Sonar 2024.09 Feedback

[aleo]

Wookiee, thanks for responding.  My computer has two drives: the larger D drive (1900 GB) contains the Audio, Cakewalk Content, and Cakewalk Projects folders.   Under Preferences>File>Folder Locations, all of the folders listed except Sysex and Cal Files are on the D drive, typically within D:\Cakewalk Content\Cakewalk Core\.  I believe CbB and Sonar are sharing these folders, though I rarely use CbB anymore and plan to delete it soon.   I've also noticed that when I save a project, the third core from the left tends to spike for a split second.  Please advise if there is something I can do to improve the efficiency of my system.

[Wookiee]

7 hours ago, aleo said:

Wookiee, thanks for responding.  My computer has two drives: the larger D drive (1900 GB) contains the Audio, Cakewalk Content, and Cakewalk Projects folders.   Under Preferences>File>Folder Locations, all of the folders listed except Sysex and Cal Files are on the D drive, typically within D:\Cakewalk Content\Cakewalk Core\.  I believe CbB and Sonar are sharing these folders, though I rarely use CbB anymore and plan to delete it soon.   I've also noticed that when I save a project, the third core from the left tends to spike for a split second.  Please advise if there is something I can do to improve the efficiency of my system.

That is good to hear, be careful if you choose to remove CbB, it is probably not required, its footprint is quite tiny, but if you must, do a custom uninstall. As you correctly observe there is a Cakewalk file tree with all the shared components. The crux here is "shared", doing a straight uninstall would remove all the shared components, along with CbB,  unfortunately the uninstaller is not very intelligent. 

Returning to your post it says 6% disk, are you saying your OS disk has only 6% free space? If this is the case this could be an issue. Ideally any disk should never be more than 75% capacity. This is to allow files to be replaced when updating or editing. I assume you realise when a file is edited you actually make a copy of the original which is locked and effectively hidden whilst the copy is modified. When you save the file it is only at that point is the original deleted. If my assumption is incorrect then I apologise. 

I run an i7 8700K with 32gig RAM but it has 4 disks the OS is a 500gig SSD, audio drive is a 500gig SSD, the Sample drive is a 1TB SSD, and the other drive is a 2TB HHD. CbB, Sonar run fine without issues. It is my backup test system, which was my primary system for the last 4 years, but I only replaced it this year with my new PC, spec in signature. 

[aleo]

Wookiee, thanks for the advice on uninstalling CbB and upgrading to solid state drives.  

Returning to my questions about CPU usage in the Performance module:  the info in Windows Disk Management indicates my C drive is 81% free space at ~440 GB and the D drive has 94% free space.  I believe the Performance module is indicating only 6% of the drive has been used.   Page 1370 in the old CbB Reference Guide explains the data shown in the Performance module.  If this information holds for Sonar, my system is probably working efficiently as I've never seen the Disk Load icon turn red.; it seems to stay at 0.00%.  I'm thinking the flurry of CPU activity I observed a couple of days ago, not connected to the internet, nothing being loaded, played back, or recorded, was likely caused by some activity going on in Windows.

[Wookiee]

@aleo the performance monitor can show different types of CPU usage, if the furry brain remembers correctly the default is the % of CPU used for audio processing, or overall system performance or overall app performance. Right click on the module and select from the options.

Presumably you have done all the standard OS DAW tweaks?

[Noel Borthwick]

On 10/24/2024 at 8:48 PM, aleo said:

When I initiated Sonar (v. 2024.09) this evening and began working on an old project containing only two recorded MIDI tracks, I noticed an unusually high level of activity among the cores in the Performance module.  Two cores went into the red and stayed there.  My System Performance was roughly 10%, Engine Load approximately 0.5%, Late Buffers stayed at 0.  I opened four other projects including one that was simply a blank template and observed the same activity.   When I opened a sixth project everything had calmed down; System Performance averaged 1%, Engine Load 1.1%, and Late Buffers remained at 0.  As I continued working on several other projects, everything remained very calm in the Performance module.  I don't believe I was running any other programs when I started Sonar unless Windows was running something in the background and it didn't seem to affect playback or the sound from any of my tracks, but I just wondered if anyone knows what could have caused this.  This never happened when I was using CbB.

Additional info:  Disk space = 6%, System Mem. = 8%.  My P.C. has an Intel i7-8700 CPU @ 3.20GHz., with 32 GB RAM, 64 bit , Win 10 O.S.

Which driver mode are you running and which audio device?

[Noel Borthwick]

On 10/24/2024 at 6:46 PM, Michael Crepps said:

Yes if piano roll is open and I am in piano roll view everything works ok. Sluggish compared to before. When you move cursor or press play or stop its a half sec delay. Was instant before patch. if you close piano roll view everything works great. Its when open piano roll view and then click on track view for instance but piano roll is still open on another monitor but not the current selected window. Thats when everything goes crazy. When you click play you cant stop it. U can click on other windows. click stop click anything but nothing works for about 10 secs to 14 seconds. (counting myself).

