@Another User said:

ASIO Guard 2 uses low latencies just on the tracks where latency matters while using a larger latency that saves performance for playback tracks. It now supports instrument tracks including multi-timbral and sample instruments that feature disk streaming. 

http://www.steinberg.net/en/products/cubase/whats_new.html

Actually, I think that you're just under informed:  ;>😉

"In Cubase 8, multi-timbral VST Instruments are running in ASIO-Guard mode, too, which enhances performance additionally. However, multi-timbral VST Instruments will be switched to real-time usage as soon as a MIDI track is selected, that is assigned to the instrument. This may increase the real-time processing load significantly and cause drop outs. The performance drop when switching from ASIO-Guard mode to real-time can be softened by using multiple mono-timbral VST Instruments instead of a single multi-timbral VST Instrument."

A source for that quote would be useful DG - can't see it in the manual or Knowledgebase.

It is of course completely logical that multitimbral will increase the resource load.  The only relevant question is whether or not that's an issue in practice.  So for for me it has not been, using Kontakt, Omnisphere, Stylus on my i7 4930 @256 - all safely within limits.  Your asioguard vs soundcard settings will depend on a large number of factors.  But key is assessing what proportion of your overall CPU load you'll need to access live at any one time. If you have, say, 30 multitimbral instruments, logically you could reduce the realtime load to only 1/30th of what it was using asioguard (all other things being equal).  However, if you're on a modest system where you were struggling with only one multimbral instance, asioguard won't help you at all if you keep it that way - you'd be much better off spreading the load among monotimbral instruments as your quote suggests.  Most pro users will have powerful rigs and quality soundcards though, for them this advice should be fairly moot - hence perhaps why they are talking it up on the main what's new page on their website, specifically mentioning multi-timbral compatiblity.  Would be very strange to talk it up there and later say you shouldn't really use it.

Anyway, the only real issue so far for me has been VE Pro 5. Incidentally, I did hear that VE Pro 4 behaves much better with asioguard.  That would be interesting if so.

https://www.steinberg.net/nc/en/support/knowledgebase_new/show_details/kb_show/details-on-asio-guard-in-cubase-and-nuendo.html

@noiseboyuk said:

A source for that quote would be useful DG - can't see it in the manual or Knowledgebase.

It's in the Knowledgebase. Down the bottom under Cubase 8 ASIO Guard.

https://www.steinberg.net/nc/en/support/knowledgebase_new/show_details/kb_show/details-on-asio-guard-in-cubase-and-nuendo.html?tx_p77sbknowledgebase_pi1[keyword_search]=ASIO%20Guard

DG

Hopefully VSL will offer a fix via a VE-Pro 5 update. 

Thanks for the link.  Yes, my interpretation of that is that is exactly as my previous post.  Unless you're pushing things to the absolute limit or if you are very stretched on resources, you should be fine with multi-timbral.  I see no reason for those who have templates and workflows using multitibral to change things.

We're kinda off topic at this point - VE Pro falls over on standard settings with just two instances containing one instrument.each.

Would be very curious to hear reports of anyone using VE Pro 4 - I understand that works much better.

I have disabled ASIOguard on my system at home. I have duplicate setups at my studio and at home: each location has a host PC (HP 810) running a VEP server + Cubase Pro 8 and a slave PC (Dell 7500) running another VEP server. There is only differences between the 2 locations are the audio interfaces: my studio setup has the Fireface UC RME (USB), and at home I have the Yamaha MR816CSX (firewire).

Every week I work some in the studio and some at home (I sync my projects through Google Drive & Dropbox). My work is all MIDI, and I have around 500 MIDI tracks in my template (organizational folders and group/fx tracks push the track count to 900+).

At my studio, I left ASIOguard running - default after Cubase 8 upgrade. Everything ran just fine there, but when opening the same project at home, I experienced dropouts and crackles. As soon as ASIOguard was disabled at home, everything was perfect.

As a side note, I found a utility for the MR816CSX that increased the firewire buffer of the unit. The factory setting buffer size is set to "small!"

Hopefully, that helps someone or provides another thing to look at when troubleshooting.

A couple of additional thoughts.....

