Sonar V-Studio 700

[andrewfoshee]

Anyone used this yet?

[llmonty]

nope not yet. there are some threads on their weird forum about it, and on gearslutz. i myself am pretty bummed about some of the key aspects of it -- at first it was all bundled together, then they offer the controller only at a crazy high price that it doesn't make sense not to buy the whole thing. no expandable # of faders, etc.

[andrewfoshee]

I'm wondering how the pres & a/d converters sound

[calaverasgrandes]

I checked it out at the AES, and I am a former Sonar Beta tester as well. Speaking to the guys from twelve tone, they are very confident that the converter side of it can stand up to anything. ITs all based on the Roland V Mixer digital console stuff.
I am not that put off by that, the deal breakers for me are that its USB connectivity. The dude from 12 tone was trying to tell me that since Roland makes its own ASICs for USB they dont have the same problems everybody else does.
Which is horseshit. The problem with USB is that its almost always a part of yoru computers chipset. It will be running on the driver you get from Asus, Dell. Gigabyte etc. For these manufacturers USB is a convenient way to hook up the mouse keyboard and printer. Anything else is just extra and not mission critical. Then they set about making sure teh SATA controller work and forget about the USB.
Will Rolands magic ASIC be able to keep my computer from interupting the USB data stream to perform other USB tasks? Will my mouse fuck up my audio?
I would be far more enthusiastic about this boz if it was firewire or a proprietary cable to a PCIe host card.
Oh yeah, one adat out and one adat in? In 2008 they came up with this? Illiterate mouth breathers are recording at 96k and want to use SMUX to get 8 more channels of jaw harp on their magnum opus. Sonar/Roland seems to think 8 channels of 48k/4 channels of 96k is dandy.
The single pair of control room outs is lame too. I'd rather have 3 sets of control room outs or at least two.
All of these things could be overlooked on a product that was $1500-2000. But the V700 is $4000 MSRP.

[andrewfoshee]

Wow, lots of great points and information, thank you!

Q: Why do I still want it so bad?

[llmonty]

because you want it to be something it isn't unfortunately. same here. there isn't anything on the market that isn't protools (and that is completely debatable) that is seamless in integrating DAW world and analog world.

I am tired of a mouse but like some of the conveniences of DAW automation, and plug-ins when I don't have enough or the right kind of outboard.

[calaverasgrandes]

I think that the V700, while it may not be perfect, is a good start. I eagerly anticipate the next model. V1000? If they can put at least as many inputs and outputs as an 828MKIII or Fireface 800 and change it to anything but USB then I might be a buyer.
But I am starting to have issues with Sonar. I have been on Soanr since ver 1(actually since CWPA 9) and am starting to really be annoyed by the developers at twelve tone. While they coontinue to pile on new features, they do not address long standing bugs.
For instance, if you copy a clip go to another place in the song move a clip out of the way and paste it, nothing happens. Apparently moving stuff clears the clipboard!
They have also begun to take away features. You no longer can hold down the shift button when moving clips to constrain them in the time line. Instead you have to rely on "snap to" to be sure you dont fuck up your timing. There are other problems I have, but suffice to say I am trying out Logic right now.

[andrewfoshee]

anyone else tried one of these?

[andrewfoshee]

Going to a V-Studio clinic tomorrow at Big Dude's in Kansas City.

Don't really have an interest in one of these anymore, but I will say that Sonar 8 really kicks ass!