Recording - June 2013 - 48

&
That’s not nearly enough, right? Well, let’s
not forget what you’re already getting with
SONAR: Session Drummer 3, Rapture,
Dimension Pro, PSYN-II, Z3TA+, TruePianos,
DropZone, Studio Instruments Strings,
Dreamstation... I really could go on!
So you think you’re Smart!
The next major change is how
you interact with the user interface. The Smart Tool, first introduced in SONAR X1, has been
updated in the way you perform
the essential functions of selecting,
dragging, pointing and clicking.
Right-clicking and dragging now
selects as a lasso tool, while leftclicking and dragging will select a range
of items, such as notes or audio clips.
SONAR X2 has also improved how you
zoom in and out of both your clips and
your project. Using the new Auto Track
Zoom, you can minimize all track heights
in Track View, then select a single track
and adjust for optimal height while editing
it. Then when you select a different track,

but now you can access each automated
parameter in its own lane. Combined
with the Smart Tool functions, editing
automation envelopes is now a breeze.
Take and Automation lanes are available
and customizable with an assigned
default parameter to each new lane you

open, but this can of course be changed
with ease.
Take lanes share FX bins, sends, I/O and
mix controls with the “parent” track, but
you can also insert plug-ins into any clip in
any lane. The Automation lanes make for
more precise and easier automation control. What’s really nice is that even if you
have multiple Automation lanes under a

Getting in Touch with SONAR X2 on Windows 8
All the other great new stuff aside, a lot of attention has been
given to SONAR X2’s new support for Touch gestures as part of
its integration with Microsoft Windows 8. Cakewalk was kind
enough to loan us a Win8 laptop with multitouch display for a
few quick tests right before we went to press, so we could Touch
SONAR X2 for ourselves.
While not every function that you’d normally control with a
mouse has been optimized for Touch, there is a good selection
of basic capabilities that show a lot of promise for DAW work.
We had fun triggering sounds in the Matrix View and scrolling
through audio data and across mixer channels with sideways
swipes; pinching is supported to zoom Track View data as well.
Our brief experiences with Touch in SONAR X2 were good
ones; while some gestures didn’t seem to work at first, a little bit
of common sense and care soon gave good results. For example,
we had a hard time figuring out how to get a single ProChannel
to scroll up and down while in Console View; the secret is to first
tap the ProChannel to select the name of a particular effect in the
chain. You can then drag the display up and down, rather than
changing some random parameter with the swiping motion.
the previously selected track is minimized
and the new one automatically adopts the
optimized height. Another major overhaul
is the Timeline zoom. Now, when you
zoom using the Timeline, the zoom stays
focused on your point of contact, no matter how far you zoom in or out. No more
getting lost while trying to see the big picture!
Let’s change lanes!
Finally! Beautifully realized Automation
and Take lanes have come to SONAR at
long last. Automation envelopes can still
be overlaid on top of clips if you want,
48

RECORDING June 2013

projects, which I expected. However, as
noted before, XP and Vista aren’t supported
any more... you can experiment with X2 on
such systems, but you do so at your own risk.
Moving to my Windows 7 laptop and
desktop, SONAR X2 voraciously ate up
anything I could throw at it, from a large
project with 48 stereo tracks to
multiple instances of high-power
virtual instrument VSTs running
simultaneously. As mentioned
above, SONAR X2 was rock solid
with no dramatic spikes in CPU
processing or disk access.
Summary
While I am biased in my DAW
choice, I have tried other big names
in the category, from common
“Professional Studio” level programs all the
way to the small, hardly noticeable freeware applications, and I keep coming back
to SONAR. It is easy to use and navigate
through the interface and workflow, and
when you add the included content, VSTs
and FX, exporting options, and extensive
customizability to the performance, you can
hardly go wrong.

Our main takeaway from the Touch experience in SONAR X2
had less to do with whether SONAR X2 was “doing it right” with
respect to Touch—we feel it’s off to a great start—and more to
do with the hardware itself. If you go to Cakewalk’s website and
watch the SONAR X2 Touch video, you’ll note that most of the
demos are shown on large touchscreens, 27" or more in size.
In our experiences with the laptop, we found that doing accurate work in Touch wasn’t straightforward; the screen was comparatively small and tended to bounce when touched because it
was on a hinge. We could easily activate the transport, scroll
around various Views, and trigger sounds in Matrix View, but
certain fine-detail scrolling actions and any kind of touch-based
mix work were very difficult.
If you want to get the most out of working with a touch-sensitive screen in SONAR X2, you’ll want to have the right sort of
screen. It should be large, very stable against being touched,
and preferably angled comfortably for easy reach. If you take
care ahead of time to set up the ergonomics properly, you will
see for yourself why SONAR X2’s Touch integration really does
point toward a new paradigm for working with DAWs.—AG
with Mike Metlay

“parent” track, you can still view the
automation or filter data in the parent track
itself as well. This is ideal for overlaying
automation over clips or other automation
for comparison. This really cuts down on
edit time, because the revamped Smart
Tool also works in the various types of
lanes, making editing quite an easy chore.

