PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic calkwalk anoucement sad news

hi guys i have been a user for a long time so sad they are not going to develope sonars and products so sad for the sonar team eric

Whoa.

Well after just downloading Sonar Home Studio less than a week ago, and really surprised how good it is, this is a surprising announcement.

I take it they will keep all the products and serials downloads on the site, or will they/

Musiclover

whoa is right

Even though I've weened (well weening) off of it this is going to cause a lot of nervous folks issues/ulcers and start all kinds of rumors.

What that announcement didn't say was whether CAKEWALK would as a subdivision would be cut loose, sold off, or folded-up. I suspect it will be still be around but under new ownership of one kind or another or sold-off/bought by old rivals (e.g., Steinberg/Yamaha) who can take parts that shore up the weaker parts of their own product.

All those that think they know how to write real-time DAW SW better than the next guy - here's your chance


(OK I can't resist: So much for "lieftime.")
Larry

Nothing when you go on the website and go to account , I got an email to upgrade or pay 1 year for updates.

Weird one !

from cakewalk forum

Cakewalk Announcement
After 30 years of Cakewalk's long and illustrious history, I am saddened to announce that we ceased new product development and reduced overall operations this past Friday. You can read the formal announcement from Gibson here, which states that this decision was made in order to align with the company’s acquisition strategy, focused on growth in the global consumer electronics audio business.
 
Working at Cakewalk has been an incredibly positive experience for all of us who worked here. This can largely be attributed to the incredible people who worked here, past and present. I've been at Cakewalk 19 years and I've never come across a more dedicated and talented group of people. Our greatest motivation was the joy in producing software for an astonishingly passionate base of artists, musicians and producers who used our software to create music on a daily basis.
 
So what does this mean for you, our loyal customers who've been with us all these years? Cakewalk's servers will continue to operate, you will still have access to all of your online assets, and your software will continue to work normally. A dedicated team has been established during this transition period to continue to serve the Cakewalk community. Monthly updates to SONAR from Cakewalk will however cease during this time. We will continue to post notifications to keep you informed with any relevant developments. A sincere thank you to everyone in the Cakewalk community.
 
Sincerely,
Noel Borthwick,
CTO, Cakewalk

Well.... that bites.

I;m thinking they will do a spin off since there's a solid recording platform that lots of people love and use. Although...... I could be wrong and this is just the beginning of the end for the beloved Cakewalk line.

Never fear, it will keep working, until it doesn't, and then there will always be another DAW to use..... and perhaps RB will rise to the occasion to fill the void.

Time to buy Pro Tools.

gahhhhhh! I'll keep Sonar going as long as possible.

Goodness, no. But there are other choices.

Concur on that one


And to GuitarHacker - the next "neato" Win 10 "Feature" update (that no one asked for) this spring could bring Sonar, as it sits, to a halt or begin to cause intermittent "hiccups," without CW developers staying on top of the ever changing OS mods (they ain't all about or for OS security and OS integrity)


=========
on soapbox:

I really wish MS would knock off the feature updates (feature updates should ALL be optional and immaterial to underlying OS framework and security base code).

Security patches and preemptive mods are great! FEATURE MODS not so much (from a business user/support developer perspective)

off soapbox

I kind of agree with that guess and hope you are correct....guess we'll see.
I began with Twelve Tone Systems back in 1994 with Cakewalk 3.0 and purchased every upgrade.
I have always felt confident in recommending their DAW platform.

I'm on X3 and was not interested in going with the new subscription paradigm a year or two ago.
I'm 70 so X3 with happily outlive me for my uses.
I would never go the Pro Tools route for a couple reasons and I think their are many other viable choices for those just starting out.

I'm sad to see this occurring but I guess that's the nature of this ever changing industry.

Carry on....

There will come a day when all the others have stopped supporting or producing and only Pro Tools will be left standing. What then?

