Cubase 11, Windows 10, multiple SSD drives.
I had to leave my apartment so I saved and backed up my entire project to an external drive as I usually do after major edits.
Two hours later, I fire the project up (a Windows update happened on shutdown which I sort of ignored) and while all is well in the GUI - mix console, tracks, etc. all show audio happening in MIDI, VST and audio tracks, no sound at all. The most recent .bak version did the same thing.
I fished out the backed up version parked on one of my external drives from two hours earlier, it works.
I compared the setup in both projects, they are identical:
And the other weird thing is that I hit the internet to find some videos to potentially fix this but… as long as the no-sound .cpr is loaded in Cubase, the audio on YouTube AND my local media player (VLC) are very distorted as if being way over-clipped.
Just unloading this corrupt file without closing Cubase fixes the YouTube/online and local media player distortion.
I thought this might have been some Windows 10 update issue or audio interface or other, but I did a full system restore (I use Macrium Reflect), and updated the audio drivers - I have a Behringer UMC2040, ran a sfcscannow, etc. it’s still happening.
Yes, being backup-compulsive helps, but it still worries me how this kind of audio black-out corruption of a .cpr can happen and how this can mess with my sytem’s audio.
BTW, all my audio Cubase projects are on my D:\ drive, not C:\ and some of my VST content (Kontakt and other) are on another external drive.
Very puzzled.