Multiple VSTs Causing Crackling and drops outs after Windows Update

Cubase
1

Hey, A few days ago I had Cubase 10 Elements working completely fine, projects filled with VSTs with no drama whatsoever.

After a Windows update a few days ago, everything has stopped working, If I put 2+ VST it starts to crackle, so as you could imagine, more than that, there is like zero audio coming through.

Its not the interface as the standalone vsts work fine and all other sound coming through has no drama.

I even tried upgrading to Cubase 12 Elements to see if it was the program but getting the same issues.

But FYI
Audio Interface is Focusrite 2i2 Gen 1 (Device Settings Sample Rate: 44100, Buffer Size 256, Tried with safe mode on and off)
PC is ASUS ROG Strix G512LV
Intel(R) Core™ i7-10750H CPU @ 2.60GHz 2.59 GHz
16GB RAM
512 SSD (Nowhere near full)

Any Help Or guidance is very appreciated!

2

Hi and welcome to the forum,

I would try to use the LatencyMon utility, which would inspect your system and point to the possible bottleneck.

3

I have the same problem with Cubase 12.0.50. Everything was fine until a Windows update a week ago - since when I get horrendous pops, dropouts and crackles as soon as I play any project with more than 1 VST instrument.

I will see what LatencyMon detects. In the meantime I have disabled ASIO Guard which seems to have [temporarily - as I intend to switch it back on at some point] stopped the issue.

4

Hi,

I would also try to reinstall the ASIO driver and make sure to install it as administrator.

1 Like
5

Another idea might be to undo the latest Windows update.

6

Screenshot 2023-03-26 152038
Screenshot 2023-03-26 1520381412×717 56.8 KB

here is what I’m getting, Any chance you can help deciphering?

7

unfortunately disabling asio guard just turns the lack of sound into fizz

8

So I uninstalled the last security update and everything is working perfectly as it was. very strange, but I’ll just have to watch out for future updates it seems!

1 Like
9

Can you inform us which exactly windows(KB number) update ? Win10, Win11?

2 Likes
10

The update was for Windows 11, March 14, 2023—KB5023706

The details of the update were around enhancements to active directory?