Are there any official long-term plans to make older versions of Cubase accessible?
It would be delightful and I think creatively very inspiring to have that option.
Similar to having something like an old little tape recorder, microphone, Rhodes, DX7 or tracker around.
Unfortunately, I made the mistake of upgrading to the new licensing system and haven’t kept around any full versions of Cubase, only LE.
But now I seriously regret that.
I would like to revisit old modes of thinking with Cubase 4 and revive an older machine with a less ensh*tified OS than current Apple and Microsoft offerings as an offline recording solution and a VSTi nostalgia box.
If you still have your working elicenser dongle, most ALL the old versions are on the ftp or the sb downloads pages.
I have Cubase 14,13,12,11,10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3…..all running great on my Win11 Pro systems. All from the ftp/downloads areas. Requirement is of course that my elicenser continue working.
Now …let’s say you lost your elicenser and you ONLY want to run Cubase 6.5. In that regard, there is no solution ….
Why “won’t” Steinberg simply “make” the old versions available without need for the dongle?
The reason there (as I’ve always understood it) …is that programs like Cubase 8 (etc) were coded at the time to continually communicate with the dongle in what amounts to a h-u-g-e spiderweb of dongle calls.
Every version of Cubendo utilizing a completely different “spiderweb” of communication code.
It’s not like SB can simply spit out Cubase 7 as dongle-less code…..not without….who knows….a mountain of sifting through code to zap the thousands of dongle calls.
Which…..sb has no profit incentive to do for old versions.
Here is a knowledgebase article detailing what can be converted, and how:
Your only option here is to obtain a functioning USB-eLicenser with at least a Cubase 4 license on it.
On the other hand, Cubase 4 already used the still-current .cpr file format which can be directly loaded with every version of Cubase that has been released since.
Worst case scenario, even if you have to purchase again, IMHO even Cubase Elements is a better option than Cubase 4 was.
Ohhhh, I just realized something.
I thought the transition got rid of the license, but I also made the switch to Nuendo at the same time, so THAT got rid of the Cubase license.
But I never checked whether older Nuendo versions would run, because I only had Cubase installs.
So there’s an old Nuendo license. Not quite Cubase, but close enough.
Now that is really nice surprise.
Yeah, that’s what makes me terrified for the future and wonder what will happen to future unsupported versions that use the current copy protection.
And it makes me feel, I’m stupid for choosing a DAW and some plugins with such wasteful and intrusive anti-consumer and anti-software copy protection.
Nevertheless, kudos to Steinberg still offering all those downloads.
Right now, I’m just happy and hope my eLicenser lives until someone at Steinberg (or somewhere else…) figures something out.
It would be a shame, if one day all that fantastic Steinberg software would be impossible to run because of copy protection.
Just seeing that screen gives me the vibes of happy times.
And yes it seems to install without any problems on 11.
