Cakewalk: Making Music with Sonar

The Discussion

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  Hey Charles. So far, having watched 1 minut, i like it. The way the camera switches the view, i think thats really cool.
  I like the black background. We get to see the actual person.
  
  And i must say that the video and audio quality is WAY better than anything i have ever seen on channel9!
  
  Wow, this rocks!

• 

  This was filmed in our studio and edited by one of the best shooters in the buisness (Bob Snyder). You will see more of this style in the future!
   
  Glad you like it. Of course, you will also continue to see the usual style, which is our trademark
  
  Mixing it up,
  C

• 

  Did anyone else notice that the volume dropped at 23:37 or so?

  Despite that its good stuff

• 

  Sweet.  I wonder if they have heard of the .NET Micro Framework for realtime, and what they make of it?

• 

  I look forward to watching this when I get a chance.
  
  I recently bought Sonar (replacing my old version of ProTools LE), in part because of Cakewalk's forward looking commitment to compatibility with Vista.
  
  Even though I have yet to move my DAW system to Vista, I felt reassured that they had already done the work needed before I even purchased it (and that others would no doubt reveal any remaing problems before I eventually make the switch .
  

• 

  >> I recently bought Sonar (replacing my old version of ProTools LE)
  
  How does it compare to ProTools LE?
  
  ProTools is the market share leader.
  
  Do you think Cakewalk has a shot at gaining market share?
  

• 

  
  >> How does it compare to ProTools LE?
  
  For reasons I can't recall now, I never found PTLEs UI to be very conducive to composing music, which is what I wanted a DAW for. I also didn't much like it visually (the tiny aliased fonts were ugly and various cross-platformisms were a turn off). Sonar 6's UI is very flexible and customizable. You can get most everything you need while recording and editing on screen at once. It has better MIDI tools, which I wanted for putting together drum parts. It also came with a bunch of plugins bundled, which PTLE didn'twhen I bought it.
  
  I also wanted to break free of having my audio interface (Mbox) tied to my DAW software. Upgrading PTLE would have required me to buy new hardware with a newer version of PTLE included. With Sonar I can pick from a wider set of hardware to replace my Mbox when I feel the need.
  
  >> ProTools is the market share leader.
  They're mainly that because of their high end DSP based systems and inertia. I suppose it can be handy in some cases to work in the same project format as the "big studios" though. I'm not to worried about that with my projects.
  
  >> Do you think Cakewalk has a shot at gaining market share?
  
  Sure, why not!
  
  

• 

  Interesting video,
  
  thanks
  
  Edit: I also agree with the MSI documentation, need more information about how to do more advanced setups

• 

  It's been a  while since I've seen a good video like this on C9.
  Of course I've always like Sonar so it's a subject I was already familiar with but it was also great to hear their requests for the Vista team to try and make it even better.
  
  http://www.crossfader.com/ has some more info about Sonar and interviews with people who use it if anyone's interested.

• 

  I thought that Windows Installer XML (WIX) was supposed to make MSI a little more understandable. It looks as if http://wix.sourceforge.net has become abandoned. Does anyone know what is going on in WIXland? Changing subjects... Was there any talk about WPF? It seems that audio applications have to implement all kinds of custom UI to simulate the hardware metaphors that musicians know and WFP could be helpful in fulfilling this need.

• 

  It was a good video. It could use a more going-deep like detailing of architechture and whiteboarding though. Some more information about why it doesn't use the Vista Audio Service / Engine. Something about their experiences with MMCSS.

• 

  nice video charles thanks

• 

  Pro tools does not currently take advantage of 64 bit processors. Cakewalk mixes at 32 bit, but Pro Tools mixes at 48 bit (audio resolution). All of this is crazy good, and currently to mix to CD means you end up distributing audio mixed down to 16 bit (major degredation from what the studio engineers listen to).

  I would love to be able to record macros in Cakewalk (can we get .Net language integration?).

  The major great thing about Sonar 6 is that I can have a job (Datawarehouse/BI Technical Lead), a family, a life, and still mix 3 hours of music a week while keeping up with learning new tunes with my friends. In other words, mixing is made so fast, that I can record a 3 hour Wednesday night jam session and get mixed to CD and give it to my friends by the next Wednesday we get together.

  Cakewalk is great! I would say that Cakewalk with Windows has passed anything else available at this time.
  

  The Mary J. Blige recording was ProTools demo at a recent tour through Richmond, VA on why pro_tools is great. This was hosted by Sweetwater Music Supplier. It was interesting to see the original Mary J. Blige tapes and watch Pro Tools remix and alter the tempo of the recording and so forth, but after watching the demo, I still had no interest in switching to pro tools.
  
  It is interesting that both Pro Tools and Cakewalk (other name for Sonar 6) feel the Mary J. Blige recording was a win for them.
  
  I would say that it's a bit like Java vs. .Net. For most of us, either one is more than we need now, but we all want to make the choice that will best grow over time. Close your eyes and pick one, and you'll probably be fine for all your purposes. For what it's worth, I've chosen Sonar and .Net, and for years I have never been disappointed.
  
  Geoff

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  I have a lot of respect for Cakewalk & have used it since the DOS days.  However, I found it a bit disappointing to hear the CTO, who himself admitted he first got into it because of Cakewalk Application Language (CAL) essentially dismiss it as "deprecated", offering no indication of what programmability features, if any, will be offered in the product going forward and pretty much ignoring the question about enabling the product to accept managed-code plug-ins or the like.
  
  For heaven's sake, you can't even record a simple macro in SONAR.  What up?