Crackles in Cubase. Please help!

Cubase
#1

All audio within cubase has a crackle, almost like an old record. I have tried adjusting my buffer rates, which only makes the crackling get worse the higher it gets, and never completely takes it away even at the lowest level. All my connections are ok and sound is perfect outside of cubase. I’ve played around with and even disabled the ASIO guard.

If anyone can help or offer suggestions on what to do please do so! I am new to cubase and am excited to be making music…after this problem gets fixed.
Thank you!

#2

Anything exceeding 0dB? Often sounds like a buffer crackle.

#3

Nope. The crackles still happen even on the quietest of sounds.

#4

You’re probably running too much CPU if you have a lot of VST instruments going. You could try freezing the tracks or you can just render them to audio and disable the VST tracks. This saves tons of CPU. It’s good to get into the habit of putting small fades in your audio too. there is a setting in Cubase where you could set it up automatically. It eliminates punch in static.

#5

I’ll definitely try that, although I’ve tried it with one very small VST instrument and I still get the crackling.

#6

You should try reinstalling your Steinberg USB and MIDI drivers. To a clean install and get them directly from Steinberg site. The options page on the VST instrument also gives you the ability to up the RAM.

#7

It also could be a clocking issue. Make sure the setting in Cubase matches the setting in your audio interface. In digital audio there can only be one clock master.

#8

Yes sounds like a clocking issue to me

#9

Try opening Cubase in safe mode using the option to disable all plugins. See if the crackle are gone. If so the culprit is likely to be a plugin that causing the crackles. Sometimes demo plugins use crackles.

In the mixer window there is a button to turn off all inserts, the turn the plugins on and off to see if you can find the culprit.

What is the CPU meter telling you?

Try Control/Alt/Delete and look at the Task Manager Performance and open the resource manager to see if there are any CPU peaks

Perhaps run through the Windows 10 setups for music production and check you have all the correct settings.

A lot of us have been there. Good luck.