Once Steve helped me get my Focusrite to play nice with Pro Tools, it is glorious. It is simple to use and is the industry standard. The automation tunnels, the sub grouping... it's great. My timing was exquisite though, buying it just as I was pretty much saying goodbye to music. I just don't get why you all hate it so much. Because to hobbyists it is relatively expensive? By that logic, you should also play a guitar that came from Toys'R'Us because it is cheap.

I wonder how many people who hate Pro Tools have never tried it beyond one short test song, possibly never tried it, or because it was too expensive to buy and then if you hate it you are out $600? Every kid who loves Brussels Sprouts now had to be convinced to try that first sprout... It's only money, and nobody here seems to be all that destitute, not when I read posts about $4500 keyboard purchases.

I mean, I don't care what anybody else does, but you guys cling to this software like a bear protecting her cubs. I remember the onslaught I got a few years back from one guy telling my why I just HAD to try Reaper and I would love it. Why? Because YOU like it? I see this in every field. What people are comfortable with suddenly becomes THE BEST. All I am saying is that the studio industry standard is Pro Tools, I bought a copy, I took a class to demystify it, and now I like it, though I rarely use it (or anything else) anymore. None of them are Real Band, which writes and plays music for me.

Ha....good question.....I'll have returned to star dust by then.

If you were addressing my comment?
I don't hate Pro Tools and all competitors in this market have their place with dedicated users.
PT is just too much money, too proprietary from my standpoint.
I'm not a professional musician any more anyway and no one is knocking on my door telling me how great my song writing drivel is.

If I had to learn a new DAW I'd try some demos of the more cost effective ones to see which interface/workflow that felt intuitive to me.
Plenty of 3rd party add-on's to select where the new DAW of choice is limited.
But, that's just me....to each their own.

Like yourself, I don't have the same verve and drive in the musical sense since I was able to finish my last (5) songs thanks to BIAB.

Back to it....

Several replies to my first post that mentioned (the dreaded) Pro Tools would along the lines of "Anything but Pro Tools". I just wonder why everybody hates it. The first thing I hear about is the price, and I will agree that $600 can sound expensive, but the cost of anything is relative to the resources of the person making the purchase. I bought it from Sweetwater and got 2 years same as cash so I paid $50 a month until it was paid for. I sure didn't need it, as I am probably the least active musician on this system. But for me it was a new thing to learn, a new challenge, so I bought it and took a course at Kent State and found that once I got past some initial setup things and got used to some terminology, it is very good. Industry standards become so for a reason, no? Houses are all built with the studs 16 inches on center for a reason, and I suspect that the reason might be that 16 inches is the best option for structure. Some rogue carpenter might build his house with the studs 32 inches on center if he wants to, but if it collapses..... That is a strange example, I know, but all I am asking is why people hold their nose at the very mention of Pro Tools. One down side is that it takes a rocket sauce computer to run WELL, though it will run on minimum level requirement computers, it will spit and stutter. In my case, it gave me a reason to buy an i& with 64gb of RAM and a high end video card, as well as a shiny new HP monitor. Not that I've ever really needed reasons to buy more computers....

I was honestly quite surprised to hear this news myself, I know quite a few people who use Cakewalk products.

ProTools is as un-intuitive (initially for me anyway) as RB/PT/Reaper.
They all require some learning.

One of the choices above costs much more, and to be honest the trade-off of features is arguable once you know them.

ProTools can do things RB/PT/BiaB/Reaper cannot, but the reverse is also true.
If you can afford it, get/use all the tools you can.
They are all just 'tools' at our disposal and discretion.

Ozone is expensive too, but it makes just as much difference in RB as it does in ProTools ..
Know yer tools, and select the best path for you.
Apparently Sonar isn't going to be the best option as an alternative soon.
Plenty of others still available.

Well this sucks! But Cakewalk has been through this before, remember Roland?

The ironic thing is back when Gibson bought Cakewalk I said on the Cakewalk forums that I hope Gibson doesn't abandon it like they did Vision. Vision was ahead of its time back then IMO. The response I got was no they will not. Well they did!

I used Cakewalk's ProAudio 9 for years, Sonar 5 for years so it looks like I will be using the latest Sonar Platinum for years to come.

