I have a Steinberg CI2 with Cubase AI5, installed on my MacBook. I get no sound on playback. I’ve read all the Troubleshooting Tips and the forum posts about No Sound. Extremely frustrating. I get no sound after setting all the control panels and VSTs and ASIO Drivers and everything I can find. I am surprised by the number of posts by people who can’t get basic sound to play back. Things are usually relatively simple with a Mac. Is this a bad sign? Should I see if I can return this equipment? Any advice for getting it to work? If we get it to work, will it be this hard to keep working? I’m just trying to record guitar, vocals, etc. with a microphone and play it black. Seems like it should be a simple fix.
I did some searches beyond this site and found many discouraging comments about Steinberg customer service. Is this accurate? Was this purchase a mistake?
Excuse me, but what exactly means “setting all the VSTs”? For me as long-time (12 years) Cubase user it makes ZERO sense.
If you think that everything “is simple with Mac” you should stay with GarageBand.
OK … </rant off>
First off all: what’s your audio interface?
Second: Have you selected your Audio interface’s ASIO driver in Devices | Device Setup? What did you exactly choose there? Screenshots, please.
Third: Have you configured Cubase’s I/O in Devices | VST Connections? How? Screenshots, please.
Fourth: How have you routed output of your tracks in Cubase. Screenshots, please.
Yes it was, if you want to have a plug’n’play toy which gives you everything out of the package. No, if you want to have a serious audio engineering/song-writing tool which gives you unlimited options to work with.
Well, now, I’m not looking for a toy, but if it’s this hard to get sound, I get concerned about doing something more challenging. It’s such a simple, basic function that either it’s the simplest fix in the world or we’re entering a world of frustration.
Can’t seem to imbed screenshots here, so I can describe what I’ve done and maybe we can get past my frustrations and rants and your frustration and rant about my post. Obviously, I wrote that when I was frustrated. Sorry, I was seriously experiencing buyer’s remorse after three attempts to configure this equipment, a very disappointed son who I bought it for, multiple posts that seem unresolved about no sound through Macs and some very discouraging posts on other sites about steinberg’s customer service, which is closed while I try to make this holiday gift work for my son.
He’s, by the way, the musician and the Mac user and he turned it over to his non-musician, PC-user Dad. Actually, I don’t think everything is simple with a Mac, but all my Mac friends tell me that it should be.
I followed the Troubleshooting guide in the steinberg manual under no sound. Volumes are set. Nothing’s shorted. We’re not running multiple applications. Steinberg CI2 is selected as the ASIO Driver in the VST Audio System window.
Input and Output latencies were automatically set upon selection: 8.231ms, 8.685ms. Sample rate @44100.0Hz.
When I select Steinberg CI2 it is set to both IN and both OUT ports, visible and active. When I select Control Panel from there, it displays a 256 Samples Buffer Size. But when I select Open Config App, all I get is a Copyright Yamaha screen that I can say “okay” to.
We can easily see wave forms when we record, voice and guitar. It’s just that we get no sound upon playback, through headphones through the Steinberg CI2, through the computer internal speakers, through headphones on the computer. Is it necessary to set this up through an amplifier and speakers? Most of the sample configurations show this.
“Was this purchase a mistake” was a serious question. He needs to go beyond Garage Band. And this was recommended to me as a good first step up. Some of the posts indicate that it is. But some posts show this same problem. This equipment has many advanced features – which will either be great or will be over my and his head. He’s a talented musician and songwriter and I want something he can enjoy and work on music with, recording multiple tracks and work on songs. Thanks for your response. Please help again.
It’s really not that hard… Once you get it 
When you select the C12 ASIO driver in Cubase all sound into and from Cubase will now be through the C12, so you will need to hook up an amp and speakers to the C12. You should get sound from headphones connected to the C12.
Import a wave file into Cubase and play it. Can you see the level meters going up and down on the channel and the master output.
Make sure the Mix knob on the C12 is turned all the way to DAW
Yes, getting sound out of your DAW is a simple function, but may require few steps … in Cubase the ones I mentioned in my post: Selecting the right driver, configuring your VST connections, and routing the output of your track into the right output.
Just click Upload attachment tab just below the text box you’re writing your post into. I’ve never posted screenshots here, but it took me about 15 seconds to figure out how to do it.
Don’t believe on iTruth iGospel. iComputers are as iComplicated as any other computer systems.
That’s a good start. Everything OK there.
Completely irrelevant information until you can eben hear the sound … but nice figures, anyway. But the question remains:
- How are your VST connections set up?
- How have you routed the output of your audio track?
