well, i've ended up simply using the line out from my amp straight into the mic or line-in socket on my soundcard, 'cos that seems to yield the best results with cakewalk. using a mic, you just have to be spot on with everything. I normally use a marshall jackhammer distortion/overdrive pedal, but for recording i just use the amp distortion on my Marshall MG100...I find it's best to play around with set-ups you'd never use because they just might turn out to record better...
for what it's worth, I've found Sonar 3 to be pretty damn good.
for what it's worth, I've found Sonar 3 to be pretty damn good.