Eddie, the studios I work in use Pro Tools but only because they feel they have to. It’s expected by clients who don’t know better, and it is a standard that makes it easy to transfer files between studios. But the engineers who use it daily swear at it all the time. It is not stable.

In my limited experience with using it, I found it quite user UNfriendly compared to SONAR, Digital Performer and Studio One. I don’t use a DAW all day every day and would be totally lost using Pro Tools.

But that’s all just an opinion, since you asked.

Maybe PG might buy Cakewalk, then everyone (at least everyone on this forum) would be happy!

Now if PG did become the new owners and could manage to add generation of realtracks/drums within it, wouldn't that be something, though its easy enough to do otherwise by importing.


Musiclover

Hardly.

You're welcome!

Pro Tools Rant
Cost: I did similar to what I had switched to when I used Adobe Audition. I pay a monthly subscription of about $20 a month for as long as I like and don't have to worry about software upgrades as I get them as part of that. So when I went the Pro Tools route, I unsubscribed from Adobe and went to Avid. Monthly rate was about the same from one tool to the next.

Performance: Yes, a lot of people on the Avid forums complain about bugs but IMHO most of those are people that do not have the tech-savviness to figure out how things work in the first place. Once your sound card and software are locked in, things work great. I just love it because it is a work horse software that can carry a heavy load when needed. I had no issues at all recording all 8 inputs of my interface at once while recording a band. You can throw a ton of plugins on it during mixing without dropping a beat.

Difficulty: Yes, it may be overwhelming coming to it from scratch like I did 2 years ago. Like any software I kept plugging at it until I figured things out. Lots of searching in the .PDF manual and "The GOOGLE".
End Rant

I think many people who dislike Pro Tools actually dislike the company AVID. This was the company that mistreated the Sibelius team a few years back. They wanted a cheaper operation so sacked a brilliant specialist notation team which was immediately snapped by Steinberg. They are now the team developing Dorico which is aiming to be the top notation program. Since that time Sibelius has pretty well stood still with hardly any real development so you can imagine that many Sibelius users have a pretty low opinion about AVID.

In addition AVID's overall profitability looks pretty shaky and so I would not bank on the long term viability of the company

Well put sir. Thanks!

I started out oh so long ago with PT LE and the M-Box. Back in the day I coined the pharse "I didn't leave ProTools, ProTools left me" and added it to my Reaper account. Since Reaper I have never look back. Otherwise, all these years later, I honestly don't really recall why I got so upset at ProTools. But I did!



I hope you are making money with ProTools, cause otherwise, that sounds crazy.

hi protools not plugins to exspensive i have it and don't use it just me I'm trying studio one 3 see if it fits for me thanks eric

Just downloaded mixcraft 8 pro studio trial.

After an hour I bought it.

The wave files I made in biab then over to mixcraft comparing it too sonar it blew sonar away sound/clarity, And I was about to purchase a reverb plug in from waves for 79.00 dollars.

Daw and all the plug ins that you get and it records top notch on the vocals again blew sonar away on my comparison.

Paid $99.00 USD on special rrp 179.00.

Worth a try on the trial.

I've certainly had Value For Money from my Cakewalk Guitar Pro2, bought in 2003. It's been unsupported for years but still does all I need. Never made much money out of me!
Ian

Wow,

The fact that I have about 300 songs and other compositions saved as Cakewalk projects all pointing at Cakewalk folders, all with Cakewalk Mixing Board templates, and hundreds of Cakewalk FX presets I built for as many different instruments doesn't bother me at all.

Sure I don't mind switching to another DAW and starting over from scratch.

Hmmmmmmmmmm.

Glad I have the guy down the street that used to build IBM mainframes.

Gonna pay him another visit soon and back up the operating system again.

This rots.

Just stating that if you where interested and that I was about to buy a 79 dollar reverb then bought mixcraft tons of plugs and loops awesome recording sound etc.

David yes I know we all get stuck in a bit of a rut depending on a fav Daw.


awww well onwards and upwards.

Everybody DON'T PANIC!

