Before ProChannel, if you wanted console-style saturation or a tape sim, you had to buy expensive third-party plugins. SONAR 8 put a 4-band EQ, a compressor, and a tube saturation module right on every channel strip. It sounded good, it was efficient on your CPU, and it gave your mixes a "glued" feeling that was hard to find in competing DAWs at the price point. While Ableton Live was winning over loop-makers and Pro Tools was dominating audio recording, Cakewalk never forgot its roots in MIDI.
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If you still have that old install disc in a drawer, or an old Windows 7 laptop gathering dust, fire up SONAR 8. Create a new project. Add a soft synth. Open the ProChannel. Before ProChannel, if you wanted console-style saturation or