engineer and producer and also as a fan for the last 30 years. Trust me, you'd be surprised at what you hear on a record and how it actually was done, and the reaction to it. But don't take my word for it, hop over to the Produce Like A Pro YouTube channel and listen to a few stories from Warren Huart. His credits absolutely dwarf anything I've ever done (and I'd suggest most of us here) and they speak for themselves. EDIT: We're probably going a little off topic for Sean's original post though.

While there's some truth in that, in that what we hear on a lot of hit records was massively comped together to get an incredible take, I know myself I've had artists come in and absolutely NAIL it in the first 2 takes. Sometimes perfect is the enemy of great. You'll also get some incredible vocalists who really just are that good. Or you actually may want that first immediate raw take before they start to overthink it. Whatever it takes to get "the vocal" is ultimately what you do, whether it's 2 takes or 200. The listener really doesn't give a crap, they just want to have the performance hit them in some way, whether it's raw, comped or tuned.

Yeah, I'll often have dozens of tracks of harmony vocals in what we do, even on top of the main vocal layers, so folders are an absolute must for wrangling the big projects. Even with leads, I'll often do 6 to 10 takes on different tracks to choose or comp (I prefer that to take lanes, personally) so I get what it's like when the count starts to get up there! But yeah, track folders and even sub-folders if necessary. Easier to move a single folder with 70 tracks in it than moving 70 tracks!

As one of the "if they don't null they're broken" crowd, I both stand by that... *and* agree with what you've come up with. Like I said earlier, if you have a repeatable source (imported or recorded audio) and just mix in mono with that, any changes will be practically inaudible between DAWs. Add panning and you're at the mercy of pan laws, which can get fairly close and you can compensate a bit by raising or lowering levels, etc. I'd say that if you got them close, the results would be tiny in difference. Then you have effects. Again, unless we talk about upsampling, most effects effects will work almost identically across each DAW, other than free flowing things like modulation or algorithmic reverbs, etc. But they would sound different in the same DAW on each pass anyway. Does anyone use all of the same effects in each DAW? Possible I guess but there's a better chance someone will use a stock effect somewhere that's not present in the competition. Synth rendering, especially with synths that have those kind of built in effects (like, most of them) will be the same as what I just mentioned. So I think both statements can be correct. That said, I don't think anyone would be trying to 100% match settings from DAW to DAW anyway, they'd just be actually mixing, and letting their ears guide them. And therein lies the real smoking gun. I personally don't think any DAW has it's own sound ("I mix in ProTools because the high end is more glossy, Bitwig sounds more analogue", etc) and if you just mix as you ordinarily would, you'll naturally be compensating for the differences in pan laws, etc. But in this case, it's now a *different* mix, and a different mix won't null, even if underlying math of the DAW *will* null with other DAWs. The quality of DAW engines these days is exceptional, and even entry level audio interfaces are pretty damn good if not great. The real differences, sonically, between them all is ultimately negligible, taking out the variables above. Workflow is the real decider at the end of the day. If that suits you better in one DAW over another, you'll make different or maybe better choices with your mix. THAT will have a huge impact compared to any possible math differences in engines. And on top of that, let's not count out speakers and environment too. Slap some panels over that back reflecting wall or do something to cut down on your room standing waves and I bet your mixes suddenly sound SUBSTANTIALLY better, no matter which DAW you use! Far more than a different pan law or how a compressor reacts in a FX bin. Ultimately I choose Cakewalk because the workflow lets me get to the goal the fastest. I have no doubt I could get similar results from any of the other DAWs but it's less enjoyable if you're fighting it all along the way. A happy mixer dude is going to make better mixes (but I can't guarantee I'll null against myself if I don't have coffee on hand ?) Great work on the tests, Erik - the last lot of stuff especially was super interesting

I had 5 different jokes ready to go, but this being a family friendly forum has prevented me from using any of them. This is a disaster. ☹️

I think people are getting a little touchy since this is a more lengthy gap than usual, but not out of the ordinary for software releases. There's been a few threads about it lately, and some people immediately jumping to the conclusion that the sky is falling, thus the odd replies and locked threads. But rest assured, I posted up a reply from the CTO in one of these threads where he put the rumour to rest:

Start a new thread with as much information about your computer, audio interface and which vst on this forum: https://discuss.cakewalk.com/index.php?/forum/2-cakewalk-by-bandlab/

If you're going to be adding tracks, don't duplicate stuff, do new takes and maybe use a slightly different sound, and then pan left and right. Those little variations make a HUGE difference to how big stuff sounds.

There was a thread on the old forum that might help: http://forum.cakewalk.com/m/tm.aspx?m=3040778&p=1 Craig Anderton was doing something similar and I think he needed to adjust the Automation Decimation value to get it to work right. I'm not sure if this is still a thing with defaults in CbB though, so this may be a bad suggestion, but it's worth a look.

Might be an idea to get that dodgy project to a Baker to check out. If the Exception Handling setting isn't catching the crash, something somewhere sounds like it's gotten into a bad state - I'd say they would be interested in seeing what.

+1 to any recommendation for Chernobyl - Scott really knows his stuff and you can learn a heap from his channel.

This is kind of my point, though. Did you hear the blip or did you hear one of the many things that might be masquerading as a blip? Pretty much what Bruno was saying. Like I said, I'm not dismissing anything with what you're trying to do, as much as I am a fairly firm believer that most DAWs will null in true repeatable scenarios - I agree, it's an interesting exercise and you can certainly learn a lot about the differences in how VSTs are handled if nothing else, but you need to eliminate the known variables first or you're pretty much just chasing shadows. No results can be really definitive if there's something that may lead to a wrong conclusion. And yes, apologies if I've skimmed over something and I've missed a crucial point of the thread!

I'm out on location this week and only skimming this thread when I get the chance but I'm wondering if this is being approached from the wrong end? I'm seeing a lot of points of failure that could cause wacky results because too many things have the potential of not lining up (the most recent posts especially say as much). How do we know if there's an engine difference if the problem is with a synth, or how it responds to an arp or any live modulation baked into a patch? That's not to say getting to that point is a waste of time, but starting there is asking for wailing and gnashing of teeth. I'd personally start off with the same audio file, imported into each DAW at unity gain and then rendered out at various bit depths and then those files null compared. If the null tests are negligible then move on to different gain settings in each DAW and see if the math of that changes. Then I'd try adding in another audio file on a different track and see if the summing math makes a difference, repeating the different gain settings, etc. I'd start off with exports first, but also see if you could capture a live out from your audio interface to see if any live playback jitters are a thing. Unlikely this would be 100% identical, but would it be *audible*? That's the only thing that really matters. If you have a -100dB difference, I'd say maybe concentrate on mixing better than hearing flies fart on the other side of a pond. I'd use all of that as your baseline before getting into any live generated synths or anything like that because you have a 100% repeatable source that isn't getting any synth or effect variance muddying the results.