Audio tracks go silent though the meter shows activity

So I’m not certain if this is an issue specific to Cubase 10.15 or the result of a garbled project but I’ve been noticing a strange phenomena where I open Projects that I’ve played with recorded audio on any given previous day without any apparent issue; will suddenly open and all my audio is silent.

I’ve thoroughly gone through every possible setting to ensure that nothing has somehow been reset causing the issue including the Studio Setup, assigned connections within the DAW, Control Room settings and etc. but cannot find 1 single issue.

I’ve even gone as far as to check all my hardware connections as well.

Baffled at it all, I tried duplicating the audio track and the same thing; no audio although the meters are showing activity.

In a last attempt of troubleshooting, I created a new audio track with the identical routing and the audio comes through without issue. I can actually move the audio from the newly created track back to the old track and nothing. Move it back to the new track and my audio comes through.

I’m going to contact Steinberg regarding this but am posting this out of curiosity of knowing if anyone else has seen this issue?

Going to also see if I can identify which file (if any) stores the routing information in the project and maybe delete it to see if there is some type of file corruption going on. But I’ve never seen this one before. Really weird.

What audio hardware are you using?

UAD Apollo Twin

Thanks for that Manike!!! That at least provides me with a legit sanity check, so I know it’s not just me.

The steps you provided in that link are some that I’ve also tried previously that have worked with some success. I do use the Control Room frequently though but I will agree with you that switching to a installed preset and then switching back has usually resolved the problem.

This time however, it didn’t work using that method and the only thing that would resolve it was to recreate the audio track and move the audio over to the new track.

The only thing I can think of at this point is possibly a corrupted custom routing preset but it makes no sense to me that switching away from the preset and then back resolves the problem. I mean, corrupt is corrupt; not corrupt so reload and it’s good :confused:

I’m considering totally removing Cubase entirely and install the Full version to see if that resolves the problems I’m seeing. Seems to me that installing cumulative versions and updates on the system sometimes sets things out of whack. Could be wrong, but it certainly can’t make it any worse.

Thanks!

No problem - sorry it didn’t work this time.

I have had this problem in all the versions of Cubase I’ve used (pro 8 to pro 10). Sometimes doing a reset of the Audio Interface corrects this, other times not. Usually, if I close the program and reopen it, the problem is corrected. It’s an odd, intermittent problem. I’ve not been able to identify a step-by step way to re-create this or to solve it. :frowning:

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Thanks for this reply. My two audio tracks went silent while my instrument track kept playing. I restarted my audio interface and everything works again. Weird though–wouldn’t the interface just receive a stereo signal that’s already been compiled by Cubase? (I know–computer issues are rarely that simple.)

To ALL who have had this problem:

Is this silent audio problem happening on Cubase for Windows or Cubase for Mac or both?

Windows, here, but the issue is not exactly the same : in my case, when the issue occurs, the audio outputs are dead at the start of a Cubase session, but it also occured sometimes during a session already started, the audio having worked as expected previously.

In all cases, the meters as well as the Audio Performance panel no longer show an activity, and MIDI messages, though being received by Cubase, can no longer trigger Instrument track(s).

99% of the time, the solution is to use once or twice the Reset button of the Studio > Studio Setup > Audio System panel. I had once the case where I had to stop Cubase and restart my audio/MIDI interface, though.

Cubase Pro 12.0.60 - Windows 10 Pro 22H2 (sleeping modes set to ‘Never’) - RME Fireface UCX (USB).

Update: it was just a phase-cancellation problem caused by a loose headphone plug. It was at the “headphone” end of the cable, which is why I didn’t twig straight away. Carry on. (No idea why restarting the interface made any difference.)