Hi everyone,

Until now I used the MOXF-VST in combination with Cubase. Looking back I think it was a ‘lucky hit’ to get the communication between my MOX and my PC working. I never bothered to check everything cause it all seemed to work. To make a long story short:

I’m trying to use the Steinberg VST (HALion) next to my MOXF-VST. When I start Cubase the Hub always comes up with a MOXF preset witch I choose to start a new project. This directly loads the tracks and the MOXF-Vst interface.

Now when I try to add a new Midi-track and select the HALion-vst the interface shows and the leds show there is Midi-activity. But there is no sound, except from the tracks assigned to the MOX-vst.

I checked and adjusted (as good as I can) the in- and output of the channels but didn’t see strange settings.
Note: When I start a new project I always (automatically / manually) select “VST” in the interface because otherwise I hear the default piano-sound of the MOX together with the (other) sound on the VST tracks. I think the Moxf is sending a Midi ánd analogue signal to My Pc.

When I start the HALion as a “stand-alone” Vst (not using Cubase) I hear al the instruments from the HALion Vst. I already (also) searched on the Motifator and Cubase forums but a solution but my problem seems “somewhere in between” possible causes.

Greetz,

Ed

Hi Ed S,

Welcome to the forum.

You don’t need the MOXF Editor at all to play a VST instrument such as HALion inside Cubase. As long as you have a MIDI connection either via USB or 5 pin DIN, you should be good to go.

You do however need to create an instrument track in your project to use HALion on, as opposed to a MIDI track, which is for external MIDI gear.

All DAWs will either let you choose instrument tracks for soft synths such as HALion, Nexus, Omnisphere etc (synth plugins if you like) or MIDI tracks for external MIDI gear such as hardware synths, modules and drum machines.

An instrument track is basically a MIDI track for virtual instruments.

If you continue to hear sounds from your MOXF after you’ve created an instrument track, your MIDI Local Control is probably set to ON, you’ll need to set it to OFF for use with a DAW:

Press the [UTILITY] button.

Press button [F6] for “MIDI”.

Press the [SF6] button for “SWITCH”.

Using the cursor buttons select the “LocalCtrl” parameter and press the [DEC] button to it turn off.

You might want to press STORE otherwise it will be set back to ON the next time you power up.

(Don’t forget to turn it back to ON again when you wish to play your MOXF standalone).

Hi Philwoodmusic (Phil?),

Thanks for welcoming me and your quick reply.

Your reply makes a lot of cense to me. I really had no idea it worked like that. Things are beginning to fall into place now :-)

But...the problem remains: I took the following steps

1: I checked if my MOXF is acting as a Midi instrument following the steps you advised. (B.t.w. button SF6 should be button SF2 I hope) SF2 was the one to alter the “switch” settings.
My MOXF was already set to “LocalCtrl” so I didn’t alter the settings.

2: Opened Cubase and started an empty template

3: I created 2 Instrument-tracks. The first one to use the HALion VST and the second one I assigned to the MOXF.
Both tracks showed Midi-activity in the transport-bar. The Led indicated it.

The HALion still did not play any instrument sound. I checked the channel-settings but I’m a beginning user so that’s where my knowledge ends ;-)

The MOXF however played all the instruments normally (I was surprised but happy to see I start to learn something already).

Greetz,
Ed

Click thumbnail to see full-size image

Are you using the MOXF as your audio output interface - i.e., to listen to the audio from Cubase?

From your MOXF editor window I can see that you are using “direct monitor” for the MOXF so that will definitely sound as you are hearing the audio direct from the MOXF, and not through via Cubase and back again to the MOXF (if you are using the MOXF as your output audio interface).

A few obvious things to try, assuming you are using the MOXF as your audio output interface:

- (The most obvious first) The “DAW level” slider on your MOXF. Is this turned up? If not, and you turn it up, do you then hear sound from Halion via Cubase?

- If not, then we need to debug your audio outputs. Can you post what you see under Devices -> VST connections in Cubase?

There also doesn’t appear to be a MOXF audio and automation lane in your track list. Why is that, do you know? How are you currently using the MOXF VST?

Hi Davelet,

I’m not sure if I use the Moxf as an audio interface, this must sound stupid. I can only hear my Moxf if Cubase is active. And when I start HALion as a stand alone application I also hear the sound (from the HALion)when I play my Moxf.

But, also some good news already: Like you suggested I checked the level of the DAW-slide. It was indeed set to ‘zero’. When I moved it I could hear the sound of the HALion-Vst but only when I played the virtual keys with my mouse on the screen, so it didn’t respond to the keys I played on the Moxf.

The first instrument track (Moxf-Vst) played without trouble when I used my Moxf keys.

To respond to your second question I made some screenshots of my current connections (input and output).

My answer to your last question: I installed the Moxf-Vst so whenever Cubase starts I get to see a Pre-setup in the Cubase-Hub. I choose one of these (two) to startup Cubase. This way I can use the Moxf directly. Because it always worked I never bothered to dive in to the other (channel, port and in/output) settings.

Thanks very much for your response,

Ed

P.s. I just found out: After creating 3 ins-tracks with different VST’s. When I “Export audio Mixdown” only the audio of the MOXF seems to be recorded, while the composition in Cubase records- and plays all the VST’s.