Why not wait and see what is going to happen in the next few months instead of running out and buying a new DAW? Does Sonar meet your needs now? If so use it. If Cakewalk isn't picked up in a few months then it is time to change. Unless of course you are like me! Sonar as it stand right now does all I need so I will probably use it for at least another year and maybe longer.

YMMV

Yes I agree Mario it was a good buy for me, as their are two excellent reverbs that I have tried so far.

I got another daw and a whole load of plugs for the price of one.


It does blow sonar/acid out the water tho l.o.l.

Hmmmm, puts the Craig Anderton leaving Cakewalk recently into perspective, doesn't it?

And this really sucks. I have purchased over the years almost everything Cakewalk related - sound libraries, DAW's, etc.

I hope they sell off the Cakewalk division, rather than just drop it, and then the new company offers something for loyal companies.

Otherwise, I will never ever buy anything with a Gibson or Philips brand again. May not make a difference to them, but that's my response to something like this.

I’m concerned that they keep the authorization servers working. If not, my lifetime ‘subscription’ reverts to demo mode. That would be bad.

I plan to just sit tight, but also start saving any unfinished project files. Then I’ll decide which other DAW to use.

To the poster who said the BIAB files sound better in another DAW besides SONAR, well, no. There is something else at work.

Yes, good advice Mario. Let's not jump to conclusions here. Early days still. Early days.

Shows how much they care about their customers that have dropped a good bit of money on their products.

I guess all they have to say is, "sorry".

And the lifetime offer was when Cakewalk was already owned by Gibson, so what the hell??? Did they know then that "lifetime" was really about two years or so?

Hope I don't sound like an ambulance chasing lawyer, but

... the folks over in the Reaper forum will welcome you all with open arms. For those who don't know, Reaper is simply fantastic. Rock Solid and fully featured. New features added on a frequent basis and I never see bugs. A complete detailed manual which is updated with each new revision. But better yet, just Google what you want with the word Reaper and you will find the instructions. Compatible with everything!

Free to try for 60 days, then 6 sec delay screen at start to remind you that you should send them 60 USD [that means, Try until you buy, no restrictions]. I didn't leave Pro-tools, Pro-tools left me. Went to Reaper and never looked back.

This may be the time for you to come on over. Look for me in the Forum. I am still Jazzmandan over there.

maybe someone will start a reaper for sonar users thread over there to ease the transision

I’ll tell the Tracktion story to possibly give the Cakewalk owners some hope.

Tracktion was developed primarily by one developer through version 2 or so. Then Mackie bought it and bundled a pile of software with it, acted like they would push the software which they did for a short time then abandoned all development. Panic ensued in the rather small user base. Software went dark for several years. Original developer reappeared with a new team and it came back to life and is now at what amounts to version 8. It’s still my fave DAW and has led PRo Tools in some features by years. Still very inexpensive relatively speaking. Still confusing to people that can’t use a DAW without a fake mixing board on screen.

I read this news with some distress, being a Cakewalk user since the days of Pro Audio 8 (Win98 days) and I've played around with other Cakewalk products that would come bundled with sound cards and the like reaching all the way back to the good ol' DOS days.

There's one primary reason why I've stuck with Cakewalk all these years and it is because they've always included a Staff View in their products. I think on the staff when I write music. It's a big reason why I've stuck with BiaB for almost 20 years. A staff view. Pro Tools (ptui!) does not include a staff view in its product. So it is useless to me. Yes, AVID is the current publisher now for Sibelius, but Sibelius is more like pretty-looking music publishing software than software meant to get real sounds from. And it doesn't fit well with PT anyway.

I guess I'll continue to use Sonar until the bitter end. If I have to maintain an antiquated system just to keep Sonar going, I'll do so. Hopefully somebody will realize Gibson's folly and rescue Cakewalk from its predicament. What about an employee buy-out option? That's worked in other industries. It might in this case too.

matt

To the poster who said the BIAB files sound better in another DAW besides SONAR, well, no. There is something else at work.

Hi Matt what do you mean by this, As i have used Cakewalk way back to midi only.

