Cakewalk FAQ

I cannot input my registration code I have received from Cakewalk. The input area for the code has been grayed out. What should I do?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator

If you are using Windows 7 or Vista you will need to right click on the icon that starts the program and select Run as Administrator from the resulting pop-up menu. This will open up the space where you input the registration code that was previously grayed out.

I didn't receive my product serial number from the Cakewalk web site when I made my purchase on-line. What should I do?
When you buy a new Cakewalk product such as SONAR 8, SONAR Home Studio 7, or pyro Audio Creator directly from Cakewalk, Your serial number and registration codes are emailed to you, using the address you provided during your purchase. Please check the Junk Mail folder in your Mail program to see if it was placed there. You can check your serial number information on-line at the Cakewalk website. To see your Cakewalk purchase history, set your preferences and more click here. If you require further assistance you can contact Cakewalk direct by clicking here.

How do I start learning Music Creator 5?
The information in this article applies to: Music Creator 5, Music Creator 5 LE

A series of tutorial videos is now available to help you get started using Music Creator 5. Please note: These videos were created for Music Creator 5, while they are applicable to Music Creator LE there may be variations in the content used in some of the examples. You can click here to view the tutorial videos.

Also check out the tutorials found in the Help Menu in your Cakewalk software as there are a number of tutorials there that will help you get started.

My attempt to install my program failed and and error message appeared saying "DeleteFile failed; code 5 access denied". What should I do now?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator

Windows 7 and Vista Users:

Windows 7 and Vista users may come across the error "DeleteFile failed; code 5 access denied" when installing a Cakewalk product under a user account with limited privileges. Follow these steps to resolve the issue:

Restart your computer, and log in with another administrative user account. If you are already logged in as the Administrator, you will need to run the installer manually as Admin:

1. Insert your Cakewalk CD or DVD installation disc. Note: If you are using a downloaded version of the installer, skip to step 4.
3. Close out of the auto-run screen (if displayed) go to Computer, right-click on your DVD/CD-ROM drive and choose Open.
4. Find the Setup.exe for the installer. It should be located in the Install folder. For example, GT Pro 4's installer is located under \Install\GuitarTracks_Setup.exe
5. Right-click on the .exe and choose "Properties."
6. Then click the "Advanced" button at the bottom of the window that opens.
7. Check "Run as Administrator".

If this steps above do not work there is no other User Account to log into, please create a new one with Administrative rights. Click here for some tips on creating a new user account. Your permissions for the current user account might be corrupt. A new User Account will have fresh privileges, and hopefully work for you.

Make sure nothing else is running while you're installing the program, such as virus scanners and so on. Choose Start | Run and type MSCONFIG. Click OK, then click on the Startup tab at the upper right of the window that opens. Uncheck all items listed, click OK, then restart your computer. You can always recheck those items again at a later time. If you have any realtime monitoring software running like Spy Doctor or Zone Alarm, please disable them from within the program.

Try reinstalling Cakewalk.

Windows XP Users:

In some rare cases, XP users may encounter the same problem. You will need to give full permissions to your user account under HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT in the registry. Here are the steps:

1. Open the registry editor by going to Start/Run and typing in REGEDIT
2. Hit OK and right mouse click on HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT
3. Select Permissions
4. Under Group or user names, highlight "Users"
5. Under "Permissions" for Users, check the box for "Full Control"
6. Click OK
7. Reinstall Cakewalk

Will my program work on Windows 7?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator

You can click here to find information about Windows 7 and whether your program will work with  it.If your version is not listed as being compatible then you will need to purchase an upgrade. send us an email with your enquiry and we will assist you with your upgrade options.

Will my program work on Windows Media Centre?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator

We no longer officially support Media Centre. This is for a variety of reasons but the main reason being that no audio devices support it. SONAR will work on Media Centre however – but it won’t do much good if the audio device is not accessible.

How do I use the TTS-1 Synthesizer with my Standard MIDI File collection?
The information in this article applies to: Music Creator 5, Home Studio 7

You can click here to read an article on how to use MIDI files with the TTS-1.

How do I reduce the latency so that I can play my keyboard without hearing a delay?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator

When input monitoring or playing a Soft Synth in real-time, the biggest problem people come across is latency. Before you can get monitoring to work with out a delay, you will need to make some adjustments in Options | Audio | General. If you can get your buffer size down to 10 msec or less, you probably won't notice a delay. How low you can set your latency depends on a few things:

1) WDM drivers. Make sure you have the latest drivers from your sound card manufacturer's website. Manufacturers are constantly updating drivers. Most Cakewalk products will try to access the WDM driver mode by default, but many times, built-in sound cards will have trouble in this driver mode. If you are forced to switch to the MME (32bit) Driver Mode under Options | Audio | Advanced, then you may not be able to achieve ultra-low latency.
2) DMA buffer size. Most high-end cards allow you to change DMA Buffer size in their control panel or mixing software. After you lower the buffer, you must hit the Wave Profiler button under Options | Audio | General for the changes to take effect.
3) ASIO Drivers. If you use ASIO you can usually access the ASIO control panel under Options | Audio "ASIO Panel". If not, go to your sound card's mixing or control panel software. Lower the buffers here to improve latency.

