[Edit: Go to my 06 Nov 2018 21:30 reply for a solution]
I have a project which is causing crackles and pops. When I open the Audio Performance window, the lower meter (peak audio) is pegged in the red regardless of how many tracks are playing. Even if -all- tracks are muted and all VSTIs are disabled it is pegged.
I -assume- that if I mute tracks and remove various plug-ins at -some- points the crackles will go away, right?
Is there a hidden track or automation I’m not seeing that could be causing it?
How can I determine where the crackles are coming from?
I’ve been struggling for a week with a matter that might shed some light - not a solution but something related.
Every hour from system startup, windows 7, I get a peak in the red - regardless of something is playing or recording, just idling stopped in Cubase.
When recording, while this hourly thingy is coming, recording stop and get a dialog over dropouts.
Playing back when this is coming - i get serious crackles.
I tried increase asio buffer size - no difference.
Asio Guard on - much lower peak meter idling - but red peak comes either way.
I ran 32-bit engine, and tried 64-bit no difference.
This never happends in Sonar, doing the same thing.
So certain things going on in system - affect Cubase audio more than other apps.
I have removed certain Check for updates in various software - Adobe something could cause this, not on the hour but 12 minutes after system startup. Turning that off that went away.
All that remains now is that hourly thingy - currently no clue what it is.
The hourly thing for me - comes exactly, looking in task manager and uptime - 2s after the hour every time, round the clock.
No network up.
There might be related to your stuff, don’t know - just shared the info.
Something seems overly sensitive in Cubase regarding this.
In Sonar I never hear a pop.
Next step for me - is going back to Cubase 8 or 8.5 and see if the same.
My next crackles/peak comes in 13 minutes from now, got to go…
EDIT: No C8 is the same, but not sure if it runs on an engine from 2015 or current one.
I have had projects that used way more resources than they should.
I have simply made a new project and copied the parts over to it.
Exact same midi, audio and plugins used, and 1/4 of the resources now used.
Only suspicion I have, is a lot of variaudio and hitpoints where used on the original project.
So the solution is NOT, I repeat NOT to start an empty project and copy over the parts. What that does is copy the -problem-.
The solution is to:
open a GOOD WORKING CPR
Remove all tracks
Copy over all tracks from the offending CPR
…presto, changeo…
All the crackles are magically gone.
Why? I have no idea. I -have- had this happen before.
The really interesting thing is that Cubase will thoughtfully attempt to try to not only insert the events/tracks, but also the inserts and the sends. Alas, you lose yer automation, but it’s interesting that the code tries so hard to ‘correct’ the problem.
And I wish there was a way to put this solution somewhere findable, because I’m about 100% sure this issue -will- afflict some other poor sap.
So maybe a corrupt cpr, that it doesn’t work with an empty project is strange.
Maybe the cpr gets fragmented in some way internally, nothing a User really can analyze.
Glad you got it sorted, making a mental note for next time it happens to me.