Old 11-21-2017, 01:21 PM   #1
husker
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Default Instrument Definitions in Reaper

I am one of the lifetime Sonar users who was burned today. Really crappy day for me.

I imagine, you folks will see an uptick in users shortly.

I am looking at both Reaper and Studio One. A Sonar feature that I use regularly are instrument definitions - I can set in a track the midi channel, bank and actual patch for my hardware synths. I've been poking around the Reaper demo, and don't see this functionality. Does it not exist in Reaper (I would really be surprised if it did).

Any previous Sonar users here with Reaper Midi experience? How is the midi editing compared to Sonar.

I know there isn't a lot of Sonar love out there, but it is a sad day when any DAW dies. There are a lot of us Sonar users will will remember today for a long time.

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Old 11-21-2017, 01:32 PM   #2
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Hi and welcome :-)

Take a look at the reacontrolmidi plugin. I suspect that will offer what you need - i.e. specify channel, bank, instrument definitions (reabank) etc.

I jumped ship on Sonar myself (back in Producer 8.5x days) so I feel your pain.

Cheers
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Old 11-21-2017, 01:38 PM   #3
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Hmm... just read the announcement from Cakewalk that Gibson are (effectively) shutting them down...

I feel for current Sonarites :-( I cut my DAW teeth on Cakewalk Pro Audio 6 so I'm grateful to them...
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Old 11-21-2017, 01:48 PM   #4
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Originally Posted by husker View Post
I know there isn't a lot of Sonar love out there, but it is a sad day when any DAW dies. There are a lot of us Sonar users will will remember today for a long time.

Not a Sonar user, but it's always sad when a product that has a long history is dead.
RIP Cakewalk, RIP Sonar.
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Old 11-21-2017, 02:11 PM   #5
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Originally Posted by uncleswede View Post
Hi and welcome :-)

Take a look at the reacontrolmidi plugin. I suspect that will offer what you need - i.e. specify channel, bank, instrument definitions (reabank) etc.

I jumped ship on Sonar myself (back in Producer 8.5x days) so I feel your pain.

Cheers
The Reacontrolmidi plugin will actually read Cakewalk/Sonar .ins files directly, last I checked. *.INS should be in the dropdown for file types.

-Susan
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Old 11-21-2017, 02:12 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by uncleswede View Post
Hi and welcome :-)

Take a look at the reacontrolmidi plugin. I suspect that will offer what you need - i.e. specify channel, bank, instrument definitions (reabank) etc.

I jumped ship on Sonar myself (back in Producer 8.5x days) so I feel your pain.

Cheers
Yeah - should do everything you need: video tutorial here

ReaControlMIDI Plugin in REAPER
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0evLmpNjXDw

BTW - this is one of many excellent videos that are now available free (see sticky thread at the top of the REAPER forum)
Reaper 5 Explained! - tutorial videos by Kenny Gioia
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Old 11-21-2017, 06:11 PM   #7
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Thank you guys. Appreciate it.
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Old 11-21-2017, 06:35 PM   #8
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Thank you guys. Appreciate it.
No problem - a lot of us used to use SONAR and it's a sad day. Was a sad day when P5 (my favorite) was shut down too!
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Old 11-21-2017, 06:42 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by husker View Post
I am one of the lifetime Sonar users who was burned today. Really crappy day for me.

I imagine, you folks will see an uptick in users shortly.

I am looking at both Reaper and Studio One. A Sonar feature that I use regularly are instrument definitions - I can set in a track the midi channel, bank and actual patch for my hardware synths. I've been poking around the Reaper demo, and don't see this functionality. Does it not exist in Reaper (I would really be surprised if it did).

Any previous Sonar users here with Reaper Midi experience? How is the midi editing compared to Sonar.

I know there isn't a lot of Sonar love out there, but it is a sad day when any DAW dies. There are a lot of us Sonar users will will remember today for a long time.


Yeah, it's a sad day for Sonar users. No glee here.

In Reaper you have complete control over your hardware outputs, you can send tracks wherever you want. Reaper only has one flavor of track, audio / midi / video / anything.

And by the way, you can convert all of your Sonar sessions to Reaper sessions with AA Translator.

Your Reaper demo is fully functional, just play around with it for as long as you like. If you want I can convert one of your Sonar sessions to a Reaper session and then you can see how that works for you.
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Old 11-21-2017, 07:00 PM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by peter5992 View Post
Yeah, it's a sad day for Sonar users. No glee here.
I feel for all the users who just got orphaned.

Quote:
And by the way, you can convert all of your Sonar sessions to Reaper sessions with AA Translator.
Does AA Translator do more than just get the audio and midi tracks moved over?

