Cakewalk.ini

Many of the items in Cakewalk.ini are set using Cakewalk menus and dialog boxes. However, some items can be changed only by using the Edit > Preferences > File - Initialization File command or by directly editing this file using the Windows Notepad.

Cakewalk.ini is divided into different sections. Unless otherwise noted, all entries should appear in the section that starts with the line:

[Wincake]

 

For example, if you want to add the line AutoLoadAudioSnapPalette=0 to Cakewalk.ini, you should put it on the line under [Wincake], like this:

[Wincake]

AutoLoadAudioSnapPalette=0

 

The following section lists the different variables you can change in Cakewalk.ini.

Table 97. Cakewalk.ini 

Variable	Type	Default value	What it does
AutoLoadAudioSnapPalette=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	By default, the AudioSnap palette appears automatically whenever you enable AudioSnap on a clip. If you prefer to never auto-show the AudioSnap palette, you can change this behavior by setting the value to 0.
CPUMeterMode=<0 - 2>	Integer	0	This variable specifies how the CPU meter appears in the status bar on multiprocessor systems. The values are as follows: 0 = The peak thread load is displayed as the bar and a yellow indicator shows the average of all audio threads. This the default mode. 1 = The average audio thread load is displayed as the bar and a yellow indicator shows the peak thread. 2 = A bar is shown for each audio thread. This is the same display as previous versions of Cakewalk.
CreateNewGroupsOnPaste=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	When you copy and paste clips that belong to a clip group, this variable specifies if the pasted clips should be placed in a new clip group or continue to be grouped with the original clip group. By default, a new clip group is created. The values are as follows: 0 = The pasted clips will belong to the same clip group as the clips that were copied. 1 = A new clip group is created for the pasted clips. This is the default behavior.
CtrlSurfaceRefreshMS=<50 - 5000>	Integer	75	You may want to increase the value of this Cakewalk.ini variable if you are experiencing sluggish UI responsiveness when using a control surface and playing back high CPU projects. Also, if you are using a control surface that is not bi-directional, the surface does not need to be refreshed at all and you can safely increase the value.
DrawPlayingAudio=< 0 or 1>	Boolean	0 (disable)	This line controls whether the audio waveform is redrawn or not when the display is scrolling during playback. By setting the value to 1, you can force the Track view to always redisplay audio data, even during playback. This is recommended only for very fast machines.
DrawToolbarGradient=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	Global and view toolbars are drawn with a background gradient. If you prefer a flat background, set the value to 0.
EnablePluginCancelButton=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	In Cakewalk 4.0.2 and earlier, opening the property page of a VST plug-in during playback could result in a slight disruption in playback. The cause for this problem has its roots in the little Cancel button that sits in the top right corner of the plug-in's property page. The purpose of this button is to allow the user to cancel out of any changes they might have made to the plug-in, restoring back to whatever state the plug-in was in before they opened the GUI window. To make this work, Cakewalk would need to take an initial snapshot of the plug-in's state, and some plug-ins with large amounts of preset data could cause an audio hiccup if the data was captured for the Cancel button. To address this issue, Cakewalk 4.0.3 (and later) does not take a snapshot of the plug-in's state by default, and the Cancel button is not available.
EnableWin10DPIAwareness=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0 (disable)	[Experimental feature] This variable enables improved high DPI rendering on Windows 10 build 1809 (October 2018) and above. When enabled, the rendering quality of text and other GDI-based primitives automatically improve when the window is displayed on a high-DPI displays such as 4K monitors (may not be noticeable unless your Windows display scaling setting is > 100%). All Cakewalk UI is potentially affected, including menus and dialogs, but plug-in windows are created without high DPI rendering improvements to avoid UI issues.
