Cubase Pro 11 not starting with NordVPN running

Cubase
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1

I wonder if someone ran into the same issue.

Cubase Pro 11 is not showing the splash screen and therefore not starting when NordVPN is active. A weird, not very helpful error message coming from eLicenser shows up. If I disconnect from the VPN-Server, Cubase Pro 11 runs perfectly well. I can see Cubase running in the Task Manager, but it simply doesn’t start. When I hit the shortcut, it starts another instance with the same result. If I repeat this, several cubase.exe showing up in the Task Manager according to how many times I hit the Shortcut to start Cubase.

Connecting NordVPN to a server while Cubase Pro 11 is running makes Cubase Pro 11 crash immediately. What did you do?

I use Emsisoft Anti-Malware and when I lockdown the Internet, Cubase Pro 11 also refuses to start. What the heck?!

That’s about it.

2

Hi,

What kind of message does the eLCC show, please?

3

Hi,

Here’s the message that appears. It takes quite a while until it shows up.
eLCC-error

When NordVPN is running, Cubase11.exe is appearing in the Task Manager and so is SYNSOPOS.exe. I can start as many Cubase11.exe as I want, they just count up in the Task Manager. SYNSOPOS.exe remains as a single entry.
When I lockdown the internet with Emsisoft Anti-Malware, Cubase11.exe and SYNSOPOS.exe don’t even start. This also occurs when NordVPN is disabled. So there must something fundamentally be wrong with how Cubase Pro 11 is starting up.
However, when I set Malwarebytes Windows Firewall Control to “High Filtering” while having NordVPN disabled and Emsisoft’s Lockdown not activated, Cubase11.exe starts smoothly.

So there must be something going wrong ahead of the Firewall. Thinking about it leaves me with the idea that the eLicenser is in a way addressed via network and the VPN and Lockdown both do block this communication, but I may be wrong.

Edit: I actually never use the Lockdown functionality of Emsisoft. I was just trying this because it’s also network related. It’s pure coincidence that I found this out.

4

Hi,

You can use Cubase completely offline. I don’t think this

is the case. But I don’t understand the network stuff at all. So I might be wrong.

5

By network I don’t mean the LAN-type of network, but maybe the eLicenser is addressed as if it was a network of its own and the VPN is causing this “network” to break. I have no clue either. Just blind guessing.

However, I may have found the cause for this problem… I will investigate further and report back.

1 Like
6

I found out what the problem is:

Since I am running Malwarebyte Windows Firewall Control, It appears that I somehow accidentally blocked Cubase11.exe permanently within WFC when it was trying to access the internet. This caused the problem described above. It looks like blocking Cubase11 in the firewall assumingly will restrict its access to the eLicenser under the given conditions (when NordVPN is running or EAM Lockdown is active).
This is for sure a quite specific configuration issue (NordVPN/EAM, Malwarebytes WFC and Cubase). However, it may also occur with other similar software configurations and knowing this may be of use for everyone with the same problem.

1 Like