Come on! You can’t be serious! Do you really think Cubase would be unable to play back your tracks? Would Cubase sold zillions of copies during dozens of years, if it couldn’t? It’s all about to configure your Cubase the right way. It’s all in the manual and I’ve even given you hints for these steps (in form of questions). All information is there. But don’t hesitate to ask, if you don’t understand what to do.
But please, give us screenshots … they give us more information than million words.
Apologies in advance if this is not the correct place to post my question: new to this site.
I am using the Alesis Multimix 8 (which came with Cubase LE5). Previously, I was using Cakewalk Sonar with the only limitation with the mixer being some general latency issues. As is recommended by the Cubase Manual, I use the ASIO4ALL drivers for my Windows Vista Computer (pause for laughter). Anyway, the mixer still works fine with Cakewalk and any stand-alone applications I choose.
When I attempt to use Cubase however, I can see signals being recorded, can’t hear anything though; see the playback and once again no sound. I’ve gone into the Device Setup and selected “ASIO DirectX Full Duplex Driver” (left side panel window) then, verified the USB Audio Speakers (my Alesis) as “active”. I’ve used mixers for years and all selections including monitoring etc. are set to hear audio. As I stated before, the board works fine with all my other music software programs.
Lastly, the ASIO4All control icon does NOT load in the task bar like it does with all other programs. I’ver reinstalled it a couple of times, tested with the other applications as mentioned and still no output from Cubase even though I can see the LEDs etc. indicating a signal is being sent.
Any ideas or suggestions would be grately appreciated.
Thanks.
Addendum to my other post: I used Split’s suggestion; “Import a wave file into Cubase and play it. Can you see the level meters going up and down on the channel and the master output.” and got sound into the board that way. Now the issue seems to be specifically related to recording and playback of Midi files. I am impressed however that Cubase uses the ASIO driver without the typical task bar icon activated.
Anyway, once again any assistance getting those all important midi files and VST plugins into the mixing board from the Cubase system is highly appreciated. I’ve reviewed the manual a few times before resorting to this post and maybe I am just misinterpreting the language in the manual.
Thanks again.
Glad to see I’m not the only one with a problem getting Midi sounds out of Cubase LE 5. Seems to be lot’s of people with exactly the same problem. I’m using LE 5 that came bundled with a Zoom R16 Recorder. I was just hoping to be able to use some Midi drum tracks to use as backing. Maybe Steinberg needs to write their manuals a little clearer or let us know the correct software or hardware we need to make their gear work. Kind regards to all, Lotney.
To use existing midi files in Cubase, you need to to use VST instrument tracks. This is clearly explained in the getting started manual.
Finally got sound out, thanks to all. Had to selct HALionOne as the VST instrument, then edit instruments to select an instrument sound. This was a bit of a pain on an imported Midi file as had to guess what each instrument track was, but got there in the end.
Regards Lotney.
Do not use DirectX driver. Alwayse use real ASIO driver. In case of Alesis Multimix the right one is ASIO4ALL (since Alesis didn’t bother to write a real ASIO driver).
**Hi guys,
i have a C12+ issue if anyone can help please. i am new to this site and so i hope its ok for me to post my question within this particular thread.
i can hear a plugged in guitar/keyboard thru the C12+ no problem (via headphones plugged into the C12+). But i can’t seem to get any response from the TRANSPORT PANEL ?? So none of the ff/rw/play functions are responding. And also the AI BROSWE and READY LED’s are not lighting up ??
Would be awesome if anyone could help me with this please ?? i did scan the various threads but coud not see any that directly related to this issue.
Best,
Paul**
“Was this purchase a mistake?”
Yes.
I’m happy with the hardware, and trying a few different software suites rather than the one that came with it (steinberg/cubase). But nothing kills creativity quite as effectively as having to route your creativity through something so counterintuitive as this disaster, and I’ve just got to do what I can to keep others from suffering this crap.
Regardless the pro/anti tenor of forum participants’ remarks, you can judge the quality of a product by the amount of nastiness within relevant user/tech help forums. Great product? People don’t tend to yell at one another. Rubbish? Yeah, people from both the “this is crap!” and the “well, you’re a moron because you can’t figure it out!” camps abound.
Oh, I’m as guilty as anyone. 
I get VERY impatient, type in all caps, you name it. But over many, many years, and hundreds, if not thousands, of software suites for you name it, I’ve come to realize one giveaway of a bad product is the abundance of shouting and screaming in tech support forums.
Obviously I didn’t heed my own “wisdom,” and only skimmed a couple Alesis iO4 reviews before buying it. Had I found allusions to the attached Cubase suite, I’d have checked out this forum (and others like it), seen the nastiness from both sides, and told myself: “self, keep looking. This product is not for you.”