ExceptionHandlingSeverity=<1, 3, 5, or 7>	Integer	1	This variable controls the sensitivity for error detection. The values are as follows: 1 = Unhandled errors are caught (default) 3 = All access violations are detected and unhandled exceptions are caught 5 = Unhandled errors and heap corruption is detected 7 =Unhandled errors, all access violations and heap corruption errors are caught (this is the strictest error detection mode)
ForegroundForSMPTE=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1 (enable)	This line specifies whether or not Cakewalk should jump to the foreground (focus) once it locks to SMPTE.
HyphenDir=<drive:path name>	Path	<installation directory>\ttshyph.dll	This determines the location of the Hyphenator extension .dll used by Cakewalk, and is written during installation. This should never need to be changed.
IconTopLeftPixelTransparent=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	By default, track icons support transparency. The top left pixel in the BMP determines the transparent color. If you prefer to not have transparent icons, set the variable value to 0. Note: When transparency is enabled, the global color entry (Edit > Preferences > Customization - Colors) called “Track View Icons Background” determines the background color (“Console Strips Icons background” does the same for the Console view and Track Inspector).
JogPosTimer=<milliseconds> (default=120) PauseOnJog=<0 or 1> (default=0; off)			There are two variables that control the behavior of using a control surface jog wheel to change Cakewalk’s Now time: JogPosTimer is the period of the now time throttle. When a jog message comes in, Cakewalk sets the transport time immediately but will not set the transport time again for this length of time. During the time, Cakewalk just remembers the latest jog time received. PauseOnJog is the main switch. 1 does a pause and invokes the throttle timer. 0 just sends the now time with no pause and no throttle timer. If 0, the setting of JogPauseTimer is “don't care.” For example: [Wincake] JogPosTimer=120 PauseOnJog=0
LargeIconHeight=<num>	Integer	48	This variable specifies the large track icon size. By default, large icons are 48x48 pixels.
MaxPanelUndoSteps=<num>	Integer	128	Each StudioWare view remembers a certain maximum number of (Design mode) operations before discarding old ones. This line lets you control the maximum depth of each Panel undo history. Be aware that the larger the number you specify, the more memory must be dedicated to storing the information required to undo commands.
MicroscopeHZoomMax=<2.0 - 8.0>	Integer	3.0	This line specifies the highest horizontal magnification that will result when using Microscope mode.
MicroscopeHZoomThreshold=<1..20>	Integer	8	By default, the Microscope mode begins horizontal magnification when a 32nd note is narrower than 8 pixels. This line lets you specify the horizontal zoom threshold (1-20 pixels).
NoFontSmoothing=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	Set the value to 1 to disable font smoothing in Cakewalk. You must restart Cakewalk in order for the change to take effect.
PanelsShowWidgetBitmaps=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1 (enable)	This line controls whether Cakewalk hides (n=0) or shows (n=1) all widget bitmaps while in Use mode (except those in Image widgets).
PanicStrength=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0 (controller 123 only)	The Panic/Reset button stops playback and turns off any stuck notes. There are two ways a MIDI note can be turned off: By a note-off message (n=1) or by MIDI controller number 123 (all notes off). By default, Panic uses controller 123 only (n=0).
PauseDuringSave=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	By default, when saving a project file during playback, Cakewalk saves the file asynchronously while playback continues. While this is not a problem with most projects, complex projects under high CPU load conditions (particularly while running under low latency) may take longer to save than if the transport was not playing. Setting PauseDuringSave to a value of 1 in the [Wincake] section changes the default behavior and pauses playback temporarily for the duration of the file save. This allows the file save to proceed as fast as possible before playback resumes.
ProgressiveWavePictures=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	This option enables progressive display of waveform pictures. When enabled you will see pictures being displayed in the clips view dynamically as they are being computed. The waveforms will update in the background when the application is idle. If the ComputePicturesWhilePlaying flag is set to 1, waveforms will continue being displayed progressively even while audio playback is in progress. This can save time waiting for a complete picture to be finished before you can see it.
