Reference Guide

1215
Setting up control surfaces
External devices
5. In the Input Port and Output Port fields, select which MIDI input and output ports the controller/
surface uses.
6. Click OK to close the Controller/Surface Settings dialog box.
7. In the Preferences dialog box, make sure that both the ACT and WAI check boxes are enabled,
and click Close.
Now that your controller/surface is connected, you can see which tracks and/or buses are being
controlled by it by looking at the colored markings (the WAI display; see “The WAI display” on page
1232 for more information) in SONAR’s interface.
If you selected the ACT MIDI Controller plug-in or the Cakewalk Generic Surface plug-in for your
controller/surface, you can load a default set of mappings by opening the property page for either
plug-in, and selecting the name of your controller/surface from the Presets window in the property
page.
Synchronizing channel strips between SONAR and control surfaces
SONAR allows control surfaces to display all channel strips in a project, or only the channel strips
that are visible in the Track view or Console view.
1. Go to Edit > Preferences > MIDI - Control Surfaces.
2. Under Control Strips Visible in, click one of the following:
• Track View. The controller/surface matches the channel strips that are visible in the Track
view.
• Console View. The controller/surface matches the channel strips that are visible in the
Console view.
• All Strips. The controller/surface shows all channel strips in the project.
The controller/surface immediately refreshes and displays the specified channel strips.
Note 1: You may need to read the documentation for your controller/surface to find out which
MIDI input driver your controller/surface uses to control software applications. If your controller/
surface includes a MIDI keyboard, your controller/surface might use one MIDI input driver for
the controller/surface functions, and a different MIDI input driver to send MIDI notes and pitch
bend data to the application (the piano keyboard functions).
Note 2: Control surfaces retain their current MIDI port assignments even if you add or remove
MIDI devices.
If any assigned MIDI port is missing when you load a project, SONAR will let you remap each missing
port to an available port. For more information, see “Changing MIDI Output devices” on page 67.
Important: If your controller/surface needs to be in a certain mode, or have a certain memory
preset loaded in order to control a software application, put your controller/surface in the proper
mode or load the required memory preset now.