I’ve been thinking about getting Nuendo for quite some time, but the prospect of losing my Cubase Pro license has stopped me from doing it. I’m currently on Cubase 11 and with the release of Nuendo 12 with some new features that interest me I’m revisiting the situation.
Looking at the crossgrade options, the crossgrade from Cubase 11 says this:
This crossgrade only applies once to a single Cubase license. Note that after the crossgrade, the Cubase license remains active but is no longer eligible for upgrading.
Unless my memory is failing me, this is a change from the previous situation where Cubase would no longer function.
The crossgrade from Cubase 12 says this:
This crossgrade only applies once to a single Cubase license.
No mention of Cubase 12 remaining active. Does it? If so, will I be able to upgrade Cubase in the future?
I’m wondering if in fact nothing has changed and the Cubase 12 license is deleted. Perhaps it’s just that because of the new licensing method, older versions of Cubase manage to sneak through?
Perhaps this is all a moot point and I wouldn’t lose anything moving from Cubase to Nuendo?
Can Cubase load Nuendo projects? I’m assuming Nuendo can load Cubase projects.
In previews versions, the fact that the Cubase license had to be replaced by the Nuendo license when crossgrading, was a technical restriction of the eLicenser. It wasn’t technically possible to keep both.
But now that’s no longer the case with Steinberg Licensing! Now, if you crossgrade from Cubase 12 to Nuendo 12, you get to keep your Cubase license so in the future, when a newer Cubase version is released, you can keep updating it if you want. The crossgrade to Nuendo is restricted to one per Cubase license though! Applying the crossgrade twice on a single Cubase 12 license is not possible. (That’s what’s meant by that notice in the shop).
When crossgrading from an eLicenser-based Cubase version, e.g. Cubase 11, the license in the USB-eLicenser will remain active and can be used to open Cubase 11 (and older) indefinitely, but that license can no longer be updated or crossgraded in the future.
So, the best way to go, though the more expensive one, is to first update to Cubase 12 and then crossgrade to Nuendo 12. That way you keep your Cubase 11 license in your Dongle, and you also keep your Cubase 12 license active for future updates. If the day comes when you realize that you no longer need Cubase because Nuendo does everything you need and more, you could always resale your Cubase license.
I’ll look more closely into Nuendo over the coming weekend, but I think I’ll probably end up doing the upgrade to Cubase 12 and then crossgrade to Nuendo.
Hi @Luis_Dongo
I bought a crossgrade from Cubase 11 to Nuendo 11 but didn’t use it yet. If I upgrade Cubase 11 to 12, will the code work to crossgrade to Nuendo 12 afterward?
Now, if you crossgrade from Cubase 12 to Nuendo 12, you get to keep your Cubase license so in the future, when a newer Cubase version is released, you can keep updating it if you want
Is this why the crossgrade price from Cubase 12 is currently the same as the crossgrade from Cubase 4-11?
Hi,
If I crossgrade to N12 from C12 pro, how many computers can I activate the N12 license? I activated all 3 C12 pro licenses on three different computers already.
Can I activate the N12 license on only one computer or all three computer?
To join into this subject: I made a crossgrade from Cubase 11 to Nuendo 11 and therefore “lost” my Cubase license. Is there a away to regain it for users who did the same?
I was almost afraid of that… But if the loss of the Cubase licence only had a technical background in the past, nothing would actually stand in the way of reactivating it. Well, another disadvantage of the outdated eLicencer system, which once again mainly affects long-time users. Pity.
@TimoWildenhain, sorry to insist, but what about upgrading from C11 to C12 and then crossgrade the C11 license that is still on the eLicenser (with the C11 to N11 code)? Would it be possible?
I suspect you will not be able to crossgrade the Cubase 11 licence once it has been upgraded to Cubase 12. The eLicenser licence will be ‘upgraded’ from “Cubase 11 Pro” to “Cubase 11 Pro (upgraded to Cubase 12 with Steinberg Licensing)” as part of that upgrade - this is intended to signify that the licence cannot be further upgraded. eLicenser upgrades are strict about the licences they will upgrade, and I cannot see them allowing upgrades from a licence that is not intended to be upgraded.
What will you lose by upgrading to Nuendo 11 (and presumably getting a grace period upgrade to Nuendo 12), losing your Cubase licence in the process? My understanding is likely incomplete, but the only things that come to mind are VST Transit (which, for some reason known only to Steinberg, is omitted from Nuendo), also the ability to interwork with Cubase editions other than Pro. Nuendo will open Cubase files, but only if they were saved with Cubase Pro, not a lower edition. Is anyone else aware of other things?
Personally, I’d like to see a Nuendo licence open the corresponding edition of Cubase Pro as, with the few caveats noted above, Nuendo is pretty much a superset of Cubase Pro. However, for understandable product differentiation reasons, Steinberg have decided that Nuendo is not part of the Cubase family, so I cannot see this happening.
I keep asking because what I’m looking for is what Luis described: “But now that’s no longer the case with Steinberg Licensing! Now, if you crossgrade from Cubase 12 to Nuendo 12, you get to keep your Cubase license so in the future, when a newer Cubase version is released, you can keep updating it if you want.”.
I bought the crossgrade last year when it was on sale, but was in a middle of a project and didn’t activate it yet. So in an ideal world, I would like to keep my Cubase license after the crossgrade now that it is possible to do so.
Unless you can persuade Steinberg to exchange your C11 to N11 Download Access Code for a C12 to N12 DAC, which is unlikely, I think your quest is doomed. Steinberg Licensing has changed what Steinberg can do for new purchasers, so they have changed the crossgrade offer. You are asking for those benefits to be backdated to a (different) product that you bought in last year’s sale.
In the end, you will get what you paid for - a Nuendo licence in exchange for your Cubase licence. You will also get a (non-upgradeable) licence for something left on your eLicenser, but I am unsure whether this will be a Nuendo 11 licence or a Cubase 11 Pro licence. I suspect you will get what you paid for - a Nuendo 11 licence in exchange for your Cubase 11 Pro licence, which will then be eligible for a grace period update to Nuendo 12.
I crossgraded from Cubase 11 Pro to Nuendo 11, so I no longer have a Cubase licence. The main point of my post was to question whether you would miss a Cubase licence if you no longer had one, especially as you would then need to pay to upgrade both Cubase and Nuendo in the future if you wanted to stay current.
I guess it’s more a “if I can have more, why not” case. I would have like to have a C12 license in my account even after crassgrading (now that it’s possible).
Wow. I always thought this was a business decision by Steinberg in the past. To find out now that it actually was a technical restriction of the e-licenser is interesting. It always broke my mind why a competitive cross grade would be less expensive and more advantageous than cross grading as a Steinberg customer… I guess they could have given those interested a “new” license for Nuendeo 12 back then though. But anyways. It’s great that this works now the way it should have worked long ago. I guess Steinberg might think about a kind of “grace-period” cross grade for those that crossgraded last year - it would be easy to include an update license to Cubase 12 for a smaller fee within the cross grade process to Nuendo 12, I guess…