PRVColorizeVelocity=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	By default, note events in the Piano Roll are colorized based on velocity. Darker colors indicate higher velocities. To override this and use the static track color instead, add the following line to the [WinCake] section: PRVColorizeVelocity=0
RechannelMIDI=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	This variable specifies if a MIDI track's forced channel should be applied to channelized MIDI data when bouncing MIDI data, or when saving Format 1 Standard MIDI files. The values are as follows: 0 = Do not re-channelize MIDI events. 1 = Re-channelize MIDI events.
ShowClipShadow=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	By default, a drop shadow is not displayed on clips in the Track view. To always display a drop shadow on clips, add this to the [Wincake] section: ShowClipShadow=1
SmallIconHeight=<num>	Integer	32	This variable specifies the small track icon size. By default, small icons are 32x32 pixels.
StaffViewChanSeparateVoice=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1 (enable)	This line specifies whether or not Cakewalk should treat channels assigned to each note as separate voices. This is useful if you want to force note stems up or down for different voices.
StaffViewPreScanMeasures=<num>	Integer	16 (measures)	This line specifies how far back (in measures) Cakewalk should search for long elements in order to display them in the Staff view. If a long element does not start within the specified time, then it will not be displayed in the Staff view (although it will print).
TempoMapDecimationResolution=<0 - 3>	Integer	1 (240 ticks / 16th note)	Setting the value to 2 or 3 will increase the number of decimation points, making the tempo changes more accurate, but will slow down calculations when drawing envelopes. The values are as follows: 1 = 240 ticks (16th Note) 2 = 120 ticks (32nd Note) 3 = 60 ticks (64th Note) 4 = 30 ticks (128th Note) 5 = 15 ticks (256th Note) 6 = 12 ticks (320th Note) 7 = 6 ticks (640th Note) 8 = 3 ticks (1280th Note)
TempoImportDecimationResolution=<0 - 3>	Integer	1 (240 ticks / 16th note)	This variable should be left at 1 in most cases in order to pick up most shapes. The values are as follows: 1 = 240 ticks (16th Note) 2 = 120 ticks (32nd Note) 3 = 60 ticks (64th Note) 4 = 30 ticks (128th Note) 5 = 15 ticks (256th Note) 6 = 12 ticks (320th Note) 7 = 6 ticks (640th Note) 8 = 3 ticks (1280th Note)
TempoImportErrorThreshold=<0 - 250>	Integer	10	This variable controls how close the tempo entries have to match points on a candidate curve before this curve is chosen. The best fit curve will always be chosen first, but this threshold determines whether to go with that curve or continue with discrete points. Valid entries are 0 to 250 ( 0.00 to 0.25 ). The default is 10, which equates to a difference of 0.01 of four point differences added together. A value of 0 effectively means import everything as discrete jump values.
ToolTempFileDir=<drive:path name>	Path	<Windows TEMP directory>	This line specifies where to store temporary .wav files when launching a third party wave editor from the Utilities menu.
TransparentClipNames=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	Cakewalk can write Clip Names with an alpha channel such that the waveform behind the clip name can be seen. To enable this effect, set the value to 1.
TVBoldStripNames=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	Specifies whether track/bus names use bold (value=1) or regular (value=0) font style in the Track view.
TVControlHeight=<number of pixels>	Integer	17	Specifies the height of controls in the Track view. The value shouldn't be changed more than 1 or 2 from the default value, or you may experience unexpected results.
TVControlSpacingX=<number of pixels>	Integer	3	Specifies the horizontal space, in pixels, between controls in the Track view.
TVControlSpacingY=<number of pixels>	Integer	3	Specifies the vertical space, in pixels, between controls in the Track view.
TVControlWidth=<number of pixels>	Integer	41	Specifies the width of controls in the Track view.
TVLargeStripNames=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	Specifies the size of track/bus names in the Track view. The default size is large (value=1).
