Cubase 4 New Feature Tutorial - by Fred Maher

We are going to cover one of the great NEW features in Cubase 4…
Great but, possibly confusing, especially for users of previous versions of Cubase.

The “create instrument track” is great because it enables you to get to work right away. It creates a new “hybrid” track that is both a MIDI track and an “Audio Output” track for the VST Instrument in just two mouse clicks.
BUT, there is a “gotcha”!!!

The operation above, brings up this window where I have chosen Steinberg’s
HYPERSONIC VST instrument…

Now, this is what we’ll see in our new project. In this case I have the MIXER open to show the newly created VST (Hypersonic) channel. You will also notice that I have opened up the VST Instruments window and you will notice that HYPERSONIC is NOT in there. WHY!?

Well, this is the “Gotcha”. While the INSTRUMENT TRACK is handy and quick,
It allows only ONE stereo output from ANY VST Instrument. In this case,
HYPERSONIC is a true “Multitimbral” instrument capable of 16 separate channels of Audio output. This would also apply to other VST Instruments like KONTAKT, BFD and HALION.

If you start with a Mulitimbral instrument and want use it the way it was designed,
IE: One VST Instrument with MANY outputs… Stay away from using the INSTRUMENT TRACK. Instead, do this…

Open up your VST Instruments window (or rack as it’s sometimes called)…

This time I’ll choose BFD…

Now (this is a new feature too) Cubase asks me if I want to create a new MIDI track for this instrument.

Click on CREATE and Cubase will create a MIDI track and assign it to (in this case) BFD.

Now, here is a NEW feature of the VST Instruments rack…
You can now tell Cubase how many outputs of the VST instrument you want to activate.

This is helpful because in the past, Cubase would just automatically create
as many outputs as the instrument was capable of. In some cases this would crowd your project with tons of unused audio channels.

So, in conclusion, if you simply want to get writing right away – go ahead and use the INSTRUMENT tack option… It’s great for pianos! But, if you want to have the option of having multiple audio outputs from your VST Instrument like HALION,
KONTAKT, HYPERSONIC or BFD… Stick to using the VST Instruments rack.