I think that it may depend heavily on your particular workflow, the way you think and the how you construct your music. I use midi exclusively. I have no live inputs for guitars, drums, vocals etc instead relying on hardsynths, samplers and VSTi's. I have been a long time user of Sonar and currently have X1d loaded. Based on suggestions here in the forum, and in particularly from Rharv, I've been learning Realband and the use of RealTracs. I must admit, the use of RB and RT is much easier than I've experienced with Sonar. In my mind, Sonar is so configurable that in many cases it leads to complexity. However, in comparing RB to Sonar, I would say that neither lends itself to easier configuration or setup of the synths and VSti's. Keep in mind, that I am trying to integrate synths that range in age from more than 25 years old to some of the newer VSti's and romplers. Once, however, you have gotten past this, the workflow in RB works better for my way of thinking about music. More so than inital setup and configuration, try some of the other DAW offerings and go with the one that best integrates with your workflow style.

Win11, Intel i7 7700K 4.2Ghz, 32Gb RAM, 2x1Tb HD, 500Gb NVMe, BIAB/RB 2025, MOTU 828MK3 audio, MOTU Midi Express, Yamaha Montage 7, DX7II, TX802, Motif XS Rack, Roland Fantom XR Rack, Oberheim Matrix 1000, VoiceLive3 Extreme, Kontakt 6, SampleTank 4.3