Reason I ask is I used ReaRoute (the virtual ASIO driver that comes with Reaper) along with MidiOX when I started using Reaper, to convert my Sonar projects. I had to play them each one single time, with Sonar sending it's audio through ReaRoute and it's midi through MidiOX. I set Reaper up to receive on multiple midi channels and multiple audio channels. It was a bit of setup the first time, but I saved it as a template once working so I could move other Sonar projects over.

What it did NOT do, was assign any FX or VSTi plugins, so I had to do that by hand. If AA Translator can bring a project over with everything setup, I might want to have a look at it, because I still have old Sonar projects than I never converted. I do have Sonar 5 installed though, and can play them still.
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Old 11-22-2017, 03:13 AM   #11
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AAT is pretty amazing but as we mention on the AAT web site it does not convert FX or midi.
AAT will convert practically to/from any format including many native session files.
Unfortunately, we do not yet convert from native Sonar session files.
Normally, a Sonar user would export an OMF and we would convert that
BUT
Sonar's OMF export not only contravenes the OMF specification and allows stereo media to be referenced but it pretty much only contains the absolute basics.
So at this stage until we start looking at converting from native Sonar session files I would recommend exporting stems rather than spend money purchasing AAT for just this function. If you had other formats to convert from/to then that would be a different thing and AAT would probably be a good buy.
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Old 11-22-2017, 03:33 AM   #12
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I just thought I'd mention that yet again I have contacted Sonar with a view to trying to get some assistance to allow us to support Sonar users with AAT.
I have tried this several times over the past five years but without any luck - maybe this time it will be different?
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Old 11-22-2017, 08:53 AM   #13
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Originally Posted by Runaway View Post
AAT is pretty amazing but as we mention on the AAT web site it does not convert FX or midi.
AAT will convert practically to/from any format including many native session files.
Unfortunately, we do not yet convert from native Sonar session files.
Normally, a Sonar user would export an OMF and we would convert that
BUT
Sonar's OMF export not only contravenes the OMF specification and allows stereo media to be referenced but it pretty much only contains the absolute basics.
So at this stage until we start looking at converting from native Sonar session files I would recommend exporting stems rather than spend money purchasing AAT for just this function. If you had other formats to convert from/to then that would be a different thing and AAT would probably be a good buy.
Thanks for the info. I was hoping that AAT might do some magic reading of the project files and create a compatible project file for the target DAW.

Just using Reaper's included virtual ASIO driver, you can set Sonar to use "ReaRoute" on individual channels to send audio directly out of Sonar to individual tracks in Reaper, in one real time playback, and since it's not really going through a D/A - A/D conversion, lose no quality in the process.

When I did it, I deleted all my plugins in Sonar right before sending, and then added them all back in Reaper right after the audio transfer. I also went one more level and used the virtual midi port MidiOx in both Sonar and Reaper and snagged all the individual tracks of midi at the same time, adding the VSTi plugins back in Reaper after the transfer.

One additional thing was I slaved Reaper to Sonar's clock, so they were sync'd up timing wise. I'd press record in Reaper with 20-30 audio and midi tracks in record ready, and then pressing play in Sonar would start both DAWs running.
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Old 11-22-2017, 11:13 AM   #14
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Ah well - at least my Sonar 3 pro will still work for the forseeable future as and when I need to use it, I suppose.
Very glad I was cynical enough to assume that the super deal on lifetime updates meant they were about to bale out and decided to milk the cash cow as hard as they could before pulling the plug.

Lets all just be very grateful that the Reaper ownership and development is in the hands of just a couple of guys, rather than a Kollection of Korporate Klownz.
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Old 11-22-2017, 11:19 AM   #15
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Ah well - at least my Sonar 3 pro will still work for the forseeable future as and when I need to use it, I suppose.
Very glad I was cynical enough to assume that the super deal on lifetime updates meant they were about to bale out and decided to milk the cash cow as hard as they could before pulling the plug.

Lets all just be very grateful that the Reaper ownership and development is in the hands of just a couple of guys, rather than a Kollection of Korporate Klownz.
I still have Sonar 5 Professional installed on the same machine as Reaper, and had even fired it up to look for a song only the day before the "Gibson killed Cakewalk" announcement.

Hehe, my registered app to play .wav and .mp3 files is Winamp. Fifteen years after I last downloaded it, it STILL really whips the llamas ass!!!
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Old 11-22-2017, 11:46 AM   #16
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Lets all just be very grateful that the Reaper ownership and development is in the hands of just a couple of guys, rather than a Kollection of Korporate Klownz.
Makes you wonder what OTHER DAW companies are at risk. Who owns what, what are their corporate metrics etc.
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