I am giving my honest opinion I was on mixcraft last night again and it is awesome what you get included for a daw .

And the special price means I'm looking at the Cakewalk scenario as luck.

Made me try another daw.

As the meerkat says simple.

Hi beatmaster. I’m not disputing your good results but I would argue it’s not because you are playing .WAV files in another DAW. Any DAW playing .WAV files should sound exactly the same. In fact, if they don’t sound the same, something is very wrong.

So, since it sounds better to you in Mixcraft, there is another reason. It could be a difference in the default panning law, since SONAR has several choices. More likely you have some form of processing plugin set on in Mixcraft. Take a look for that. Or, on the flip side, maybe you had some plugin in SONAR that wasn’t helping.

Mixcraft is one of the few DAWs I haven’t used, so I’m glad you like it. Everyone has to choose a DAW based on features and user interface/workflow method. But not based on sound. Does that help?

Although I'm not a Cakewalk fan, I'm sad about this and I feel for you.

I still have an XP computer so that I can use Master Tracks Pro.

Microsoft bought Passport (the originators) so it could use its technology in Power Point. They sold the rights to Encore (notation) and MTPro (sequencer) to G-Vox.

G-Vox changed very little, they added long file names, more modern looking dialog boxes but introduced a number of bugs in it. All but a couple were eventually fixed.

They continued to develop Encore but did nothing for MTPro. Eventually one of the people in G-Vox bought MTPro and renamed his new company Passport with the intention of revising MTPro. That never happened.

I like MTPro because there is no Audio and thus a simpler interface with no sub or sub-sub menus. It's much faster to use and it also loads and saves fast so I spend more time on the musical instrument and less time on the computer.

Plus it's very powerful and has groove filters.

Then when I'm all done with the MIDI, if I want to add audio, I'll open the MIDI file in a DAW.

My oldest version of MTPro doesn't work in Win10 and it's the bug free version. The newest version barely works in Win10, certain features just don't work right, thus the XP computer.

MTPro started on the Motorola Mac and was upgraded to Intel/OSX - and no longer works. It was ported to the Atari first and then Windows. Now it's an orphan.

Cakewalk just got orphaned too. At least Cakewalk works on Win10 so you should be able to use it for a decade or more without worries.

Notes

I'm legitimately shocked to learn about this. While I'm not a Cakewalk enthusiast myself, clearly they have an extremely devoted user-base. This is will sadly be a big loss to many

Some good news:

Cakewalk just posted that, if the servers are shut down, they would send the authorization codes to all registered users (so the program doesn’t revert to demo mode, or you can install it on another computer).

That is very good news. Thanx for sharing.

yup good news for sure

Yeah, that is good news.

I'm waiting for a Cakewalk announcement where they say they're assuming control of the company once more independent of Gibson and will continue to produce award-winning products.

Hey, if Gibson is just shutting down CW that means it has no value to them. Possibly even negative value. So that means that the Cakewalk personnel should be able to take over without having to pay Gibson a dime. Right?

Well, here is some good news.

If you only had to go to the next to the last inner ring of hell in Mixers Inferno you could go with Pro Tools.

But if you really want to go into the innermost ring where the torture is the most severe, you could be forced to use Ableton Live.

I guess we should all be thankful that while most of our bodies are covered in severe burns, we aren't totally covered in burns.

That's what I have learned from all of this as I strive to be on the optimistic side.

And in a galaxy far away there are us Logic Pro X users who at the very least can rest assured Apple will not desert us. Excellent reviews and no copy protection. $199 forever. I’ve had several major upgrades and many minor ones over the five years and they are always free.

Yeah, I know it only runs on a Mac.......

I've been a Cakewalk user since version 3 and have upgraded every time a new version came out. I'm using Platinum today. I'm sure going to miss it if I ever have to give it up.

However, I'm thinking about learning something new. I bought a new Mackie mixer this past week and it came with a full blown version of Tracktion. This isn't a "Light" or stripped down edition. It's a full version. That being said, it is old - Tracktion 4.

