If you have purchased this software as download from the PlugIn-Shop.com website, please note that due to the size of the file the sonicWORX 2 manual can be found on the download page at http://www.prosoniq.com as a separate file. If you are done with the installation, please go there and download the manual to make full use of the software.
If you have any questions on this product or need support please see our internet site at http://www.prosoniq.com.
sonicWORX Version history
The following feature and bugfix descriptions apply to all flavors of sonicWORX (Artist, Studio and PowerBundle) unless stated otherwise.
v2.5.0
Bug fixes:
Ñ Compatibility with ECHO audio cards has been improved.
Ñ In versions before 2.5, the AIFF marker and loop data was not always updated correctly. Fixed.
Ñ The overall handling of WAV files has been improved significantly. Previously, there have been some problems and error messages with opening and editing certain types of WAV files.
Ñ When choosing "Play Last Version" after an offline plugin has been executed which lengthens the file (like one of the Reverb plugins) there was an error message appearing. This has been fixed.
Changes/Improvements:
Ñ The most obvious new feature of sonicWORX 2.5 is its powerful batch processing capability. Please refer to the "Batch Processing Manual" for a quickstart guide and a detailed explanation of the batching functionality.
Ñ The incompatibility of Waves 3.x plugins with sonicWORX has been fixed with a workaround.
Ñ There is a new menu item in the "Windows" menu called "Minimize Audio Windows". When choosing this item, all the audio windows are set to minimal size and arranged in a tiled way across the screen. This is a very useful feature if you are in the process of mastering an audio track (that is, tweaking all the different plugin settings) and like to compare it quickly to a number of other tracks (like the ones that will go on the same CD, for example). Note that in the minimized version, you still see the overview of all the windows and can trigger playback instantly at any position with just one click into the overview's ruler.
Hold down the option key while selecting "Minimize Audio Windows" to get an even tighter arrangement of the audio windows. This way you don't see the overview any more but you get more windows on the screen at the same time and, of course, you can still click on the overview's ruler or into the "Play" button to start playback.
Don't forget that you also can trigger playback of any open file by holding down the "Control" key and selecting it from the "Windows" menu.
Ñ IMPORTANT: due to changes which were neccessary for the batch processing feature, parameter documents (now called "offline" documents) which are saved with this new version 2.5 are not backwards compatible (that is, you cannot open them with versions of sonicWORX before 2.5). Nevertheless, documents saved under previous versions can still be opened with version 2.5.
Ñ In the Parameter Window (now called "Offline Window") the different parameter sets in the left list can now be reordered by dragging them with the mouse. This is an important feature when it comes to setting up a sequence of batch processing steps.
Ñ When you launch sonicWORX and have a lot of files in the "Autoload" folder, which takes a lot of time until they are all open, you now can type and hold ESC or command-period to abort the loading process.
Ñ Studio and PowerBundle versions now also load and check aliases of realtime and VST plugins and of subfolders in the "sonicWORX Realtime Folder".
Ñ The level meter now has two reset buttons, one for the peak hold indicator and one for the over indicator. This eliminates the need to select something from the popup menu to reset the peak hold and overs.
Ñ In the "Save Changes ?" dialog you now see the type of window that is going to be closed, that is, if it's an audio file or an analyzer window or a realtime DSP page etc.
Ñ If the option "Import/Export AIFF Markers & Loops" in the preferences dialog is switched on, marker information and loop information is saved within the appropriate standard AIFF data area (MARK and INST chunks), so that it can be imported in other audio applications capable of reading this standard marker and loop information.
If you want the markers of existing AIFF files to be exported, be sure that the option is switched off. Then, open those files, switch the option back on and save the files.
If there are two markers in the file called "Loop Start" and "Loop End" (exactly like shown here) then also loop information will be written to the file.
If you save such files as WAV files, the information about the loop and the corresponding two markers will be saved into a special data area so that these types of files can be directly read by AKAI S5000 samplers (via use of a CD-R, for example), which will also import the marker and loop information.
Ñ In the realtime DSP window, PgUp/PgDn/Home/End keys on the extended keyboard can now be used to scroll the window's contents.
Ñ The "Active" button in the realtime DSP page is now automatically switched off after the DSP page has been applied to a file with the "Apply To File" button. Choosing Undo/Redo still activates/deactivates the page as expected.
Ñ When using "Save As..." from the file menu, you can now also save the file replacing itself, for example to just change the format or file type. This has been made possible by sonicWORX' 2.5 improved file handling.
Ñ The names of the various plugin folders has been changed. All the offline plugins (which appear under the "Offline" menu) are now contained in a folder called "sonicWORX offline plugins", while in Studio and PowerBundle the realtime plugins (including VST plugins) are contained in a folder named "sonicWORX realtime plugins". Also, sonicWORX does not look any more for a folder called "VSTPlugins" in the main application folder, but instead you can drop VST plugins directly into the "sonicWORX realtime folder" or into a folder called "VSTPlugins" (or any other name) inside the "sonicWORX realtime folder". Also please remember that you can create subfolders inside the "sonicWORX realtime plugins" folder to organize and group plugins together.
v2.1.0
Bug fixes:
Ñ The "Goto Position" dialog which is used to enter numerical positions of markers and selections now returns the accurate sample position instead of the milliseconds position. Before, just double-clicking on a marker to change its name would move the marker to the next full milliseconds position, which could be as far as 11 samples away from its original position (at 44.1 kHz).
