Cubase 9

[Guy Rowland]

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/CubaseP9

[kpc]

Not being a Cubase user, I am curious how this is going to go over. Parts look interesting to me, I like the Sampler Track and the multiple Markers. But I didn't see anything that made me think "I wish Logic had that", or that I should consider switching.

[IFM]

I gave up on C8.5 because it just had too may problems with VEP and even more than 80ish Kontakt instances (the number varies). Sure you can use disabled tracks but that's a PITA too. I wasn't the one who discovered the Kontakt limitation and others seem to have more success. Oh and now that I host everything orchestral on VEP in the same machine (thank you Play5!) connecting 24 instances is also cause for ASIO meter peaking...this even occurred with the PC slave. LPX doesn't bat an eye.

The main thing I miss about Cubase is the MIDI editing...much better than LPX as far as certain operations are concerned. Mainly I mean controller lanes and their way of easily scaling or compressing the data. Yes you can scale in LPX but it's a little kludgy.

All that said maybe after the Steinberg site is up there will be some notification about this being improved. Thanks to my contacts I have a red key and once it becomes available I can at least test it out for a time.

Chris

[Thomas Mavian]

@kpc, we already have multiple marker sets in Logic and the sampler track seems to be a bit like the EXS24 functions.

The interface looks way better than Cubeat v1 that was my first version of Cubase

[Guy Rowland]

Guy, with Cubase 9 and the new Kontakt 5.6.5 with Global Purge, you must be in heaven :-)

You'd think that, wouldn't you?

(K 5.6.5 - yay indeed, yet to try it, but will probably give it a go at the weekend if the reports are good)

Cubase 9. I'm actually travelling back to base today, but at £20 I thought it was worth updating the laptop Cubase Elements to give it a whirl. So here's a very quick early user report based on Elements 9.0.0 (didn't know about the 9.0.1 update while I could download it).

The new features first:

The Lower Zone. This, I figured, is where it might shine - on a laptop. I couldn't think of a use for it on my main multi-screen rig, but the idea of tabs for all your main extra windows seemed like a reasonable idea. Quickly, however, it became apparent that it will stay off for me. The problem is that everything I might use it for requires height. A mix console so crippled you can't see a fader and a send at the same time; a key editor where you can't see all the keys and so on. It seems like a fundamentally flawed idea.

But there's worse to come - as far as I can work out, although you can get rid of it, it KEEPS COMING BACK each time you click a midi part to edit any data. Bang, up it pops in all its truncated glory. You then have to click again to pop it out to a sensible window; you then have to then get rid of it again manually. Three clicks vs one in the old one. And, again, there seems to be no way of disabling this madness. Maybe there is, but I've tried preferences and all the options in the window. So unless I can figure that out, Cubase 9 is liable to just get uninstalled and I'll put the £20 down to experience. [EDIT - it IS there in preferences / editors, so it can indeed be properly banished. Phew]

The Sampler Track. Maybe this will fare better? It's sort of a promising idea actually, from one who had no interest whatsoever in the whole idea of a bundled sampler. The notion of a quick and dirty thing that you can just drag and drop and it works - well, not too shabby.

My optimism didn't last for long. The first annoyance - you drag your small audio clip down to the sampler track (in that, yes, bloody lower zone under its own tab), and then you realise you haven't just dragged that small clip at all, you've dragged an entire 3 minute vocal take. Great. OK, so you can trim it down to the tiny bit you need, but what a waste of time and space. Next, it adds a new Sampler track down at the bottom of the project window, not next to where you dragged it from, so your project window is now a mess. Oh, and look there - it routes it to Stereo Out, not the group that the original track was routed to. So your mixer is a mess too. And there appears to be no place to work with it except in that dreaded Lower Zone.

Next...

Mix Console History. Not in Elements it isn't.

Next...

EQ with Frequency. Again, MIA.

Is there ANYTHING good to report? Well yes - the VST rack can now be reduced in width to under half the old, and collapsed vertically to just show the name and basic controls. This is nice. Also, adding an output to a VI is now more elegant - you click all the ones you want in one hit without it auto-closing.

But honestly - that's the only plus I've found. It blacklisted almost every plugin I own, including the latest VST3 versions of iZotope stuff, and VST 2 versions of NI products. Overall, the negatives are so overwhelming, I'm not going to "upgrade" the main rig at all. No fixes - still less improvements - for disabled tracks, no performance improvements that are discernible. None of the countless other small, useful workflow feature requests.

On this evidence, Cubase 9 is - in a word - rubbish. It's an insult, almost. A paltry selection of half baked features that impose themselves on you. Shockingly bad.

[Raymond_Kemp]

My first thought is not to do with laptop but more to do with a single large 4K screen. Just the one and not this multiple screen thing I'm using atm.