I bought an audio interface 2 weeks ago, but returned it for a swap for the mixer. It came with a light version of Cubase. I had a quick look and really didn't care for it. Now this isn't fair to the software because I really did nothing in it during the 20 minutes I was looking at it.

But seeing as both of them didn't cost me a dime, and the thought that I may have to look for a new DAW further on down the line, this may be a good excuse to start learning something other than Sonar.

I'm not in a panic about losing Sonar. I just think I shouldn't remain being one dimensional.

Bobby
Bobby

I've just been sampling demos of several competing DAWs. So far I'm not finding what I need. Haven't looked at Cubase yet.

I'm trying a couple as well i have reason 10 going to try Cubase studio 1 3 is pretty good so far eric

Cubase "Lite" I guess it was came with a piece of hardware I bought. After being put through the ringer just getting my copy validated so I could even look at it, I found it to be rather dry and clinical. And, my memory is not 100% here, but I don't think it has a staff view. Which is enough to kill it for me.

I can feel your pain from trying to get Cubase validated. They sure gave me the runaround when getting my copy authorized.

Bobby

What I see in this thread with a few exceptions is old guys. I am one too. We're not the demographic music companies care about. Sucks I know, one day we're the masters of the universe and the next we're tossed aside like yesterdays laundry, sniff, sniff. Excuse me...

Ok, that's over.

Bottom line is this guys. If CW was making Gibson money this wouldn't have happened.

We all know the music biz has dramatically shifted in the last 20 years and it's accelerating. Don't believe me? Look at the description of one of the HipHop styles. It says "Old School Hip Hop". Old School Hip Hop!? To us it was yesterday and it still sucks as bad now as it did then but in reality it began in the 80's. There are a few hiphop billionaires now. Can anybody in this thread name them? More to the point can anybody in this thread name a few of their greatest hits?

The change is slow and inexorable, we don't notice it because it's going on in the background of our lives sort of like the frog in the pot. The heat is up and that frog doesn't have much time left.

Gibson is hurting all over because guitar sales have been tanking. Modern pop music doesn't use guitars or much keyboards either for that matter. Yes there are exceptions but overall sales are way down. And our "old guy" demographic isn't enough to support these companies any more.

Bob

Cubase has perhaps the best staff view and MIDI handling of any DAW. I don't know if that includes their 'lite' version, though.

While I have no knowledge of Gibson other than their ownership of Cakewalk (the SONAR company), I know that Gibson stepped in to buy Cakewalk from Roland even when Cakewalk was losing money. Thus, in a way, Gibson gave us more time before Cakewalk would have gone under anyway. My problem is only with how the recent announcement was made.

Bob, I resemble those remarks!

All too true, I'm afraid. In fact, when I look at a modern pop "star," I see a dancer whose primary task is to look sexy on stage. Music and musicianship are secondary or even tertiary. You know, historically, I've never been much of a fan of Country and Western music. But I find myself gravitating toward it now because musicianship is still on display, for the most part, with C&W performers and their music. I suppose the fact that modern C&W sounds a whole lot more like country rock or even all-out rock has probably helped some in that regard.

Anyway, what I see happening in the music industry is a decline overall in musicianship. It used to be something to make fun of, with boy bands and hip hop and all, but these trends are persisting -- much longer than I ever thought they would.

So I wonder now if the REAL musicians where "music" is being made are not unlike little gnomes hidden away in the dark labyrinths of modern music production facilities, and it is for this select few that full-featured music production software is even being put to use. There's no wonder the industry is hurting. And there's no wonder a company like Gibson is hurting. If it weren't for amateurs and hobbyists who don't mind paying dizzying amounts for their guitars, Gibson would have probably gone belly up years ago.

