I remember years back when using Logic, it was possible set transport to pause and record, so the song position would stay fixed, but each record enabled midi channel would still record incoming midi data. This is useful to set CCs for a midi track for the start position of the song, which get chased back to always have these settings active, unless anything gets changed later. In Cubase you can cycle record one bar, but this is less fast and elegant IMO. Is there any way to quickly record incoming midi to one exact spot in the timeline (to where song position is set to)? I am not talking about drawing in midi data! I really need to record it from its midi input.
If I understand what you are asking I believe you could use the Cubase punch in/out function. Just set the locators to where you want to record and have at it.
Regards 
Hmm …, if you did understand what I was saying, at least I do not understand your answer. Punch in out is good to punch in and out of an existing midi or audio recording. What I want to do is refer midi data (CC data, to be specific) to one point in the timeline without having to activate playback. How is punch in going to help with this?
I guess I misunderstood. Using punch in/out would not assist you. But could you assign your controller to a midi automation lane then record (read) the cc data at any point you wanted? Again, I still might not be understanding your issue. If that’s the case hopefully others will chime in here.
Regards.
Thanks, Prock! I thought I might have overlooked something about Punch in/out.
Unfortunately, I don’t want to record midi to automation, either.
I just have this controller (actually a Lemur) with a thousand knobs, buttons and faders. I included one button, to dump all CC data, as the faders are sets to at once (actually, due to midi it is consecutive, but within split seconds). When I have found my desired settings of all parameter, I just want to be able to record that in Cubase to a specific spot in the timeline (most of the time in the beginning of a song). I cant do that of course by just playing back (with cycle mode enabled). But first of, that is not very precise to hit a specific point in the timeline (which is not so much of a problem). Also, I have to set a cycle, hit playback and record and then dump.
In Logic, I remember to just hit pause and record, which kept all recorded data in one place. Then, I could just go through different tracks with pause and record still enabled, find my settings for each track, dump it and go to the next track. Since playback was not activated, I could also move that faders while in record and the the last value of a specific CC would be overwritten, hence, alway the last value was recorded. With Cycle mode in Cubase, this wouldn’t work.
I hope, this makes my question a little more understandable! Thinking about it myself al little bit, I guess I could set up a macro command chain in Cubase and assign it to a button in Lemur. It would send a midi command to Cubase to activate the macro, which would the enable record, reporting back to Lemur that record is enabled which would activate the data dump. As soon as the dump is finished, record and playback would get disabled again. A little complicated, but I will look into it as soon, as I find the time.
Enabling Retrospective MIDI Record
Page 243 of Cubase Pro 8.5 Manual.
Thanks! That was, what I was looking for!