It has been reported by several users that VE PRO 4 does not have this ASIO Guard 2 problem.  

I can say in my giant template when I switch from various non-VE PRO 5 instrument tracks I do not have any delayed sound issues at all.....only when switching to or from various VE PRO 5 instruments.   Switching to different midi tracks on the same VE PRO 5 instrument is fine, the problem happens when you switch do a different VE PRO 5 instantiation.

Another major issue when I have ASIO Guard 2 on is that I get huge 100% ASIO spikes often when a tempo change happens.  I still think this is related to something in VE PRO 5 as many of us have discussed tempo change problems that cause CPU spikes when using Cubase/VE PRO 5/and usually Kontakt.

Hopefully they can get this sorted out soon.

Hello everybody, 

Just a quick update that we are looking at Cubase 8 and the interaction with VE PRO.
We also hope that we can offer a solution there, it´s not a trivial task. 

Will keep you up to date!

Best, 
Paul

@Paul said:

Hello everybody, 

Just a quick update that we are looking at Cubase 8 and the interaction with VE PRO.
We also hope that we can offer a solution there, it´s not a trivial task. 

Will keep you up to date!

Best, 
Paul

Thanks Paul, I know many of us will be greatly appreciative.

Might VE Pro 4 a temporary solution for us, btw?

We have had a look into the situation with C8 and VEP, and currently there is nothing we can do about it, more than report our findings to Steinberg. When switching tracks in Cubase, the plugin can receive a new buffer size, and since VEPro has an inherent latency which is buffer-dependent, VEPro will have to report its new latency to Cubase. Cubase immediately responds to this by reconfiguring its audio engine - causing a pause in audio.

Logic Pro (and other software which is using variable-sized buffers) do not immediately reconfigure the engine when switching tracks during playback, which allows for uninterrupted playback. We will recommend Steinberg to implement a similar scheme.

I am looking into this together with a Steinberg developer right now, and hopefully we can find a solution.

Until then, I can offer a workaround to disable ASIO Guard for VEPro manually. You can do this by going to:

[Menu] > Devices > Plug-in Manager > VST Instruments > Vienna Ensemble Pro > Click "i" for Plug-in information > Click to set ASIO Guard to Inactive. 

Please perform this operation on ALL VEPro Instrument and Fx plugins. Then also Audio Input plugins will work properly.

@MS said:

I am looking into this together with a Steinberg developer right now, and hopefully we can find a solution.

 

Until then, I can offer a workaround to disable ASIO Guard for VEPro manually. You can do this by going to:

[Menu] > Devices > Plug-in Manager > VST Instruments > Vienna Ensemble Pro > Click "i" for Plug-in information > Click to set ASIO Guard to Inactive. 

Please perform this operation on ALL VEPro Instrument and Fx plugins. Then also Audio Input plugins will work properly.

I have tried your suggestion and it does improve the dropped out audio when switching tracks but the processor drop was so minimal because most of my template involves intances of VE PRO 5. The bigger issue for me is that even with your suggestion with ASIO Guard 2 on with VE PRO 5 I can not export audio with out a serious error and a crash from Cubase.

So I guess there is no benefit if your projects run 90% VE PRO and ASIO guard 2 is turned of for this instruments?

I also guess that Steinberg isn't going to change their audio engine any soon.....

Are their any updates about this issue?

Regards,

Martijn 

Steinberg apparently think they fixed their end in 8.0.20, though its not in the versions history and lots of people seem to think its still an issue.  I can't check for a while - what are others finding, and what do you think at VSL?

Bump for this - what's the word from you, VSL?  Should the latest VE Pro build work ok, or is there another to come?

I'm very curious about this as well. Unfortunately, it's a fairly major bug for those of us on Cubase 8 at the moment.

Hello everybody, 

No changes there, and unfortunately nothing that can be done on our side, as it seems. 

Best, 
Paul

Thanks Paul.  I've asked Steinberg if they'll talk to you direct as they've closed the case and said (effectively) their end is fixed and now it's up to you guys.  It's one of those situations where we end users are caught in the middle, would be grateful if you can both figure out a better solution for us all.