Mastering with recording software, taboo?

[endserenading81]

Hello everyone,
I am almost done with my album, all the songs are recorded and almost mixed perfectly. Now I'm ready to master. I've mastered before, so I know the basics. The songs are going to flow into one another, and I'll make one long track (the album) and splice it using Nero burning rom. I just have one question: I misplaced my copy of Wavelab mastering software, and I was wondering if it would be ok just to master in Sonar Home Studio. It looks like it has all the tools I need, but I've never heard of people mastering in their recording software. Is this a no no?
Thank you,
Rob

 

[Dax Productions]

The last mastering project I worked on I did in Sonar. I'm no mastering pro or anything... just lending my ears to a friend that wanted someone to help master and he only had Sonar. I found it to be fine for mastering, but it would have been nice to have the visual aids that wavelabs gives you. I brought my laptop in later because I have wavelabs and wanted to use that to lay the cd out, but all the processing was done in Sonar.

Also, if I just have a "working" mix that I want to show to someone, I'll usually throw some mastering plugs on the master bus, find some presets that sound good, tweak, mixdown, burn. All in sonar (except the burning of course).

Audio wise, sonar is doing pretty much the same thing as wavelabs, but the wavelabs interface is geared more towards mastering.

 

[TimOBrien]

Mastering is a process, not a list of tools.

Anything that works for you is not a no no......