"Sonar 7 needs a complete rewrite to be of serious pro use! "

Feature:
Full of features no doubt like the V-vocal but even that crashes the system randomly for no good reason!Good bundled synths.

Quality:
Sorry but when you break it all down to the basic DAW Cubase is light years ahead on stabilty,looks and compatability! If the basic DAW would work with its bundled software then alls well but at the end of the day Cubase is much more expensive for good reason and like a BMW you get what you pay for! period!

Sound:
Good 64bit sound but just so unstable when using any plugins,etc. suffers from pops,clicks. Occasional lockups, dropouts galore,motorboating! I also use Nuendo3 which suffers from none of this on the same PC setup. Go figure!

Ease of Use:
A hard one this.Midi wise it has improved immensely with good tools. The console view is easy to use although the meters are far too small. Check out Cubases meters!!! the track view in my opinion neads a complete overhaul,infact a rewrite as it is too messy and busy with garish colours!

"Nice feature set, but too unstable for pro use."

Feature:
Has lots of features--and lots of very weak features. For example, you can enter MIDI music in standard notation, which is nice, but you can't input rests.

Quality:
Very poor software quality. Clearly the emphasis is on features, not stability. The program crashes routinely for no apparent reason, so obviously it's not suitable for pro use.

Value:
A cheap product--in both quality and cost, so keep that in mind when you are evaluating your own requirements.

Desirability:
Not suitable for pro use, and a bit frustrating to qualify as a cool toy.

Sound:
Sound is decent for non-professional use. Not suitable for pro use on acoustic intruments. The decimation that takes your 24/96 tracks to 16/44.1 for CD is especially nasting, introducing audible clicks and other distortion. Workaround is to record to 24/88.2.

Support:
Typical software support--count on spending lots of time searching the web, reading forum posts, etc.

Overall:
I'll replace it with something I can depend on, maybe Pro Tools.

"Does it all, designed for PC, excellent price. Great for ReWiring Reason or Ableton Live."

Feature:
great bundle of plugs

Quality:
Occasional crashes with Sonar 2.X, have not noticed this with 3.0 (but I have not had it very long . . . ). Crashes are usually due to DX plugin compatibility problems.

Value:
Compared to Cubase and Logic, it's a steal, and it does just as much, as far as I know.

Sound:
Pro quality sound, without a doubt. You are only limited by your skills, not by the software.

Support:
My one experience with them was unusually positive (as compared to Gateway, AOL, Ableton AG, or Verizon online, all of whom have terrible tech support).