Hi everyone,
With the release of Cubase 15, we’ve seen great strides in workflow, but there is still a significant inconsistency regarding FLAC audio support.
Currently, Cubase allows us to record natively in FLAC and drag FLAC files onto the project timeline AND MEDIABAY without issue. However, the Sampler Track still does not support FLAC files natively. When dragging a FLAC from the MediaBay or File Explorer into the Sampler, it simply rejects the file. This has led me to an inconsistent workflow.
Other DAWs like Reaper, Ableton Live, and FL Studio have handled FLAC natively for years
Proposed Solutions
I’d like to suggest two possible ways for the dev team to implement this:
“On-the-fly” Conversion to WAV via The Pool: Since the Sampler Track already creates a temporary buffer in the project’s ‘Edits’ or ‘Sampler Track’ folder, Cubase could simply convert the FLAC to a temporary WAV upon import (much like it does when hitting “Bounce Selection”). This would be transparent to the user and maintain compatibility with the existing sampler engine.
Native JIT (Just-In-Time) Decoding: FLAC is a computationally light codec. Modern CPUs (even mobile or mini-PC chips) handle FLAC decoding with negligible overhead. Implementing JIT decoding would allow us to keep our sample libraries compressed on disk
Why this matters?
I attempted to move my sample libraries to FLAC to save 50-60% disk space while maintaining 100% audio transparency. Having to manually convert a sample to WAV just to “test” it in the Sampler Track is a major creative speedbump.
Please consider bringing the Sampler Track up to parity with the rest of the Cubase audio engine!
Tags: feature-request, cubase-15, sampler-track, flac