Click thumbnail to see full-size image

Ed S,

Like Davelet, I’m curious about some of the settings you may or may not be using with regard to how audio and MIDI is routed in your set up. 

I fear we could be playing an endless game of “look for the incorrect setting”.  So, it would make a lot of sense for you to do a factory reset on your MOXF, being sure to back up anything you wish to keep first, by saving an ALL file to a thumb drive.

http://faq.yamaha.com/us/en/article/music-production/synthesizers/mox_series/mox6/5812/6458/

Once that is done you can use a Quick Setup from the various choices on the MOXF and you should find that a lot easier.

This article covers the various Quick Set ups.

http://www.motifator.com/index.php/support/view/mox6_mox8_and_your_computer_a_getting_started_guide

Also, if pushing the DAW level slider up results in you being able to hear HALion, then you are most definitely using your MOXF as an audio interface for Cubase.  Your screenshots also confirm this.

OK, well I’m glad the obvious suggestion of turning up the DAW level slider gave you sound from HALion. I felt a bit bad asking you about that in case it was patronising, but thought worth checking as it had me scratching my head for a long time when I got my MOXF.

Let’s try something else basic. You say HALion doesn’t respond to the MOXF keys. You have selected the HALion track, haven’t you? I.e., it’s highlighted in light grey (like the MOXF one is in the screenshots you give). Only the highlighted track will play “from” Cubase.

You want to be in a situation where when you highlight the MOXF track, only the MOXF plays, and when you highlight the HALion track, only HALion plays. If that’s not the case then we need to do some further debugging on your MIDI inputs.

David.

Hi Guys, thanks for your help!

@Davelet: Don’t worry I’m not easy patrionizable (new word) as I’m just beginning with Midi, Cubase and getting a bit dizzy reading all these new words (Ports, channels, gain, Vst, DAW etc.). With a “little” help I’ll get there.

@Phil: I didn’t (yet) reset my Moxf to factory-setting because I think we’re making progress here. If I should be necessary it won’t be a problem cause I didn’t make any changes besides maybe the Setups. But at least it seems to communicate with Cubase now.

Update: I’ve loaded 3 Vst’s (MOXF, HALion SE and Symp Orchestra). All tracks are responding (and playing the selected instrument using the keys on my Moxf). I can also switch between the VST’s and select them. So I think that’s good news.
One (the most important) problem remains…

I appear to have an Input source (being the MOXF). I plays the sounds from the different VST’s. I can hear the 3 music-tracks, I can record them ánd play it back. But when I choose “Export to audio mixdown” I don’t hear anything although I’m sure the recording is being made. When I open the wav-file I can hear the recorded music. This is an example of me being flabbergasted.
How (and why) can I hear all three recorded VST’s, when I probably have the output-channels not set right. Feel free to ‘Patronize me’ 😉

Then some (off topic) bad news: My pc is (busy with crashing as we speak. My explorer is corrupt so I’ll have to re-install Windows-10 (hope I can keep my files and settings). Also today I bought and downloaded the HALion 3 (full version) from the Steinberg shop. But I’ll have to be a bit patient before I can install it. Installing Win-10 is gonna take a couple of hours I think.

Thanks again for your advise!

Ed

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But when I choose “Export to audio mixdown” I don’t hear anything although I’m sure the recording is being made. When I open the wav-file I can hear the recorded music.

Cubase, like many DAWs offers Real Time and Offline exporting.

When you export in real time, you will hear the audio as it renders an audio file, and the export will take as long as your project or selection lasts.

When you are using offline export, you will not hear it exporting, but it will export faster and render an audio file, just as you have found out.

You will see a Real Time Export tick box in the File > Export > Audio Mixdown window.

It could be that you are currently set up to export offline.  I may be wrong though.

Hi Phil,

If I try to export “offline” I get an error message so I always have to export Online.

Remark: When I record a (video) Cubase recording using the keys Win+G or other video-capturing software it only records / captures the Video and not the audio.

If you want I can send you a link to my YT channel to show you how I record my music (I have to synchronize the Video and the audio separately).

Pfff, my English isn’t getting any better then this ;-)

Attached a screenshot of the error I get.

Click thumbnail to see full-size image

Great! You are making progress.

If you are exporting with the MOXF connected and using the MOXF sounds you always have to export in realtime, so the error you see when you try not to do so is correct - so don’t worry about that.

I personally have *never* been able to listen to the audio while exporting in realtime (Cubase 9 here) with the “monitor audio” slider turned up. I just gave up worrying about it.

So, if you are willing to accept that (as I am) then you are all setup OK!

David.

Guess your kind of right here David.

After all, I can play the VST’s and record them and that was the most important thing.
So, time to close this Topic and mark it as ‘solved’.

I wanna thank you and Phil for your help the past days. And maybe well meet again in another topic.

Kind regards ;-)

Ed

No worries, I think Davelet helped you more than I did.

Glad you got to where you wanted.

Glad you got it sorted. If you ever do work out how to hear the audio while exporting to audio mixdown let me know. We’re both using Windows 10 and the latest Cubase version so maybe it’s a bug. As long as the resulting wav/mp3 is fine then I’d live with it.

David.