User manual

27
VST Connections
Setting up busses
Setting up busses
Cubase uses a system of input and output busses to transfer audio between the
program and the audio hardware.
- Input busses let you route audio from the inputs on your audio hardware into the
program. This means that when you record audio, you will always do this through
one or several input busses.
- Output busses let you route audio from the program to the outputs on your audio
hardware. When you play back audio, you will always do this through one or
several output busses.
Once you understand the bus system and know how to set up the busses properly, it
will be easy to go on with recording, playing back, mixing, and doing surround work
(Cubase only).
Strategies
The bus configuration is saved with the project – therefore it is a good idea to add and
set up the busses you need and save these in a template project (see
“Save as
Template” on page 58).
When you start working on new projects, you start from this template. That way you
get your standard bus configuration without having to make new bus settings for each
new project. If you need to work with different bus configurations in different projects,
you can either create several different templates or save your configurations as
presets (see
“Presets” on page 31). The templates can of course also contain other
settings that you regularly use – sample rate, record format, a basic track layout, etc.
So, which type of busses do you need? This depends on your audio hardware, your
general audio setup (e.
g. surround speaker setup) and what kind of projects you work
with.
Let’s say you are using audio hardware with eight analog inputs and outputs and
digital stereo connections (10 inputs and outputs all in all). Furthermore, you work
with a surround setup in 5.1 format (Cubase only). In this scenario, you may want to
add the following busses:
Input busses
- Most likely you need at least one stereo input bus assigned to an analog input pair.
This will let you record stereo material. If you want to be able to record in stereo
from other analog input pairs as well, you add stereo input busses for these, too.
- Although you can record mono tracks from one side of a stereo input, it may be a
good idea to add a dedicated mono input bus. This can be assigned to an analog
input to which you have connected a dedicated microphone pre-amp, for example.
Again, you can have several different mono busses.
- You probably want a dedicated stereo input bus assigned to the digital stereo
input, for digital transfers.
- Cubase only: If you want to transfer surround material directly to a surround track,
e.
g. from surround-configured location recording equipment, you need an input
bus in that surround format – in this example, this will be a 5.1 input bus.
Output busses
- You probably want one or several stereo output busses for monitoring and
listening to stereo mixes.
- For digital transfers, you need a stereo bus assigned to the digital stereo output as
well.