I just got faderport few days ago, used in pristine condition for about 90$,
looks really promising and works amazingly well with Reaper, every button can be mapped to whatever I need, even actions, looking forward to mixing/mastering with it

 

Abit unfair really. If you must have motorised faders then yes Nektar is a deal breaker, but for what it is, a solid, deeply integrated and easily customisable daw controller/multi fader cc controller then it does the job spot on and wth minimum hassle.

 

Faderport just arrived. It looks brand new!
So I immediately go looking for drivers while I have internet because there's none available at the studio. No drivers available, lol. Supposedly Windows can load it with a built in generic driver. There is a Faderport.dll that you can put into Sonar's Controller Plugin directory which I suppose define's the control surface for Sonar.
I did happen across AZSlow's site (http://www.azslow.com/) where he looks to have built a custom plugin interface for Sonar. Pretty excited about that as it seems to give more control over assignment of the user buttons than the actual Presonus plugin does. It's supposed to follow track/bus selections far better than the Presonus plug as well as well as allow you to use the Pan control as a jog/shuttle wheel with the shift key pressed (which I believe will be very useful).
So just tried plugging the unit up to do the firmware update, heard a pop from inside, then smelled the sweet sickly smell of fried electronics. Guitar Center sent the Faderport with a Line 6 power supply. Turns out the Line 6 supply is 2,000 ma 9VAC, and the Faderport uses 9 VDC. Just something to watch out for if you are ordering these used! Spoke with a manager, and he is willing to exchange it for another. I hope the one I end up getting is as clean looking as this one is. Damn my rotten luck!

 

how did you make software changes?

 

I'm assuming you're talking about the original Faderport. If you're a Studio One user its a must (unless you go for its big brother). It integrates beautifully.

Ive been through a lot of controllers, but the one thing that has never moved from my desk is my faderport. I now have a Tascam US2400 and the faderport is still there. All my main gain staging is done on the Tascam, but all automation with the faderport. In Studio One you can click on a parameter, link it to the fader (or pan) in with one keypress, then unlink it with the same key press. Much faster than flipping through all the modes of the US2400 (or any MCU device for that matter).

 

speaking of adapters, I checked mine and it's rated 1.2A and faderport works alright

 

Well, my replacement Faderport finally arrived. This one looks almost as clean as the one that blew up. Plus it came with the original box which is nice for storage and such.
I finally got it setup and working within Sonar. I didn't even try the default Faderport dll for Sonar which comes from Presonus, I just setup the AZSlow plugin to use it. Everything I've read say that it follow bus/track switching correctly where the Presonus dll doesn't do such a great job of that. I really like the implementation of the jog control using Shift+Pan, just haven't gotten used to having it so I rarely reach for it. Hopefully that will change as I become more accustomed to it.
For automation of track faders, this thing is really nice, plus the eye candy of watching the fader move while playing back a track which is automated is sweet. It's a far superior way to work than the Ultramix I was recording automation with before.
I'm trying to figure out how to get it to record automation of effects parameters within plugins, but haven't experimented much with that yet. If any other Sonar users with Faderports have anything to share about this, that would be awesome!
I'll update this post as I learn more and use it more, but I think it's going to work into my workflow pretty well whether I get the plugin automation figured out or not.

 

Just wanted to update since I've had my Faderport for several weeks now. This thing is awesome. I regained some of the space on my desk after retiring the old Ultramix. Which was nice.
The Faderport just works. I was concerned at the beginning because it seemed to work in some projects, but not others. That has ironed itself out. I've been using it with the AZSlow controller plugin, and I feel that if you are a Sonar user, that is the way to go. Especially the Shift-Pan=Jog Wheel thing. Biggest thing I've been missing working in a DAW versus working on something like the Tascam Neo is a functional jog wheel.
I've still got to figure out the parameter editing for plugins and try to get something going with that (ACT, I believe). I also need to see if I can get it to edit/record/playback automation moves on other track parameters (such as send levels to buses) but even if I'm not successful with that, I'll still count this thing as a 100% win as far as workflow improvements go.