Cubase lags in macOS support every single year, we need much better moving forward

Hey,
Firstly, I wanna say I love Cubase, I’ve been using it for over 10 years. Best DAW.

But every year I’m disappointed with the lack of support for new yearly releases of macOS and now with M1 it’s the same thing. This is inexcusable.

Apple does everything it can to provide developers with adequate time to test/update their apps in time for the new OS release. Usually 5 months, Big Sur beta came out in early June and released on November 12, 2020.

They also are very open to collaborating with large developers on getting their apps up to speed. I’ve even seen then rollback minor changes to updates that directly effected essential parts of dev’s apps. This is not always the case but the lack of communication coming from Steinberg we don’t even know if Cubase or other DAW’s have dev reps at Apple that they collaborate with on audio/music changes. With Apple wanting to appeal to Pro users so much this should be the case.

Other Mac apps update to the new OS with no problem and they cost way less than Cubase and are just as complicated. Affinity Photo is an example of a large app that usually does this successfully on day 1 of new MacOS releases.

Apple has a developer beta program for this very reason.

There’s no reason why we should be choosing between:

  • The security updates
  • Major privacy improvements
  • Enjoyment of better quality of life improvements
  • Compatibility with other devices
  • New features

Because an expensive DAW app doesn’t have day 1 (or even month 1 would do) support of a new operating system.

For example with the M1, they were given even more time. Apple last year released Dev Kit’s with Apple Silicon chips in June, and it’s been over 14 months and Cubase still doesn’t natively support Apple Silicon.

And I feel that there isn’t enough communication from Cubase devs too, we just get the usual random post on the blog that the new OS isn’t supported yet once it comes out.

Then months later usually in Q1/Q2 of the following year we finally get support.

Steinberg should have a team dedicated to testing new OS versions as soon as the beta is out by Apple every June, so that they can have day 1 support, which usually comes out when the new version of Cubase is released

I would also love to see more communication from dev’s more frequent dev updates, maybe a dev blog or something.

I love Cubase and I just want better OS support, we’re in 2021. Cubase isn’t the only one of course, there’s many apps especially in audio/music that lag in supporting new OS updates. But I think this is an area Cubase can massively improve on.

Thanks to Steinberg and all the great work the devs do. I know they can listen and improve, excited for the dongle less future.

I’m hoping we can get macOS Monterrey support sooner than previous macOS updates.

Thank you for attending my TED talk.

A long time user.

  • M
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Despite agreeing with you, in my experience of nearly always updating to the latest OS release for quite a few years now, I can’t remember ever having an issue.

Did I miss something? Cubase 11 was compatible with Big Sur from day one.

It seems Cubase 11 wasn’t 100% compatible with Big Sur on release in November 2020?

It wasn’t until April 2021 that 100% compatibility was released. Just under 6 months after release. And 10 months after the Big Sur beta came out.

After the initial (November 12, 2020) update warning users about Big Sur compatibility, Steinberg issued an update on macOS Big Sur and Apple Silicon product compatibility (no date). They wrote:

While many of our products are compatible with macOS Big Sur on Intel-based systems, please note that we cannot recommend using Apple Silicon-based systems for the time being until we have completed our tests or released updates to make our software and hardware compatible.

https://www.reddit.com/r/cubase/comments/kts25j/cubase_10511_compatibility_with_big_sur_on/

It’s been difficult for lots of major players:

Small companies, say ones that just produce plugins are generally more agile than bigger organisations. The M1 has put a lot of compaines behind the 8 ball and most stuff is still running through Rosetta 2 rather than natively. Apple wanted to deliver a knock out blow to the market of Intel compiled software and they have achieved it.

Yeah a lot have lagged but a lot haven’t. Photoshop, Premiere, Affinity Photo, Cinema 4D, Blender, Parallels Desktop all run natively. These are some large apps.

Cubase not having M1 support is an example of how slow there Mac support pipeline is.

At very least they could be providing us with monthly dev updates. But we get no news. I have apps that are free that have more communication than Steinberg.

Every macOS release they lag with support so it’s only normal to expect they’d lag with Apple Silicon. I’m saying this is unacceptable for an app that costs this much. They should be on top of there things.

When Apple Silicon was first announced I would have liked better communication like a blog post saying

“Hey guys, we’re excited for the new version we have a development Apple Silicon kit on the way and will start testing right away to ensure we have full compatibility as soon close to the first M1 release”.

But nope we hear nothing and it’s over 15 months since they’ve been given the resources to make Cubase compatible but haven’t.

It doesn’t seem like a priority for them and I’d like to see that change.

I want to be with a DAW that’s committed to compatibility and bringing the best experience in a timely manner.

But it seems like they just made a business move and said we’ll sell them M1 compatibility in Cubase 11.5 so the users will have to upgrade then.

Good discussion here:

How many Cubase users switched to M1 Macs on day one?

And why would the M1 be a particular priority? You get less plugin performance overall. Even though the single-core performance is amazing, the overall “run as many threads as you can” computational power crown goes to AMD, with a fair margin, followed by Intel.

I mean, it sucks when I have a new computer and some software I want to use doesn’t want to work on it. I’ve learned that the software is usually more important than the hardware, so I’ve stopped paying so much attention to the latest-and-greatest hardware sparkles. That hardware will still be there in 6 months, and someone else will stub their toes and walk into the door jambs and make my later upgrade path that much smoother!