Cakewalk 9 vs Sonar?

  • Thread starter Thread starter drathbun
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drathbun

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The question has been asked about the difference between Sonar 1.0 and 2.0 but what about the difference between Cakewalk 9 and Sonar? What is the advantage of Sonar over Cakewalk?

I have a Fujitsu notebook with a Pentium III 900Mhz, 256MB RAM and a 20GB HD, running Windows XP Home with a Yamaha AC-XG Audio Card (line in, mic in, digital out, headphone out) and four USB ports. Would Sonar run on this machine? I generally record on this machine (I use an Edirol USB to MIDI) to connect to a YAMAHA keyboard for MIDI) and then mix down to a wave file, then transfer to my desktop to burn to a CD.

I have Cakewalk 9.03 already and it seems to do everything I need. Are there good reasons for upgrading?
 
This might not apply to you, but Sonar is compatable (and includes) dxi soft synths, whereas Pro Audio 9 is not. Also, automation is a lot easier (you can see it on the screen).
 
Okay. I tried the SONAR 2.0 demo. When it did it's tests of my hardware I received the message "This device is either incompatible with this audio format or in use by another program".

Every other program I have tried works fine with my hardware (listed above). I have been using Cakewalk PA9 without any problems.

Does this mean SONAR won't work on my computer? I seem to have everything that the requirements list. Good thing I didn't buy it first!
 
Sounds like possibly you have Sonar set up to use a 24 bit sound card, but that your sound card only has 16 bit capability.

Open Sonar and go into Options -> Audio and see what setting you have for "Audio Driver Bit Depth". If it is set for 24 (or anything higher than 16), change it to 16 and then close and reopen the program. Hopefully upon reopening the program it will locate and profile your sound card.
 
For what it's worth....

I also own SONAR and am set up for 24 bit recording. When I get those "This device is either incompatible with this audio format or in use by another program" messages I select the "use anyway" option and everything seems to work okay, so I figured SONAR was just warning me that there might be some degradation and not an actual error. I'm sure it's my Soundblaster Live card that is causing the warning.

Cavaet - I'm a newbie who is still exploring SONAR and haven't done any serious recording yet, so take my post with a grain of salt.
 
That would be a big "yup," Phyl. The SB Live is a 16 bit card.

FWIW, you can have your audio project set up for 24 bits, while using a 16 bit card. In Options -> Audio, set the "File Bit Depth" to 24. However, you really should set your Audio Driver Bit Depth to 16 bits (assuming the SB Live is the card you record through).

It's not clear to me why you would want to ignore a warning message, rather than fix the problem.
 
I deleted my Cakewalk PA9 and reinstalled Sonar 2.0 demo. I told the program to use my audio card anyway when I got the error message. Then I went to Options/Audio and the bit depth was already at 16 bits.

I can't understand why Cakewalk PA9 and every other audio program I've used works just fine but Sonar doesn't!
 
drathbun - did you check the setting for both File Bit Depth and Audio Driver Bit Depth?

What happens when you profile the card from the Options -> Audio menu?

The problem could be something else, but when I have seen this message it has resulted from a 24 bit setting in Sonar with a 16 bit audio card.
 
Yes, I have the File Bit Debth and the Audio Driver Bit Depth at 16.

My Yamaha AC-XG card must be incompatible with Sonar.
 
drathbun, I would check for new drivers for the Yamaha. Sonar like drivers that is as new that Sonar itself is... I've heard.
 
dachay2tnr -

I'm recording most of my audio tracks through an Aardvark Q10 but I am trying to use the SB Live to produce MIDI drums that can be eventually brought into a SONAR audio track.

So should I leave the file bit depth and audio driver bit depth set to 24?

Phil
 
Phyl - I am not familiar with the Aardvark, but assuming it's a 24 bit card and it's what you are using for audio, then yes, IMO you should leave everything in Sonar set for 24 bits.

I'm not at home to check, but I believe you can disable the SB Live as an audio source (Options -> Audio -> Drivers) while still keeping it as a midi source. That should get rid of the error message you are receiving when starting Sonar.

FYI, 24 bit recording has been an area that has had much debate on this bbs in the past. There is a school of thought that says if you have to drop to 16 bits for CD burning anyway, it is better to just record at 16 bits.

Personally I don't subscribe to that thinking. Without getting into all the pros and cons, I prefer to record at 24 bits, and then maintain that level until just prior to burning to CD.

As they say, YMMV.
 
c7sus said:

In PA9 it is NOT possible to invert the phase of an audio clip.
Click to expand...

http://www.analogx.com/contents/download/audio.htm

A bunch of stuff here - but two free downloads in particular:

Phase -- a free directx plugin, works with Cakewalk 9, inverts phase

SampleSlide -- another free directx plugin, works with Cakewalk 9, delays signal by a given number of samples.

-lee-
 
dachay2tnr said:
Phyl - I'm not at home to check, but I believe you can disable the SB Live as an audio source (Options -> Audio -> Drivers) while still keeping it as a midi source.
Click to expand...

I just did this very thing the other day between a SB Audigy Platinum and a new Delta/Omni 66 I was testing out. It worked for me for what it's worth...
 
300 mhz notebook runs sonar 2

I have a 4 year old p2 300mhz 64 mram 20gig notebook which I loaded sonar 2 to use as a learning tool in my spare time at the job and it works fine "unless" I start to get a lot of unarchived tracks or Especially if I use effects. It drops out after the fourth effect or so. So you certainly can run the program. I was really surprized that it ran at all on my notebook! Its been a real time saver for my steep learning curve.
 
I'm using it on Wind98SE and it works fine, but I'm still using MME drivers.
 
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