here is my problem. I mix a midi sound, let’s say just a kick drum, and add some effects to have a good sounding result. I record my midi track to be able to audio mixdown my kick drum. I export the mixdown (what ever sample rate and bit depth) in wave format. I close cubase software, and listen the audio mixdown launched from windows. The sound is really not good, so diferent that it is in cubase itself. But, if I open that mixdown back to cubase, it sounds good. I don’t have any monitors, so I’m working with headphones. Is the problem comes from the fact that when I listen my project in cubase, I’m listening via asio driver, and when I listen it from windows, it’s not via asio? I try to figure out why I have that issue, but I can’t. Anybody has any suggestion?
In most cases this problem is because you have used EQ on Windows Media Player to make things sound the way you like. Now, when you do mixdown in Cubase you do the same in Cubase (with Cubase EQ) and AGAIN in Media Player (Media Player EQ): that’s doing the same operation twice.
If this is your case, the only solution is to disable Windows Media Player’s EQ. If commercially produced music sounds crap after this, you should invest in better headphones/monitors and/or learn to listen to the music way it is (not the way it appears after modifying it with an EQ to suit your taste).
EDIT: “Media Player’s EQ” may be substituted by “Sound card driver’s EQ” in this reply.