I didn't know S1 closed their forum... Now I know what the fuss is all about. I was considering it to replace Cakewalk, but now seeds of doubt had been planted...
Bandlab is definitely not Gibson, the owner has enough cash, however recent "subscription only" new Sonar tipped the scale for me after 25+ years. I decided to give them till summer of 2025 (full year after Sonar anouncement) to come up with perpetual licenses. If that will not happen, I will start transitioning to another DAW. S1 was a no brainer choice, but now I will have to investigate more.

My other choices were:
Cubase - (thankfully they got rid of USB dongles). Full featured DAW, that has a good overall track.
Mixcraft - pretty nice DAW for the price. Has a lot of potential.
Reaper - very flexible and affordable, but lacks a particular comping / take lane feature, touch navigation and a few others that I am used to.

Billy, I agree with your view on Pro tools.
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Bottom line, out of all DAWs I 've tried in the past 3 years (most of them). Cakewalk has most preferred workflow for my use. Specifically automated take lanes with individual mutes and solos, automation of these take lanes. Touch navigation and zoom. Sonar pioneered that technology about 10 years back. No other Daw came remotely close, even Bitwig which supposedly made with touchscreen in mind is far away. Multi Tool that is fairly "intelligent" and lets you work without constant tool switching. GUI is likely the most flexible one out of most I've tried. Unfortunately I don't believe in "renting" software. While Cakewalk (not Sonar) is still free, they had a very specific line in FAQ about discontinuation, which they quietly removed when uncomfortable questions started pouring in. That was an evidence of their plans, and I doubt anything will change. I still have some hope boneheads some people at Bandlab marketing will change their minds about perpetual licenses of this great software.