Changes:
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: The "Remove All Modules╔" menu command is now always active if there's a realtime DSP window open, which is much more convenient. Before, the realtime DSP window had to be the frontmost window to activate the menu command.
Ñ The challenge/response authorization mechanism has been replaced by a serial number authorization scheme. Please read our press release regarding this change (http://www.prosoniq.com/html/news.html).
v2.0.8
Bug fixes:
Ñ Improved compatibility with RME Hammerfall audio card.
Ñ Artist version: a recording problem has been fixed which inhibited recording more that once per application launch. At the same time the recording dialog has been improved; it is now identical to that of the Studio version.
Ñ The words of the challenge string in the registration dialog were messed up. Fixed.
Ñ The free space in the recording dialog (when the "Define Locations" option was used) is now displayed correctly again.
Ñ Importing CD files now stops correctly if the destination disk is full.
Ñ The level meter did not work at all if the processing sequence was set to "Plugins > SRC" in the Audio Setup window.
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: Sometimes, saving a Realtime window would crash the app if reopened. This has been fixed, but please note that the bug is in the saved documents, so it is still possible that old saved documents produce a crash, since the bug was in the saving code, not in the loading code.
Ñ The digital over detection in the level meter now works correctly. Before, some light overs could have passed undetected.
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: The headroom display now shows the accurate values again. Before it always missed some of the signal's peak values.
Ñ Eliminated unneccessary scrolling that sometimes occurred when "Follow Playback" is active.
Ñ Improved compatibility with RME Digi96 cards. sonicWORX now allocates only 2 channels, even if the card has more than two channels. On Digi96 cards allocating more than 2 channels forced ADAT mode, so it was impossible to use the digital output in S/PDIF mode.
Ñ The digital outputs of the AudioMediaIII card could not be activated anymore. Fixed.
Ñ When the "Loop" button is activated in the audio editor window and there is a non-empty selection in the waveform display, the playback now always plays back to the end of the selection and then loops to the selection start, even when ctrl-clicking. Previously, ctrl-clicking would playback until the end of the file, regardless of the selection end. This feature is of vital importance for checking loop end points when creating loops manually.
Changes:
Ñ In the Audio Setup window you can now select different subchannels if a channel group has more than 2 channels available (for multi-i/o audio cards).
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: there's a new popup menu for adding plugins in the lower left corner of the window. This replicates the "Add Menu" item accessible from the menu bar but is much more usable.
Ñ You can trigger playback of an open audio file by holding the CTRL key down and selecting the audio file from the "Windows" menu.
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: There's a new switch "RT" in every audio file window. It is set to "RT auto" by default. In this setting, the file is fed through the DSP page depending on the setting of the "Active" button in the DSP page window. You can switch it to "RT off" (or "RT on") to prevent (or force, respectively) that file being processed by the RT DSP window while being played back. This allows for very convenient file comparison. Play back one (already mastered) file in "RT off" mode while tweaking the DSP parameters for the other file which is set to "RT on".
Ñ Studio & Bundle versions: The markers which can be contained within AIFF files can now be imported and re-exported. This feature must be activated through the "Preferences" dialog.
v2.0.6
Bug fixes:
Ñ "Apply to File" now resets all the realtime plugins before executing. Previously, plugins with an internal (delaying) buffer would behave somewhat differently when used with apply to file instead of normal playback.
Ñ In some cases (depending on the authorization method used) the 2.0.5 update would refuse to run.
Ñ Improved compatibility with RME HammerFall audio card.
Ñ Improved compatibility with Korg 1212
Changes:
Ñ The current authorization state is displayed in the "About sonicWORX╔" dialog. Now you can see if your software is running in demo mode, or whether it was authorized with a master floppy or with challenge/response.
Ñ sonicWORX now recognizes ASIO drivers even if they do not have Steinberg's creator code.
v2.0.5
Bug fixes:
Ñ Option-Cmd-Key (for "Close All" or "Quit Without Saving" didn't work. Fixed.
v2.0.4
Bug fixes:
Ñ Eliminated some graphic glitches with the play position cursor.
Ñ Some command-key shortcuts (specifically, Cmd-1,2,3, Cmd-Plus and Cmd-Minus) had to be typed on the numeric keyboard. Typing it on the main keyboard didn't work. This was inconvenient especially for PowerBook users. Fixed.
Ñ Improved compatibility with some VST plugins, especially Spectral Design's ME series. Previously, saving effect settings or switching programs didn't work. Fixed.
Ñ Improved compatibility with some 3rd party audio cards, especially RME's DIGI96 series. Previously, sonicWORX would crash on startup. This fix also reduces the time sonicWORX needs to launch.
Ñ When using "Save As Autoload" on a document from the file menu, and there is already a saved autoload document of the same type in the autoload folder, sonicWORX would show 3 error dialogs and then do nothing. Now sonicWORX politely asks if it should overwrite that file instead of showing the error dialogs.
Ñ Demo versions: in the "Audio Setup" dialog, clicking on "Apply" would quit sonicWORX. Fixed.
Changes / improvements:
Ñ In the file format dialogs in the "Record New File" and in the "New Audio File" dialog, settings are now remembered between program launches.
Ñ When you "Save As" an audio file, the name and the format of the file to save are displayed above the filename type-in field: "Save xxxx (AIFF, Stereo, 16bit, 44100Hz) as:" instead of just "Save As:"
v2.0.2
Bug fixes:
Ñ Powerbundle didn't load VST plugins from the "VSTPlugins" folder. Fixed.
Ñ Authorizing sonicWORX with a key diskette after letting it run in demo mode didn't work. Fixed.