I have very good computer. I have three 4k 50 inch monitors and windows on every screen. I have 5 running instances of amplitube  5 and 7 other effects running on various tracks I have 5 keyboard tracks and 1 superior drummer track so lots of midi stuff. Vocals and 6 different layered guitar tracks going with amplitube running different preset on each one.  Never had any issues before. Until this patch.  I keep piano roll open a lot cause im constantly going back and forth between windows.

I at least discovered it was the piano roll window. For now Im closing the window each time i leave it but I dont want to have to continue doing that since I know it can function fine with it on before patch. I did click on the GPU acceleration button and turned it off and restarted but had no effect on sonar. Still acting the same.

Also just for more info. If I forget to close piano roll window and click play in track view and let it play for like 20 seconds or more without clicking stop then it takes sometimes 4 or 5 min to get cakewalk to stop playing. most of the time Im clicking play to listen to a section and not whole song. And you can kinda get it to stop after about 10 to 14 secs. but if you play like anywhere close to half a min it wont stop for anything. I click everything and it plays endlessly past the whole song for mins until it stops.  craziness

@Michael Crepps It may be helpful if you can zip and upload your project that exhibits this issue. You can PM me a link to to the file and we can investigate further. It's possible this is project specific.

[Tin Weasel]

I've come across another couple of minor graphical issues that I can't reproduce in CbB:

1. Track heights aren't saved or loaded correctly (at least when track is minimized).

Initial track heights - fully minimized:

After saving, closing, and re-opening the project, the track sizes are like this:

It happens at 100% display scaling, although the "expansion" is greater at higher scaling percentages.

 

2. Inspector only seems to allow vertical scrolling to accommodate the left section. If right section (eg: midi track setup) is bigger, some controls at the top can't be scrolled to or are cut off.

Here's the maximum I can scroll down in the Inspector - see the Rev/Cho knobs cut off at top of window:

But if I add more modules on the left side of the Inspector, then I can scroll the window enough on the right side.

 

3.  Bottom of inspector - when scrolling up and down (eg: with all modules turned on), the non-scrolling area is "broken" on the right hand side. See attached video, bottom, the right hand controls. [Sorry about pics below, no way to make video (that's small enough to upload) on my PC. What are other people using to capture just regions of the screen?].

Prior to scrolling, all looks good (non-scrolling area highlighted):

Content scrolled down a little - controls on the right side above the top of the non-scrolling area on the left are cut off, but the controls below the top of the non-scrolling area are scrolling down as expected:

And a little more scrolling: Patch Browser control now off screen and controls on right side are cut off at the top of the non-scrolling area.

 

Edited October 27 by Tin Weasel
Minor wording

[msmcleod]

1 hour ago, Tin Weasel said:

I've come across another couple of minor graphical issues that I can't reproduce in CbB:

1. Track heights aren't saved or loaded correctly (at least when track is minimized).

Initial track heights - fully minimized:

After saving, closing, and re-opening the project, the track sizes are like this:

It happens at 100% display scaling, although the "expansion" is greater at higher scaling percentages.

 

2. Inspector only seems to allow vertical scrolling to accommodate the left section. If right section (eg: midi track setup) is bigger, some controls at the top can't be scrolled to or are cut off.

Here's the maximum I can scroll down in the Inspector - see the Rev/Cho knobs cut off at top of window:

But if I add more modules on the left side of the Inspector, then I can scroll the window enough on the right side.

 

3.  Bottom of inspector - when scrolling up and down (eg: with all modules turned on), the non-scrolling area is "broken" on the right hand side. See attached video, bottom, the right hand controls. [Sorry about pics below, no way to make video (that's small enough to upload) on my PC. What are other people using to capture just regions of the screen?].

Prior to scrolling, all looks good (non-scrolling area highlighted):

Content scrolled down a little - controls on the right side above the top of the non-scrolling area on the left are cut off, but the controls below the top of the non-scrolling area are scrolling down as expected:

And a little more scrolling: Patch Browser control now off screen and controls on right side are cut off at the top of the non-scrolling area.

 

This has been fixed for the next update.

[aleo]

16 hours ago, Noel Borthwick said:

Which driver mode are you running and which audio device?

Noel. thanks for responding.  I use a MOTU 828x for my interface; and, for both CbB and Sonar, I've always used ASIO for driver mode.  Almost all of my projects run at 48KHz and 24 bit depth.

[noynekker]

I'm getting serious midi motorboating issue when using BFD3 Groove Editor. I've been using this for a long time, and have never had this problem, until this latest Sonar update. I know in these latest iterations of Sonar there have been some adjustments to the audio engine and some midi settings . . . wonder what change could be causing this ?

Does not occur when running BFD2 standalone version

Does not occur when I run BFD3 in Cakewalk by BandLab

Does not occur in my other DAW

Existing BFD3 drum midi tracks playback correctly, but you can't audition grooves to add anymore. I've tried many different settings in Preferences, (BFD3 and Sonar) played with Midi buffers . . . but just can't get rid of the motorboating . . . any help would be appreciated.

