In Cubase 15, removing a Rack Instrument such as HALion Sonic is needlessly unintuitive. A user sees what appears to be an instrument/folder structure in the Project window, yet normal track-removal commands do not remove the underlying instrument.
Having to know that the actual Rack Instrument must be removed separately through the VST Instruments rack by selecting “No VST Instrument” is poor discoverability.
Please add a straightforward “Remove Rack Instrument” command to the context menu in the Project window, with an appropriate confirmation dialog. A user should not have to understand Cubase’s internal distinction between the automatically generated folder structure and the underlying rack instance simply to delete an instrument.
If that was the only annoyance with Rack Instruments that would be okay. The biggest annoyance is how adding the rack instrument only creates one MIDI track. If you want to create 16 of them, you have to manually do so. And if you already have MIDI tracks created, you have to manually route them to the Rack instrument one by one because Q-Link doesn’t work for I/O apparently.
It’s one step. You click on the Rack Instrument’s name in the VSTi panel, and you set it to “No VST Instrument”. You remove it the same way you add it. That’s hard to forget if you use the feature regularly.
In the Add Track dialogue, you can set “Count” to whatever number of tracks you want, and you can select which Rack Instrument they’re routed to.
In the Mix Console, you can select any number of MIDI tracks, activate Q-Link, and set the routing for all of them at once to any of your rack instruments.
Adding and removing Rack Instruments doesn’t have anything to do with adding or removing tracks. Any already-existing or newly created MIDI track can be connected to any rack instrument with one step. They are extremely easy to understand and use. If you find them unintuitive–you’re probably overthinking the process.
Again, i don’t create tracks or instruments this way. I grab a vst and drag it or i click add track, choose instrument and select a vst or native steinberg instrument. Many of my composer and producer friends do the same thing. So to tell me that it’s easy to understand and use presupposes that I ever would use them. Do you get what I’m saying? I had an instrument rack automatically added to tracks for some reason and it was a major pain in the ass to get rid of them. A simple ‘delete instrument rack’ in the track ‘right click’ context menu would be far more intuitive and easy.
I have to agree with XLColdJ. The whole point of rack instruments (or the only reason Steinberg didn’t remove rack instruments when they added instrument tracks), is to divorce track creation from instrument instantiation.
If you’re creating a rack instrument when adding a track, wouldn’t it be simpler to just use an instrument track?
Rack instruments are generally used when you want to load instruments first, for example in an orchestral template, then create tracks later, but it could be I just don’t understand your use case.
But that’s in the “Add Track.” I’m adding a Rack instrument. The only dialog you have is Cubase asking if you want to create a MIDI track routed to it. A single MIDI track.
Sure, but that’s incovenient because now I have to open the Mix Console, activate Q-Link, then route the stuff. I should have to open the mixer because Q-Link doesn’t work on the routing inside the Inspector.
Do you start new projects with a template? When I start a new project, all of the VSTi I normally use are already there. I just add track and select whichever instrument I need.
“For some reason…”
Learn how to use the rack instruments and it won’t be a problem.
It takes a few seconds, and it’s not something you have to do frequently during a session. You’re complaining about opening a window and using a valuable feature.
I am because that’s inconsistent behavior with how Q-Link is advertised to work. And it used to work everywhere in the past but Steinberg decided to change it for some unexplained reason.
And it’s not “a few seconds.” If I start from adding the Rack instrument first and it’s only single MIDI track it provides, I now have to add 15 other MIDI tracks, open MixConsole, turn Q-Link on then finally route the tracks. And that’s assuming it adds the MIDI tracks in the correct ascending channel order, otherwise you have to manually change the channel numbers of 15 MIDI tracks one by one.
I have a feeling that @XLColdJ addressed @BrunoDSL and not your initial post. Actually, nobody seems to discuss your initial post in this topic. Has it derailed?
Nah, I addressed OP’s post directly. He thinks Rack Instruments are “added to tracks” (just like Track Instruments), so he wants to be able to delete them from tracks–but that’s the exact opposite of how the concept of rack instruments work with a physical rack, and with Cubase.
If I wanted one track-deletion to silently disable audio on all associated tracks without warning, I’d use Track Instruments.
Every now and then a person will ask the question how to get rid of the tracks in the VST folder or how to remove a rack instrument.
It does seem a bit unintuitive.
I wondered if Steinberg should introduce a trashcan icon on the rack panel.
Somewhat like this, obviously the height would need to be expanded for a third icon on the right side.
it’s not intuitive to have to dive and click 3 times to remove an instrument. literally every other instrument get’s removed with a right click and remove track and device. Having to click studio in the top menu, then vst instruments, then find the instrument in the rack then tell it nothing is hilariously unintuitive. And considering this is only for halion sonic, of course it’s going to be a process that no one remembers. This is another reason Kontakt is the preferred sampler, too. Please don’t bother responding. I don’t want to waste any more time reading your disingenuous responses. And I definitely don’t need you to tell me that what I find unintuitive is intuitive.
Of course it’s unintuitive, but if you’re removing a track and a device, that’s a sign that you shouldn’t be using rack instruments in the first place. For that workflow, use instrument tracks instead.