[J Rod]

The elicenser server are colapsed.

But what's the criteria for blacklist to work?, can you deactivate it completely?.

Maybe this is the new way for steinberg for "push the user to desesperation in 2017 using Cubase. oh god.

[Marius]

Wow, I'm impressed at how little seems to be new and improved here. Almost makes the Reason 9 update look rich in content.

[jneebz]

Does not, in any way, shape, or form feel like a major release upgrade. More like v8.5.30. And certainly not worth $99 IMO. Very disappointed!

[Guy Rowland]

Ray - a single large screen is probably the best use for the Lower Zone. Any other combination - hopeless.

J - not sure if you can de-activate the blacklist, but you can reinstate plugins in there (only one by one). Right now can't be bothered to carry on with Cubase 9, so I won't bother with that chore.

Marius - I wonder if they actually had meetings that said "we really can't get away with this... can we?"

One bit of good news - in Preferences / Editors you can disable the Lower Zone. So I'm at the happy place of ignoring the biggest new feature.

[FriFlo]

I totally have to join the club of disappointed folks here! There are some nice little ideas like the sampler track, but what I really would expect to do for those guys is for once put the workflow for midi users forwards! We have tablets with apps like Lemur for a decade, now, and they still haven't made it possible to work midi CCs with feedback (only with those 8 Quick controls, which is not enough). They could easily build a touch surface that makes all midi CC values visible force each instrument track you select to interact with them. And they could provide you with labeled keyswitches. But NOTHING like that ever happens! Not even the slightest move on that direction. This is poor stuff and I decided to stay with 8.5 until someone will make something great happen ... Lack of vision!

[PhJ]

Well, not in a hurry to update, reading all this

[J Rod]

I tried to download Cubase 9 ISO but is not in my steinberg download after sync the eLicenser (another minor problem).

This is by far the worst update i ever see from Steinberg. i have a completly clean system to implement C9 to test it but with all i read about Cubase 9 I don't think it's worth it. I have a stable system with C8.5 and everything works perfectly, including the AMD drivers, VEP6 and PLAY 5.
Another Year of horrors using a "Malfunction by design" in my main rig is not in my agenda, no.

Totally disappointed.

[IFM]

Guess I'll remain a happy LPX user then. Still will check it out as a demo.

[Lawrence]

Disappointing, though I'm still happily forging ahead with Cubase 6.02

I would think a newer version of Cubase would require a newer computer and I'm not willing to go there-but with increased competition, it's so odd that Cubase isn't able to forge ahead. My version is very stable, I've heard 8.5 finally got quite stable, but it's never had a great engine for max VI power....thought we would eventually see that change.

[Guy Rowland]

I'm thinking of giving my first love, Sonar, another try at the weekend. The feature list there now is stunning - just take a look at their new features vs Cubase's meager offering - https://www.cakewalk.com/products/sonar/whats-new . Plus no dongle so full versions on the laptop and main rig, and cheap as chips to update from my old version. Most of the reasons why I left Sonar have long gone, but one big big one remains - Eucon support for midi CCs. If I decided to jump back, I'd need a new solution for this, and nothing so far appeals.

[kpc]

@kpc, we already have multiple marker sets in Logic...

Yes, I remember now, though I have never used them. So maybe not that big of a deal? Sounds like a nice thing in the literature, but one of those things that's get little use? At least for me.

Sorry this is turning out to be a disappointment. Even though I don't use Cubase, i understand it is no fun to be excited for an update only to be frustrated with the direction ( or lack thereof) it has taken.

I'm keeping one eye on Reaper as an alternative if Logic starts to fail for me, or Apple decides to get out of the DAW biz. I am really impressed with what they are doing over there, and I think if I were to jump ship, Reaper would be the place.

[Guy Rowland]

I'm keeping one eye on Reaper as an alternative if Logic starts to fail for me, or Apple decides to get out of the DAW biz.

Surely that's unlikely? According to my Mac app store, Logic is the #1 grossing app. I'd have thought the bigger threat to Logic is not that they would abandon it, but increasingly skew it to bedroom / DJs?

[Guy Rowland]

This Lower Zone business and the mixer. It doesn't work, clearly. Part of the reason, it seems to me, is that a project and a mix window are so different from each other, any attempt to combine them on one screen is doomed to failure - unless someone does the REALLY radical thing, which would be to turn the mixer sideways. I've thought for a long time that having a sideways mixer that can be expanded and collapsed at will would be a really interesting idea, because for the first time you'd have all your track controls in one coherent place - volume, pans, sends, inserts etc and then your actual content, all in a horizontal line. Not as a mixer replacement, but as an alternative view.

[IFM]

I'm keeping one eye on Reaper as an alternative if Logic starts to fail for me, or Apple decides to get out of the DAW biz.

