Mark Robinson wrote:
Hi Serge,

If you are using SX3, there is no need to use any of the funky UAD delay
comp plugins. Cubase now handles this automatically. However, automatic
delay comp will do nothing to help your real time monitoring problem. When
monitoring in real time with a CPU based effect (be it on a UAD or a native
VST plugin) or instrument, the audio must pass through the plugin and any
buffer it contains. Delay comp is used only on tracks that have been
previously recorded to assure that everything lines up. On modern DAW
programs, that get a bit complicated because of group channels, sends,
inserts, and busses. Effects can appear on any of them and they all have
different processing delays. Cubase has to keep track of all of the
pathways and make decisions about how to delay each of the streams of data
so that they are properly aligned at playback.

There should no issues using external MIDI as long as you have a decent
interface. MIDI events will be output by Cubase at the correct time just as
audio is. Keep in mind that MIDI being a serial data stream at a relatively
low baud rate has inherent delays that cannot be avoided. It takes almost
1ms to send a single note on command to a MIDI synth. If you play a 10 note
chord, MIDI cannot sound all of the notes at he same time. The skew will be
nearly 10ms. VSTi's have a big advantage here because the internal data
flows to the instrument at a very high speed. Playing them in real time
however, can be problematic due to the ASIO buffer and any internal
processing time.

If you are interested in the UAD-1, why not see if your local dealer will
let you try it out on your system. Since it is a hardware device, I would
expect that it would be returnable.

Mark


Hi Mark,

Thanks for the reply, it clarifies a lot and syncs up with the bits and
pieces of info I managed to find on Google. It appears that as of
version 3.1, Cubase SX automatically compensates for MIDI output latency
as well:

"MIDI Output Delay Compensation for External Instruments: MIDI output
delay compensation means that proper timing is maintained even when
using external MIDI instruments that are mixed through the VST audio mixer."

So this seems to solve my monitoring issue. Your tryout idea sounds good
- I think I will simply purchase an UAD-1 Project Pak from Swee****er
and see if it works for me - they have a 30-day return policy after all.

Cheers,
Serge