[Noel Borthwick]

I'm not familiar with bfd groove editor. Is that built into bfd? If it's just auditioning grooves internally I can't see how anything in sonar could be the cause of a rendering problem within. 

Does BFD3 itself work ok for you? If you are using plug-in load balancing try disabling it. Some plugins get confused with heavy multi threading.

[noynekker]

21 minutes ago, Noel Borthwick said:

I'm not familiar with bfd groove editor. Is that built into bfd? If it's just auditioning grooves internally I can't see how anything in sonar could be the cause of a rendering problem within. 

Does BFD3 itself work ok for you? If you are using plug-in load balancing try disabling it. Some plugins get confused with heavy multi threading.

Thanks Noel . . . yes BFD works fine as far as playback . . . the groove editor is built into the plugin, as you mention.

I'll look into "plug-in load balancing" 

Sounds like a kind of midi feedback on itself, the way it machine guns, and you have to hit the panic button to stop it.

It's just curious that the groove editor still works OK in CbB . . . so, I assume something changed along the way that would affect this.

I just now tried turning off "plugin load balancing", but it makes no difference to the issue.

Edited October 27 by noynekker
Tried plugin load balancing

[Noel Borthwick]

Is midi output enabled for bfd? That's literally the only way that you could have midi feedback if at all. 

Sonar is not sending any midi if you are playing within bfd itself.

[noynekker]

22 minutes ago, Noel Borthwick said:

Is midi output enabled for bfd? That's literally the only way that you could have midi feedback if at all. 

Sonar is not sending any midi if you are playing within bfd itself.

I've tried toggling everything on and off in Sonar, inputs and outputs. BFD has a "send midi out" button, but toggling that makes no difference. You can drag a groove into Sonar, and it does playback . . . but the groove audition no longer works inside BFD. If this were a real synth, what would be the "local off" button ? So, maybe this is audio feedback instead of midi feedback ?

[Promidi]

23 hours ago, noynekker said:

I'm getting serious midi motorboating issue when using BFD3 Groove Editor.

Is the MIDI in settings of the MIDI track that is routed to BFD3 set to a specific MIDI Channel and a specific MIDI controller, rather then Onmi and all, respectively.

Also, is MIDI out disabled on the BFD3 plugin settings ?

[noynekker]

6 hours ago, Promidi said:

Is the MIDI in settings of the MIDI track that is routed to BFD3 set to a specific MIDI Channel and a specific MIDI controller, rather then Onmi and all, respectively.

Also, is MIDI out disabled on the BFD3 plugin settings ?

@Promidi . . . thanks for your reply sir . . . I've tried assigning to specific midi channels, midi controllers, I've tried turning off BFD send midi out, investigated splitting the instrument track, bypassing my keyboard controller, and I've spent many hours comparing the preferences settings, trying to find out why it works in CbB, but not in Sonar, same VSTi, scans in the same location, I'm just stumped, 

[Promidi]

9 minutes ago, noynekker said:

. . I've tried assigning to specific midi channels, midi controllers, I've tried turning off BFD send midi out, investigated splitting the instrument track, bypassing my keyboard controller, and I've spent many hours comparing the preferences settings, trying to find out why it works in CbB, but not in Sonar, same VSTi, scans in the same location, I'm just stumped, 

What is your project sample rate, bit depth and your sample buffer size?    What audio interface are you using?  Are you using true ASIO driver mode? (not ASIO4ALL or equivalent)

[noynekker]

21 minutes ago, Promidi said:

What is your project sample rate, bit depth and your sample buffer size?    What audio interface are you using?  Are you using true ASIO driver mode? (not ASIO4ALL or equivalent)

44.1k . . . 24 bit depth . . . buffer size 2048 . . . Steinberg USB ASIO UR22mkII . . . it's pure ASIO

 . . . if I turn the buffer size down to 128, it just makes more like a feedback frequency, instead of the motorboating

This can be easily reproduced starting a blank project, adding only the BFD3 plugin

As mentioned, same steps in a blank CbB project . . . works as expected

[Promidi]

12 minutes ago, noynekker said:

44.1k . . . 24 bit depth . . . buffer size 2048 . . . Steinberg USB ASIO UR22mkII . . . it's pure ASIO

 . . . if I turn the buffer size down to 128, it just makes more like a feedback frequency, instead of the motorboating

This can be easily reproduced starting a blank project, adding only the BFD3 plugin

As mentioned, same steps in a blank CbB project . . . works as expected

This is a long shot, but is “Enable Loopback” checked in the UR22mkII tab of the Yamaha Steinberg USB Driver setup screen?  If so, try unchecking it.

[noynekker]

3 minutes ago, Promidi said:

This is a long shot, but is “Enable Loopback” checked in the UR22mkII tab of the Yamaha Steinberg USB Driver setup screen?  If so, try unchecking it.

Appreciate the suggestion, it was unchecked, just gave it a try checked, but no affect . . .