Take me, for instance. Until a couple years ago, it had been some 45 years since I'd owned a Les Paul (I bought a first year of reissue LP Custom back in 1968. I was sixteen.) I sold in in 1972 -- I always had a love/hate relationship with that guitar: love because of its sound, but hate because of its non-existent frets. I've owned a few Gibsons since then, but never a genuine traditional-looking Les Paul until recently. A couple years ago, I had some spending money burning a hole in my pocket and I was determined to buy a nice LP. I was almost ready to pull the trigger on one at Guitar Center, but of all places I found one that looked like it had never been played in a pawn shop I drop in on occasion, in which I had found various cool items in the past. First thing I noticed when I walked in was an LP Traditional hanging on the wall. I walked out with it for $1300 -- about $700 less than what Guitar Center was asking for a new one.

Me, I usually can't afford Gibson prices, so I have to scrounge for deals on used Gibson gear, which doesn't help Gibson at all. The only new Gibson I bought in recent memory was a Les Paul Special (double cutaway, two P90 single coils) at the now defunct Mars Music some 17 years ago. Yeah, it's a Les Paul, but not a traditional one like the Standards and Customs.

Gibson's prices continue to skyrocket. I just visited their website and they now have a few models with a $12,000 list price. Geez. That's some serious money and I'll bet they don't sell very many of 'em. Sure, Gibson still tries to compete in the cheaper price ranges, but to me their cheaper offerings look like dogs. I'd rather buy a nice Ibanez (I like Ibanez) and get a lot more guitar for the same amount of money. Hey, I can buy an eight-string Ibanez for about $400. That's a heck of a deal, ask me.

So, where does it all end? I dunno. I even have a hard time understanding today's popular music. So I'm definitely not writing it. I reckon I'll just stick with what I know how to do, using the software I know how to use (like BiaB and Sonar) and if folks like it, well great. And if they don't, well we all have our own tastes. I can't please everybody, so I may as well please myself and hope for the best.

This thread is truly hilarious. This is Ford vs Chevy, Ginger vs Mary Ann, Janet vs Chrissy, Miller vs Budweiser....

As has been the case in he half dozen or so debates I Have seen in my time on these forums, what you KNOW best is what you SAY is best. The course I took last summer was a split course that covered both Pro Tools and Ableton. The prof that taught it does a lot of hip hop and electronica production, and has had several compositions used in films. This after her Berklee degree from the Barcelona campus. She prefers Ableton. A local studio here, Suma recording run by Paul Hamann, allowed me to hang around and observe for 2 days while someone I knew did her album. That studio is where Paul's father Ken Hamann engineered Grand Funk, is a Pro Tools house. Sadly, Paul died recently from cancer. The guy that did my CD uses Samplitude. The common thread is that it's what THEY know best.

So I ask anybody who has ever changed DAW. Why did you change? When you sat down with your new DAW, wasn't it a learning experience? Don't you feel musically wiser for now knowing another tool? I mean, to put a golf analogy to it, you CAN hit your 2 iron off the tee, but at some point shouldn't you learn how to hit the driver/

I am STILL waiting to hear any specific objections to Pro Tools. All I am hearing is "It's too hard." "Too hard" doesn't exist in my world. My world is more like "You say it's too hard? Then that's the one for me. I want that." But that's me. I love a challenge, as is evidenced by my willingness to try marriage that 3rd time.... And my song Here Goes Nuttin' was about that brief moment of insanity where I considered doing it a 4th time.

See, I don't care about "faster". I have nothing but time. When I had that issue with my interface that Steve helped me fix, that was nerdvana for me. Computer, software and hardware troubleshooting? I really enjoy that stuff. And as I went through the steps Steve sent me, I was able to understand what got out of sync as I fixed it. The same way I worked through questions when I started using profiles.

But I am now out of this one. I really have no reason to care what anybody else uses.

Sorry, this thread seems to be going all over the place....



I watched the 2017 American Music Awards this past week. Mostly noticed a lot of very young women in skimpy dress's. But there was one Act, with a hung banner hanging in the back which read "No Computers up here, all live musicians". At least a dozen or more musicians playing there instruments. Only problem, I don't know who they were! But at least it shows the issue is recognized.

+++ The Tracktion Website +++ has version 6 available as a free download. There is also a version 7 before the DAW name was changed to Waveform.