The only downside I see to SONAR X2
is the loss of XP/Vista support. As a longtime XP user with a super-stable workstation, I can identify with our readers who
can’t afford to or just don’t want to
upgrade. But technology does advance,
and Cakewalk’s newest SONAR rides the
wave with style and grace.

Performance?
I tested SONAR X2 across multiple platforms and hardware configurations.
Running SONAR X2 under Windows XP
on an AMD Athlon quad-core PC with 16 GB
RAM, performance was sluggish on larger

Prices: SONAR X2 Producer, $499
(SONAR X2 Studio, $199; SONAR X2
Essential, $99—see Cakewalk website
for feature lists)
More from: Cakewalk, www.cakewalk.com


http://www.cakewalk.com

Recording - June 2013

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - June 2013

Recording - June 2013
Fade In
Contents
Talkback
Fast Forward
SXSW 2013—From Guerilla To Gorilla
Finding Fault
Reviewed & Revisited: Ableton Live 9 and Push
Universal Audio Teletronix LA-2A Classic Leveler Collection for UAD-2
Apogee Quartet
Reviewed & Revisited: Steinberg Cubase 7
Mock-Up Magic
Reviewed & Revisited: MOTU Digital Performer 8
Ingram Engineering MPA685
Reviewed & Revisited: PreSonus Studio One 2.5
Reviewed & Revisited: Cakewalk SONAR X2
Readers’ Tapes
Recording Fundamentals. Chapter 18: Headphones—Part 1
Recording’s Showcase of Sounds
For Your Bookshelf
Advertiser Index
Fade Out
Recording - June 2013 - Intro
Recording - June 2013 - Recording - June 2013
Recording - June 2013 - Cover2
Recording - June 2013 - 1
Recording - June 2013 - 2
Recording - June 2013 - 3
Recording - June 2013 - Fade In
Recording - June 2013 - 5
Recording - June 2013 - Contents
Recording - June 2013 - 7
Recording - June 2013 - Talkback
Recording - June 2013 - 9
Recording - June 2013 - Fast Forward
Recording - June 2013 - 11
Recording - June 2013 - 12
Recording - June 2013 - 13
Recording - June 2013 - SXSW 2013—From Guerilla To Gorilla
Recording - June 2013 - 15
Recording - June 2013 - Finding Fault
Recording - June 2013 - 17
Recording - June 2013 - 18
Recording - June 2013 - 19
Recording - June 2013 - Reviewed & Revisited: Ableton Live 9 and Push
Recording - June 2013 - 21
Recording - June 2013 - 22
Recording - June 2013 - 23
Recording - June 2013 - Universal Audio Teletronix LA-2A Classic Leveler Collection for UAD-2
Recording - June 2013 - 25
Recording - June 2013 - 26
Recording - June 2013 - 27
Recording - June 2013 - Apogee Quartet
Recording - June 2013 - 29
Recording - June 2013 - Reviewed & Revisited: Steinberg Cubase 7
Recording - June 2013 - 31
Recording - June 2013 - 32
Recording - June 2013 - 33
Recording - June 2013 - Mock-Up Magic
Recording - June 2013 - 35
Recording - June 2013 - 36
Recording - June 2013 - 37
Recording - June 2013 - Reviewed & Revisited: MOTU Digital Performer 8
Recording - June 2013 - 39
Recording - June 2013 - 40
Recording - June 2013 - 41
Recording - June 2013 - Ingram Engineering MPA685
Recording - June 2013 - 43
Recording - June 2013 - Reviewed & Revisited: PreSonus Studio One 2.5
Recording - June 2013 - 45
Recording - June 2013 - Reviewed & Revisited: Cakewalk SONAR X2
Recording - June 2013 - 47
Recording - June 2013 - 48
Recording - June 2013 - 49
Recording - June 2013 - Readers’ Tapes
Recording - June 2013 - 51
Recording - June 2013 - 52
Recording - June 2013 - 53
Recording - June 2013 - 54
Recording - June 2013 - 55
Recording - June 2013 - Recording Fundamentals. Chapter 18: Headphones—Part 1
Recording - June 2013 - 57
Recording - June 2013 - Recording’s Showcase of Sounds
Recording - June 2013 - 59
Recording - June 2013 - 60
Recording - June 2013 - 61
Recording - June 2013 - 62
Recording - June 2013 - 63
Recording - June 2013 - For Your Bookshelf
Recording - June 2013 - Advertiser Index
Recording - June 2013 - 66
Recording - June 2013 - 67
Recording - June 2013 - 68
Recording - June 2013 - 69
Recording - June 2013 - 70
Recording - June 2013 - 71
Recording - June 2013 - Fade Out
Recording - June 2013 - Cover3
Recording - June 2013 - Cover4
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