This article was adapted from the SONAR 2016.05 Update PDF.

The SONAR 2016.05 update includes the following:

1. SONAR Themes
2. Enhanced Color Picker
3. Console View Track Name, Color, and WAI Pinning
4. Fixes and Enhancements

How to Download the SONAR 2016.05 Update

Open the Cakewalk Command Center. If you don’t have the latest installer, the Command Center will prompt you to download and install it. Cakewalk highly recommends that you do this. (Also remember that you can always download the latest version from the Cakewalk Command Center page.)

To download the SONAR 2016.05 core update, download from the core SONAR Artist, Professional, or Platinum category. All new features, enhancements, and bug fixes for this release are contained within the core update as well as the Engineering FX Suite (SONAR Platinum and SONAR Professional only). Lastly, there is also an update to SONAR Local Documentation (all versions).

SONAR Themes

Artist, Professional, Platinum

“Tungsten” is a new SONAR theme that’s characterized by a darker, ironclad finish, accented with golden highlights. This theme is easy on the eyes over extremely long sessions, and is also ideal for low-lit working environments such as post-production suites.

Tungsten Features

Emphasized function status. It’s now much easier to see the status of effects (bypassed or enabled), as well as selected tabs, send pre/post, and the like. Selections are highlighted in gold to stand out more against the muted gray background.   Knob “ring.” Knobs now have rings that make it easy to see the amount of rotation at a glance.    Power buttons that are off will brighten on mouseovers. When the mouse hovers over an off power switch, the symbol changes from gray to white, making it easier to see.

Subtle strip bar handling. Instead of coloring an entire mixer strip, the color you choose applies to a bar along the bottom of the channel. A centered highlight helps differentiate it from the WAI color. 

HOW TO CHANGE THEMES   Choose Edit > Preferences then under Customization, choose Themes. Your current choices are the new Tungsten theme and the original Mercury theme.   Click Apply, then OK.    Note that you can still do some degree of color customization within Tungsten.

Enhanced Color Picker

Artist, Professional, Platinum

The Color Picker for clip foreground colors, background colors,  and track colors has been augmented to provide a selection of 24 unique colors. Furthermore, you can choose “other” for additional color options. The new color picker works with both the Tungsten and Mercury themes.

Console View Track Name, Color, and WAI Pinning

Artist, Professional, Platinum

Previously, when scrolling vertically in the Console view to see various sections of a channel’s module the track name, color, and WAI pinning could “disappear” under the lower part of the console. The only exception to this was when scrolling the Inspector. However starting with SONAR 2016.05, these labels remain pinned in place and visible in Console View as you scroll.
  
Referring to the screen shot, note that the console view to the right has been scrolled downward to see the upper channel modules, but the track name and channel color strip remain pinned to the bottom.

Fixes & Enhancements

Fixed SONAR issues where: 

• Export dialog didn’t persist Source Category settings correctly
• Opening the Piano Roll View would disable Landmarks Snap
• ACT Learning a parameter could fail in some situations, depending on the order in which multiple parameters were learned
• Splitting a clip could cause unusual cropping when there’s a tempo map
• Inserting an Instrument Track Template would insert an extra MIDI Track
• Clicking a Start Screen notification opened in the Start Screen instead of the browser
• In some situations it was possible to open two instances of Preferences
• Musical Time Snap panel would blank out when docking/undocking the Control Bar after turning on, then off, any Snap-To option
• Console View dividers were not appearing in Hardware Outputs

Fixed LP Multiband issues where:

• Mono Meters didn’t display correctly on both sides
• Band split redrawing needed correction.
• Frequency displays would go off the edge of the plot when dragging near the edge 
• Range dragger (horizontal line on the curve) didn’t display the dB range properly when dragging 
• If three bands were connected, selecting and moving the middle band could create an overlap 
• Selected states did not draw  properly 

Fixed LP EQ issues where:

• Mono Meters didn’t display correctly on both sides
• The Hz Value shown above the node when dragging wasn’t the same as the number on the dial
• Inactive band color could be the same as the active band color
• Switching a node to a pass filter didn’t set the node's gain to 0 dB
• Selected states did not draw properly