Cubase 15 performance issues on macOS Tahoe

Cubase
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I have been having the lagging UI isssue on Tahoe as well. Both Cubase 14 and now 15. Launching Mission Control seems to make it return to normal.

Also shutting off GPU acceleration in prefs seemed to help on Cubase 15. On 14 it helped but surfaced other problems.

I will say that I have not yet tested extensively so YMMV, but may be worth a shot while we wait on a fix.

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from Gemini AI: The most effective temporary fix involves altering Cubase’s graphics rendering settings.

  1. Disable GPU Acceleration (Most Effective Fix)
    The primary cause seems to be related to how macOS Tahoe handles GPU acceleration for applications like Cubase. Disabling this feature forces the CPU to handle the GUI rendering, which often eliminates the stuttering.
  • Path: In Cubase, go to Preferences > User Interface.
  • Action: Enable the option “Disable GPU Acceleration” (make sure the checkbox is ticked).
  • Final Step: Restart Cubase for the change to take effect.
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Can confirm that disabling GPU acceleration in cleared this up for me in 13 Pro. Thanks!!!

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FYI On a Studio M1 Max, disabling GPU acceleration and restarting Cubase did not fix the lag/hiccup issue. I am on Tahoe 26.2 and the Cubase version is 15.0.06

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I have M2 Studio - Tahoe was a disaster with Cubase 15 so I ended up reverting back to Sequoia and I can confirm that is works now as expected in Sequoia. Tahoe is the issue

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This is one of the things that has kept me away from the Mac Studio so far. It always seems to be the Max or Ultras that always have random issues. I see it at work all the time too. Our touch screen monitors need software on a Mac to work, so we have a third party that makes it for us. The regular and Pro chips never seem to have any troubles, it’s always the Mac Studios or MacBooks with the higher end Max/Ultra multi-processors.

I’ve seen it just with regular old desktop monitors too. Always smooth sailing when its a ‘regular’ Mac but all the problem tickets I have to deal with at work are almost always Max or Ultra’s and unfortunately I can’t convince them to buy me one. Thankfully my boss a few months back was able to get me a new base model M4 MBP to go along with our first gen M1 and the aging 2014 Intel I have that’s no longer upgradable.

Since 15 came out, I honestly haven’t had much time to play around with it, but I just finished up a couple mixes for a project throughout December and it just felt like I was working in 11/12/13/etc as usual.

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I’m on a bog standard M1. Disabling GPU acceleration worked with Cubase 13/14 on Tahoe but Cubase 15 had additional graphical corruption.

I waited to see what happened with Tahoe 26.2 and Cubase 15.0.6 but nothing changed so reverted to Sequoia and everything works as expected.

I actually prefer the UI of Sequoia to Tahoe so I’m happy to sit out this Mac OS version.

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Are all those Macs running the same OS? I run a Max processor, and I haven’t ever had any serious issues running Sequoia. As far as I can tell (from reading through all the threads on here), the problem is with Tahoe (compatibility, or bugs–IDK)–not the Mac hardware.

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I have a Mac Studio M3 Ultra and I couldn’t be happier. I’ve never experienced any of the issues others have discussed at all. I’ve had 1 Nuendo crash in 2 years I think and I can’t remember what it was. C15 has crashed a couple of times after trying to use the MIDI Device Manager (not MIDI Remote, the actual old-skool Device Manager) to build custom banks for my external synths and use the patch labels in the MIDI track after having to build out multi-channel returns using the VST Rack. But other than that my Ultra experience has been amazing. I have to say, my MBP M3 Max has always been super solid too. Just a wonderful system. The M3 Ultra is a bit absurd in all transparency, but the M3 Max 12p/4e is extremely capable in its own right.

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Since I updated to OS 26.2 I upgraded from Cubase 14 Pro to Cubase 15 Pro in the hope that the issue would be resolved, but it’s the same if not worse. Constant lagging, stuttering, and glitches, no matter what I do. It does not affects the sound tho, just the interface, its so bad that I can not adjust anything while the track is playing. I also disabled GPU acceleration, and I’m running it in Rosetta mode.

My config:

  • MacBook M4 Pro

    14-Core CPU
    20-Core GPU
    48GB Unified Memory
    1TB SSD Storage

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Honestly, I’d have to go dig through the database and look at all of my tickets for the past 3-4 years, but the types of stuff I’ve seen started long before Sequoia or Tahoe were released.

But then again, you’re talking about troubleshooting over a phone or email. If everything the users say is accurate, they’ve got ‘the same system’ Im always running, yet no problems for me. I’ve seen folks not read a single bit of a user guide and completely miss HOW to install things properly on Macs, I’ve had people with all kinds of random crap attached to their Mac for whatever reason that interferes with other things, apps that modify Finder behavior that mess with things, etc. Not that any software my company makes is perfect, but honestly, there’s only been a handful of times over the years where I’ve actually found something and reported it to our BU/developer team.

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