Surely that's unlikely? According to my Mac app store, Logic is the #1 grossing app. I'd have thought the bigger threat to Logic is not that they would abandon it, but increasingly skew it to bedroom / DJs?

For years people have been panicking about Apple and LPX. I seriously doubt this especially with what you just said about the app Guy. However I disagree about the bedroom DJ world. That world is what is popular with the kids so why not have features that aid them? I felt Cubase went down that road long before Logic did. They are all trying to capture some of the Ableton market share.

[Daryl]

unless someone does the REALLY radical thing, which would be to turn the mixer sideways. I've thought for a long time that having a sideways mixer that can be expanded and collapsed at will would be a really interesting idea, because for the first time you'd have all your track controls in one coherent place - volume, pans, sends, inserts etc and then your actual content, all in a horizontal line. Not as a mixer replacement, but as an alternative view.

Sibelius did this and everyone complained. The first thing that Avid did when it bought the company was turn it back again.

[kpc]

I'm keeping one eye on Reaper as an alternative if Logic starts to fail for me, or Apple decides to get out of the DAW biz.

Surely that's unlikely? According to my Mac app store, Logic is the #1 grossing app. I'd have thought the bigger threat to Logic is not that they would abandon it, but increasingly skew it to bedroom / DJs?

For years people have been panicking about Apple and LPX. ...

I don't want to go too far down this rabbit hole and veer off topic. Apple is so secretive that no one outside HQ in Cupertino knows the answer, so anything is just conjecture. But it does seem like Apple is moving away from the pro market. I have heard thoughts that Apple could move the MacPro and LPX, FCP into a separate High End division/company - like they did with Filemaker. That might be interesting, but I doubt it.

Apple has never shied away from ending products, even successful ones if it makes sense to them. So, while I don't think Logic will just go away, it is possible - or like you say Guy, move to something that suits my needs less. Not that I have to upgrade - I can stick with my current version. But it does make me want to keep an eye on other DAWs - which is why I'm participating in this thread at all. I have heard of Cubase's midi prowess and expression maps and how good it is for orchestral work. So I am interested enough to stay somewhat informed.

It's the age old problem, isn't it? You need to have sexy new features to sell more copies and those take precedence over fixing bugs or improving work flow. Remember when Apple shipped Snow Leopard - they said this was a Fix release - not a lot of new features, just fixing bugs and getting old cruft out. The initial reaction was "what the hell? What about new features?". But it was a really important release. I wish the big players would do more of these kinds of releases. But then, they can't "sell" that, because current users feel shafted for having to pay for fixes that should have been fixed before shipping. New customers don't get excited because no new features to draw my eye....

This is one thing I'm attracted to with Reaper (sorry, I know). Their business model seems less about making a lot of money and more about improving/making great software. I think Apple and Steinberg (and maybe MOTU?) could learn something from this?

Anyway, sorry for the derailment - back to Cubase.

[Ashermusic]

The lesson of Opcode and Studio Vision is that ANY DAW can go away. That said, Kayle, as a guy who daily is on a forum that the Logic developers participate in (that is all I can say) I see zero evidence that Logic will not continue to be anything but what Logic has been in recent years, a pro app that they have tried to make both the logical (pun intended) next step for GarageBand users while trying to add the wished features of many present Logic users.

[Raymond_Kemp]

Could Logic fanboys go start their own thread please?

[Guy Rowland]

It's the age old problem, isn't it? You need to have sexy new features to sell more copies and those take precedence over fixing bugs or improving work flow. Remember when Apple shipped Snow Leopard - they said this was a Fix release - not a lot of new features, just fixing bugs and getting old cruft out. The initial reaction was "what the hell? What about new features?". But it was a really important release. I wish the big players would do more of these kinds of releases. But then, they can't "sell" that, because current users feel shafted for having to pay for fixes that should have been fixed before shipping. New customers don't get excited because no new features to draw my eye....

This is precisely the position Cubase has been in for a few releases now. There was a big hoopla after 8.5 came out, that the community essentially said "enough" - lots of trivial new features like the cloud or new bloat plugins that nobody really wants or needs, at the expense of solid but boring improvements that people have been asking about for years. Steinberg said "ok we hear you", then distilled the scores of requests into 16 feature requests, that bore little relation to the kinds of issues people were having and asked us all to vote. Of the top 5 they announced, 4 have been touched on in this release, but imo only 2 successfully. And that's pretty much been it. A quite staggering lack of shiny OR boring new features, as if they've just been playing pool all year.

When I looked at that Sonar list, I remembered how useful new features could actually be. Vocal align, drum replace etc. It's unlikely that I will jump though - I have a feeling that the few remaining obstacles will prove to be extremely stubborn. Sigh.