# Cubase is recording midi early



## tim727 (Dec 27, 2019)

For the last year now Cubase has been recording midi early. When I'm recording everything sounds perfectly timed but when I play it back it will be something like 45ms early. Research has suggested that other users have experienced this issue over the years and seemingly many have had trouble resolving it (myself included). This issue is driving me absolutely nuts and I'm starting to consider whether lowering my latency could at least help ameliorate the problem. 

When I go to device manager in Cubase it shows that both my input latency and my output latency are 20ms, making my total latency 40ms. Is this an excessive amount for the purposes of midi recording using VSTs? I'm using my mobo's onboard sound so I'm wondering if purchasing a dedicated audio interface/sound card could help.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!


----------



## Piano Pete (Dec 27, 2019)

I had issues with this before in the past. I made a midi logical editor preset that adds the offset to the recorded midi to counteract how Cubase handles latency--especially with the metronome. I really noticed this when I started recording along with the metronome in 8.5, rather than recording along with the percussion or other music tracks. 

I observed if I played along with a kick on the quarter, based on the sound, I did not have to use the macro as I do when I used the metronome. I spoke with Steinberg support awhile ago. Unfortunately, this annoying feature is built into the DAW, so there is that.

Note this macro offsets Cubase's internal offset when a project's sample rate is 48khz. 

Hope this solves your problem. It drove me nuts.

-----------

Midi Logical Preset:

Type is equal to note (or other midi data that you want. I noticed midi cc was fine, so I just adjusted the note position)

Position Add 2784 Samples.

Transform


----------



## Polkasound (Dec 27, 2019)

I've been dealing with this since I first bought Cubase in 2013. I've tried _every_ solution suggested and adjusted every setting there is. Nothing made a difference, so I learned to live with it.


----------



## Jdiggity1 (Dec 27, 2019)

For me it was fixed by turning this off: ASIO Latency Compensation






HOWEVER, it does not fix it for retrospective record, only real-time recording.


----------



## shomynik (Dec 27, 2019)

Are you all on Windows?
People are experiencing vastly different things with midi timing in Cubase. I have the Cubase latency compensation activated and I don't have any problems with normal recording, but I'm getting early notes with retrospective record.

I wonder if it's actually a Windows problem.


----------



## brek (Dec 27, 2019)

shomynik said:


> Are you all on Windows?
> People are experiencing vastly different things with midi timing in Cubase. I have the Cubase latency compensation activated and I don't have any problems with normal recording, but I'm getting early notes with retrospective record.
> 
> I wonder if it's actually a Windows problem.


Nope, issue for me on a Mac.


----------



## shomynik (Dec 27, 2019)

brek said:


> Nope, issue for me on a Mac.


Oh, ok, good to know. Thanks.


----------



## Sample Fuel (Dec 29, 2019)

Jdiggity1 said:


> For me it was fixed by turning this off: ASIO Latency Compensation
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I think 10.5 has this working correctly with retrospective record for me. I brought this up to Steinberg and they told me it should have been working correctly since 9.5....for me it did not work right until 10.5.


----------



## tim727 (Dec 30, 2019)

Piano Pete said:


> I had issues with this before in the past. I made a midi logical editor preset that adds the offset to the recorded midi to counteract how Cubase handles latency--especially with the metronome. I really noticed this when I started recording along with the metronome in 8.5, rather than recording along with the percussion or other music tracks.
> 
> I observed if I played along with a kick on the quarter, based on the sound, I did not have to use the macro as I do when I used the metronome. I spoke with Steinberg support awhile ago. Unfortunately, this annoying feature is built into the DAW, so there is that.
> 
> ...



As a workaround I've been adding a positive midi offset on individual tracks...so I guess this would essentially do the same thing? Will this make the adjustments automatically or do I have to "execute" the macro on a set of midi manually after every time I record? If it does it automatically then this might be a better workaround then what I'm currently doing.


----------



## xanderscores (Dec 31, 2019)

I just wanted to chime in on this. I'm living with this weird offset problem (notes being recorded too early) for years and I already wasted so much time quantizing phrases to the beat. I suppose it's a problem that many people have but few realize, because you have 1. to be quite an exact keyboard player, 2. relying on live-recorded phrases and 3. use the click metronome.


----------



## Tfis (Dec 31, 2019)

Solving MIDI Timing Problems


Early notes, late notes, stacked notes... There's a range of problems that could stem from MIDI timing issues — but fortunately we have solutions to offer.




www.soundonsound.com





Did you try this?


----------



## tim727 (Jan 6, 2020)

Tfis said:


> Solving MIDI Timing Problems
> 
> 
> Early notes, late notes, stacked notes... There's a range of problems that could stem from MIDI timing issues — but fortunately we have solutions to offer.
> ...



I didn't try the "tests" suggested in the article, but I've tried every combination of midi ports/system timestamp and all suffer from the same problem. For some people one of those combinations solves the issue ... but not in my case sadly.


----------



## gennadij (Jan 8, 2020)

I made my own "lateclick" to compensate.


----------