There are a lot of tutorial videos that will help make the transition easier.

hi studio 1 3 nice mixacraft 8 really nice very sonar looking same features 99.00 reaper is very different for me midi was a hassle for me still working on it eric

Matt

while I'm not tied to Sonar anymore I did a quick serach over there and didn't see this post/announcement

do you have link (or email I know I didn't get one)


Larry

PS your post says you haven't tried Cubase yet by all means try it but I did that long time ago and walked away (three times) because problem with BOTH Cubase and Pro Tools as well is each DAW chains you to a a HARDWARE dongle! They haven't even updated to the SW versions of iLOk to make lifer slightly less risky AND slightly easier for end user).

Plus my latest issue/run in with with Cubase (8.5) was a a few years ago was in Win 7: you HAD TO be running Win Aero, no if's and's or but's -but that caused me heartaches in TWO other application's so once again I didn't bother to update my really old version. Haven't retried V10 under Win 10 - still need hardware dongle so not inclined to go down that path again....

Hi Larry. If you go to the SONAR forum, the very first sticky has the announcement (followed by pages and pages of sympathy, blame, despair and just about every other emotion you could request.

Yes, I just dumped another software requiring a dongle and would rather not go back. I do know it’s the right choice for my needs once Windows breaks SONAR. I figure I have a few years until then. I found other DAWs that were promising until I looked at notation.

Cubase elements 9 the cut down version, but still very capable doesn't need a dongle.

Musiclover

I didn’t know that. Thank you! Something to try.

Yes, this has been a crazy thread. For me, One word for why I switched from Adobe Audition to Pro Tools: MIDI

Past versions of Audition had danced around MIDI implementation a little bit and more current versions kind of phased it out. I thought that both tools were fairly comparable in terms of feature set but Pro Tools has quite the detailed amount of MIDI tools. Yes, I could have gone to SONAR since they seem to have good MIDI as well but had messed with it in past years and never really got into it as many forum members here have.

Pro Tools was a BIG learning experience and yes, I feel a little wiser for it. Another reason it was the tool I went with is that I'm a big follower of Graham and the Recording Revolution. He's a big Pro Tools guy and I had seen tons of his videos using the tool. Therefore, I already had a built-in resource for learning it. That helped me a lot.

But the first thing he tells you is WHICH DAW is unimportant, go with what you have (ditto mics, monitors, etc. ) its more about YOU then the tools

- he's all about just "get 'er done" or maybe Nike is more apropos "just do it"

just out of curiosity what about notation are you looking for (editing, viewing, printing - or all of the above)

Larry

Larry, the main limit I've seen is viewing the notation of more than one track at a time (look at a score). I know Cubase will work fine; I'm just evaluating simpler, less expensive DAWs to rule them out first.

copy, was just wondering.

let me(us) know if you settle on something

I thought it might be a notation entering/editing as well as strong MIDI editing (FL12: MIDI - piano roll is really good; but there is not any notation support, unless you count output to PDF file as "notation" support)

Since AUDIO recording/manipulation was introduced to transform Sequencers into DAW's (circa CW Pro Audio 9 days) - MIDI and especially score & notation viewing/editing/entering have ALL been afterthoughts if even given any thought at all

Larry

hi guys made the plung reaper ,mixcraft very much like sonar mixbuss and band in the box eric

Tip:

If you are trying Acoustica Mixcraft, and if you have a Behringer X-Touch, then to make that work, you must select Logic Control (not Mackie Control) in the preferences, control surfaces. This is not documented anywhere that I could find.

How are you finding MixCraft, Matt? I've played with it a little but, but mostly have used Sonar and RealBand/PowerTracks. But I like the MixCraft interface and it's not too difficult to figure out.

That's what I like about it, John: it's not too hard to figure out! After all the hoops some software has put me through, I like simple.

I love the iPhone app for it.

There are many options. The Cakewalk void will likely be filled quick, if not replaced by a buyer to use the name right away.

Reaper, Mixcraft, n-Tracks, or even multitrackstudio (plus many more)...

So many options out there now, it's hard to keep up anymore.
We live in good times.

Find what you like and make music.