Problem with setting up multiple Monitors in VST connections

Cubase
1

Hi all,

I am having trouble trying to set up three different monitoring speaker systems in the VST connections of Cubase 9, my goal being that I want to switch between these monitors in the control room of Cubase.

The main trouble seems to be that there are a lack of available ‘Device Ports’ with which to connect my three monitoring systems to…

I have successfully followed ‘Greg Ondo’s - How to Switch between different Monitors in the Control Room’ You tube tutorial and have managed to connect my Avantone and my KRK monitors to the Control room and can switch between the two no problem, however, I wanted to add my regular Panasonic ‘cheap’ stereo for a further audio point of reference but when I attempted to I found that I had run out of available virtual Device Ports to connect to.

The only way I can make the three monitoring systems work is if I share the ‘second’ set of stereo L & R device ports between the Avantone and my cheap stereo, (so, I connect the Avantone to the Left Port of the option ‘MIX 2 L’ in the drop down menu and the Panasonic to the Right port of the option ‘MIX 2 R’ but that means they are not receiving the full Left and Right stereo of the track!).

I am using a UR44 audio interface (from Steinberg) and have Cubase 9.

I have attached screenshots to highlight what is going on in my VST connections and wondered if anyone might know what it is I am doing wrong - for instance, do I need to create extra device ports or new inputs/outputs in the VST instruments?

Please also not that in the screenshots you’ll see that I used the ‘FX’ device ports for the Panasonic stereo and they do not work (just give a weird distant fuzzy sounding version - so I realise that they are not supposed to be used).

P.S. The video by Greg Ondo does not go on to demonstrate the connection of the extra monitors so I assume that I am missing something fundamental here.

Many Thanks in advance.

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2

I had to lookup the UR44 manual, but it seems it only has 4 outputs, so only enough for 2 speaker pairs. You’d need 6 outputs for 3 sets of speakers. On the UR44 the Mix1 signal goes to the Main Output and also Line Outputs 1 & 2 while Mix 2 goes to Outputs 3 & 4.

You could hookup a physical signal switcher to one Output and use it to manually switch between 2 of the Speaker sets. Or get an interface that will support 3 pairs. Other than that you can only use two.

3

Looking at the UR44 manual a bit more there seems a 3rd option. You could hook up one pair of Speakers to the Main Output and another to Line Output 1 & 2. From the perspective of the Cubase Control Room these would look like a single pair. But you could control which you were actually listening to by using the mixer in the UR44 interface, or even more simply by powering one pair on and the other off.

Good luck.

4

Thanks for your advice Raino, I will look into the options you have outlined and see which works best for me.

Many thanks again.