TVSpacingXInCluster=<number of pixels>	Integer	2	Specifies the horizontal space between each button in a “cluster”. The default value is 2 pixels. The following controls are grouped into clusters: Mute, Solo, Arm for Recording (MSR) Automation Read, Automation Write Phase, Interleave (mono/stereo)
TVWidgetsStickInHeader=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	By default, Track view controls (widgets) will only appear in the track header bar if the track is minimized and there is enough room to display at least one control. When TRUE (value=1) widgets stay in the header bar regardless of the height of a track. Note: the following controls will never appear in the track header bar: Send widgets, meters, and vertical FX Rack.
UseArrSecEndForMarkerNavigation=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	Allow the right edge (end) of Arranger sections to be treated as markers for navigation (including using a control surface).
UseArrSecStartForMarkerNavigation=<0 or 1>	Boolean	1	Allow the left edge (start) of Arranger sections to be treated as markers for navigation (including using a control surface).
UseLinkedClipsInApplyArrangement=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	Create linked clips when applying an arrangement.
VelocityAsBargraph=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	By default, note velocity tails are displayed as thin vertical lines in the Piano Roll view, and the color is the same as note events. If “Notes/Velocity” is not the current edit type, this color will be slightly lightened. To override this and use bar graph indicators for velocity tails, add the following line to the [WinCake] section: VelocityAsBargraph=1
VelocityAutoshrinkWidth=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	If you set this to 1, solid velocity tails will become narrower by one pixel if the vertical zoom is such that notes are less than 5 pixels high. For example, with: [Wincake] VelocitySolidWidth=2 VelocityAutoshrinkWidth=1 you get bigger velocity tails (ala Cakewalk 4) when the notes are big enough to edit, but really thin velocities tails when the notes are too small to edit.
VelocityBargraphFullWidth=<0 or 1>	Boolean	0	When displaying velocity tails as bar graphs (see above), you can specify whether the velocity tails should be fixed at 3 pixels wide (default), or extend the full width of the note event. To display full-width velocity tails, add the following line to the [WinCake] section: VelocityBargraphFullWidth=1
VelocitySolidWidth=<1..4>	Integer	1	By default, note velocity tails are displayed as 1 pixel wide solid vertical lines in the Piano Roll view. To make the velocity tails wider (2-4 pixels wide), add the following line to Cakewalk.ini in the [WinCake] section: VelocitySolidWidth=<pixel size; 1-4> For example: VelocitySolidWidth=2
VSTPlugInNameFormat=<0 - 3>	Integer	0	This variable specifies how VST plug-in names are formatted in the Browser, FX Rack context menus, and anywhere else VST plug-in names are displayed. The values are as follows: 0 = VST Name 1 = DLL Name 2 = VST Name (DLL Name) 3 = DLL Name (VST Name)
WavePreviewInputBuffers=<1-4>	Integer	4	This variable allows control of the number of Waveform preview input buffers. The input buffers allow more efficient access to the recorded meter history on disk, and greatly speeds up performance access to previews while zooming and scrolling the clips view when waveform preview is active. You can control the actual number of history page buffers with this variable. This value is an integer and the minimum value is 1 and the default is 4 buffers. 2-4 buffers should be sufficient for most usage scenarios. Each buffer consumes approx 32K per preview track. Lower values consume less memory but may cause more disk access when scrolling or zooming large projects when preview is active.
WavePreviewSampleFrequency=<1-10>	Integer	1	By default, waveform previews take a meter sample for each meter frame. The default interval between meter frames is 40 milliseconds. The WavePreviewSampleFrequency Cakewalk.ini variable lets you specify how frequently samples are taken. The value can be an integer between 1 and 10, and represents the number of frames to sample. It goes in the [Wincake] section of Cakewalk.ini. For example: WavePreviewSampleFrequency=1 With the default value (1), every meter frame gets written to the history file. With higher values (2-10), frames will be skipped, causing fewer history frames to be written to the history file. Higher values may be desirable if the waveform previews are affecting playback performance.