If you don't have ASIO drivers, you can try out ASIO4ALL. These drivers are a good solution for generic or OEM sound cards that have unreliable WDM drivers and/or nonexistent ASIO support. Go to Options | Audio | Advanced and change the Driver mode to ASIO.

I am getting an Audio Driver error message. What should I do?
The information in this article applies to: SONAR (All SONAR family Products), Guitar Tracks (All Versions), Music Creator, Kinetic 2, Pyro Audio Creator
This error is usually caused by audio driver configuration problems. The first thing to do is check the Audio Hardware Guide and make sure your sound card or interface is set up properly. If your interface isn't listed, try switching the driver mode to either MME 32-bit or ASIO under Options > Audio > Advanced.

If you experience difficulties changing your driver mode, please run the Driver Mode Changer utility to change your driver mode to MME 32-bit.

Users may get this error message when setting the Driver Bit Depth or Sampling Rate beyond the capabilities of the currently selected sound card or if opening a project with a different sample rate than the sound card is currently set to.

1. Go to Options > Audio > General and reduce the Driver Bit Depth to '16' and the Sampling Rate to '44100'. This is CD-quality and is the best option for most users. Please keep in mind that while many consumer cards such as the Creative Labs Audigy advertise 24-bit capabilities, their drivers only support 16-bit recording/playback.
   
2. If your soundcard's clock can be controlled via an external connection (ie Word Clock, ADAT, etc) or via a control panel, please make sure that the device's current sampling rate matches the settings in SONAR.
   
3. Your card may also be in use by another program on the computer. To eliminate this problem, please close all applications running in the background such as Real Player, Winamp, etc and turn off all Windows Sounds from the Control Panel. You may then need to restart your Cakewalk application.
4. Some audio interfaces have a control panel that allows the user to specify the device's sample rate.  Ensure that the setting in this control panel matches that of the current project you are trying to work with. Consult your soundcard's documentation for details on how to do this.
   

1. Completely un-install all Cakewalk programs from your computer. This is normally done from Start | Programs | Cakewalk. This will not remove any of your project files or audio data.
2. Next you will want to open the Run Command a) In Windows XP this can be done by going to Start | Run b) In Windows Vista or Windows 7 this can be done by holding down the ‘windows’ key and pressing ‘r’
3. At the prompt type regedit and click [OK].
***Backup your Registry before making edits - you do this by clicking the File menu, Export Registry File.
4. Now delete the following Registry keys:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Cakewalk Music Software
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Cakewalk Music Software
*Please note that this will remove any effects presets and key bindings you may have made in Cakewalk. You can back these up separately if you like, using Options|Key Bindings, Tools|SONAR Plug-in Manager, and Options|Colors. Hit F1 in these views for detailed instructions on how to do this.
5. Open the 'Run' command again.
6. Copy and paste the following into the prompt:
%appdata%
7. This will open your Application Data folder, right-click on the Cakewalk folder and choose ‘Delete’.
8. Navigate to the following directory and delete its contents:
C:\Program Files\Cakewalk
9. Open the 'Run' command again and type ‘msconfig’ Click [OK] and then click on the Startup tab at the upper right of the window that opens.
10. Uncheck all items listed, click [OK], then restart your computer. You can always recheck those items again at a later time.
11. At this point you can reinstall your Cakewalk programs.

1. Go to: Start then Control Panel then Power Options.
2. Choose High Performance
3. Click the Change Plan Settings button.
4. Make sure both power options are set to Never

1. Go to Control Panel and select Sound
2. Go to the Sounds Tab
3. Under Sounds Scheme, select No sounds
4. Click Apply and then OK
   

1. Open the Device Manager
2. Expand the IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers category then double click on each one of the IDE channels
3. Under the Advanced Settings  tab, make sure the Enable DMA box is ticked in device properties. Please note:This option may not be available on your computer.  If it isn't then you should not worry about completing this step.

1. Go to the Control Panel and select System
2. Go to Advanced System Settings and click the Performance tab
3. Set processor scheduling as Background Services
4. Click Apply and then OK

1. Press Start and in the search box type: SystemPropertiesPerformance and press enter.
2. On the Visual Effects tab select Custom
3. Untick: Animate windows when minimizing and maximizing to help prevent glitches when minimizing and maximizing. You can also experiment with disabling other visual effects in the custom list to see how they improve audio performance.
4. If you wish to optimize your Windows 7 graphics for the best performance select  Adjust for Best Performance.
5. Once you have finished, press OK

1. Create and save projects
2. Record, edit and playback your recordings
3. Find, audition and add any audio loop you have on your computer.
4. Use soft synths in your songs
5. Export, burn them to CD and share your finished songs

1. SONAR X1 users can click here for some tutorial videos.
2. Music Creator 5 Users can click here to view the tutorial videos.
3. Click here to go to Cakewalk's extensive knowledgebase.
4. Click here to go to Cakewalk's CakeTV channel.
5. If you still require more help then there is a range of books and videos you can purchase from the Cakewalk web site. Click here for details