Connecting an external effect - Cubase Elements 8

I’ve seen some tutorials that come close to explaining how this is done.
However, they always involve some variation of software/hardware that doesn’t match EXACTLY what I’m using. So they say to “click here” or “change this” and don’t have whatever that thing is to click or change.

So, I got some help from Focusrite (my audio interface manufacturer). They described how to connect my external stereo effect to their interface (Saffire Pro14). Done!

And they told me how to set the Mixcontrol (their software utility) routing. Done!

Finally they said to do the following in Cubase:

“Create a new stereo audio track in Cubase and set the input to 3-4. Set the output to 1-2, and route DAW 1-2 to monitor outputs 1-2 so that you hear the wet signal you’re recording through your monitors. Please note that you will only be able to monitor the dry signal through the headphone output as it shares the same circuitry as Line Outputs 3-4.”

This is where I need YOUR help.
Where in Cubase do I “set the input” of a channel to 3-4 and the output to 1-2?
And where in Cubase do I “route DAW 1-2 to monitor outputs 1-2”?

Thanks for your help!

In the inspector of the track in input- / output routing.

DAW 1-2 is a focusrite mixer channel, not Cubase.

Thanks for your help. But I’m not able to get this to work.
Any change I make in Mixcontrol results in monitoring being shut off. I can’t hear what’s going on.

It´s back to the mixcontrol manual then.

Alright, finished another screensharing session with Focusrite. Mixcontrol is theoretically set correctly.
But once again, they are telling me I need to change the routing in Cubase to complete my objective.
The goal is to be able to use my Big Sky reverb like a send, like I use my software reverb on any channel I want. Just like a normal send.

I made an effect channel for Strymon Left, and another for Strymon Right (I don’t know if this is necessary).

In the Track Inspector, I don’t know what to do. The output options are: no bus, stereo, links, rechts (?), and Groups-Drums.
But there’s probably something in there that I haven’t clicked that would make this work.

What do I do in Track Inspector? Thanks!

-Create an output bus in Cubase
-Connect that bus to the mixcontrol output that is connected to the physical interface output which is then connected to the -external hardware fx unit.
-create an iput bus
-connect it to the mixcontrol input that is connected to the output of the external hardware fx unit.
-create an audio track with that bus as input and activate the input monitor.
-send from any track you want to the output bus
-receive the fx signal via the audio track with input monitor activated.

svennilenni - you are great!
I did everything you said, and I believe I’m closer than ever before.
However, some weird stuff:

  1. monitor on/off doesn’t make a difference
  2. reverb is very quiet, even when cranked all the way up everywhere

Probably time for another call to Focusrite… and they just told me it couldn’t be done in Cubase Elements!

Then you are probably direct monitoring via the mixcontrol software - in which case its setup is not quite correct

Hard to tell from far at the moment.

Well, there´s a better/more user friendly implementation in the Pro version which is even called “external FX”, so most people forget about the old fashioned analog style way.