# Presonus Studio One Pro 4



## AMAROK13 (Nov 14, 2018)

What do you think of this Daw?

Handling, ergonomics, its best assets, what is missing?

Is he a good Daw to compose electronic music (Trance / Edm)?


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## chibear (Nov 15, 2018)

Just auditioning Prime for the past few days before I make the jump to spending $ on Pro. So far running Windows 7:

Pro's
Very intuitive interface and workflow. I watched 1 video and was off writing.
The browser for adding instruments, fx, loops, etc. Maybe no more templates?
Tempo track works better than expected.
Looping feature is more intuitive than any I've tried
Very good MIDI editing tools except as stated below.
Really fun to use.

Cons:
Consistant crashes if I try to change from 44.1 to 48khz in any way. Need to do a cold boot on computer to get program to work again.

Automation lines can be curved by grabbing a center node (a good thing), but the curving algorithm behaves in a bizarre manner, not allowing the curve to go above the start point. Can be kind of worked around by using 2 lines, but a pain. A need for a real spline curve.

Conclusion:
If I can find a solution to the first con, will probably buy.


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## samphony (Nov 15, 2018)

AMAROK13 said:


> What do you think of this Daw?
> 
> Handling, ergonomics, its best assets, what is missing?
> 
> Is he a good Daw to compose electronic music (Trance / Edm)?


Although I’m a Logic Pro guy I also use S1 since V1.6 and it is especially great for production. It has a fast workflow and if you are not trying to compare it to something like Logic or Cubase etc then I can highly recommend it. A lot of people around me use Ableton Live or Bitwig Studio for your type of music. I personally think you can create any type of music with any DAW. It’s just a matter of personal preference and workflow.


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## AMAROK13 (Nov 15, 2018)

Thank you for your answers.

I use for now Fl Studio 20 and even, if an excellent Daw, I do not stick.

I will never do live, even if Bitwig I like it, not sure it will be useful for Home Studio use.

Bitwig has a bit the same philosphy as Ableton, more for the Live, Launching audio clips.

I only use Vst and samples, so I'm looking for a Daw with good ergonomics of work, intuitive and effective.

Studio One 4, seems to fill the void, compared to a current music utilsation, a great thing.


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## muziksculp (Nov 19, 2018)




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## al_net77 (Nov 19, 2018)

I've switched from Cubase to Studio One and no regret. The only missing part, for my kind of work, is expression maps.
BTW, Studio One does have a deal right now


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## Dewdman42 (Nov 19, 2018)

how are people handling articulation management with studio one?


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## al_net77 (Nov 19, 2018)

In the MIDI editor window there is a "Drum mode" where you can assign labels to notes and recall the preset as you need. A bit unconfortable but better then nothing.


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## JPQ (Nov 19, 2018)

How well this works with hardware synths? looks like must discontinue logic use (suitable new mac mini is too pricey) and change to pc side with this or Cubase. Notaiton is one thing what itihnk Cubase and naotehr is Retrologue.


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## kitekrazy (Nov 19, 2018)

al_net77 said:


> I've switched from Cubase to Studio One and no regret. The only missing part, for my kind of work, is expression maps.
> BTW, Studio One does have a deal right now



The upgrade was under $70.


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## chibear (Nov 19, 2018)

al_net77 said:


> BTW, Studio One does have a deal right now



Ha! That makes my decision quite a bit easier


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## EgM (Nov 21, 2018)

I upgraded from Studio One Pro 3 to 4, I kinda forgot about it since I was mainly using Cubase Pro 9.5 since last year.

I gotta say, there's something about S1 that's special! Something about C9.5 doesn't feel right to me, the whole choppy UI while scrolling in play, plugin windows not following VEP - S1 does all this and fast!

Also, S1's presets are 300% faster than C9.5's dumb track preset window - it needs a complete rewrite!

I love C9.5 and it's in my opinion the most advanced DAW regarding MIDI but I'm almost prepared to sacrifice those features for S1's ease of use and smooth operation.

Edit: Also, Steinberg has no support whatsoever :(


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## AMAROK13 (Nov 21, 2018)

Studio One Pro 4 seems to have an excellent evolution and is becoming more and more interesting and full of tools for the production of electronic music, there is still some way to go, but Presonus delights me with this choice and I hope it do not stop there.

What is missing is the integration of a loop system like Acid and if improvements to the existing products of Studio One Pro 4, it could become a must.

A classic Daw and a sequencer of loops, linked to a system of launching clips like Live / Bitwig, a perfect hybridization. It could be the best Daw, all in one.

Presonus if you hear me


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## InLight-Tone (Nov 21, 2018)

AMAROK13 said:


> Studio One Pro 4 seems to have an excellent evolution and is becoming more and more interesting and full of tools for the production of electronic music, there is still some way to go, but Presonus delights me with this choice and I hope it do not stop there.
> 
> What is missing is the integration of a loop system like Acid and if improvements to the existing products of Studio One Pro 4, it could become a must.
> 
> ...


You could buy Maschine Jam and use Studio One with it and be done with it...


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## jbuhler (Nov 21, 2018)

I find Studio One excellent for arranging songs, moving sections around, using the sketchpad for keeping track of variants and moving things in and out of the song. I have not been able to find a good work flow for midi editing however. 

It may be that I haven't spent enough time to get it set up properly, but adding lanes for editing cc data is a pain and it often changes the lanes that are visible from the ones I set. It also thinks it knows better than I do what resolution I want to view the piano roll in, and so I'm constantly having to reset that. It also crashes about 80% of the time when I close the song if the song has a Kontakt instance in it. Because this bug always appears on close (and after save) it's not a major problem, but I do have to force close the program.


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## elpedro (Nov 22, 2018)

Downloaded the Studio one demo,was comfy with the workflow after 5 minutes, bought the license. So much for not going to buy anything this Black Friday! Still love my Cubase, but I do enjoy different workflows for different types of arrangements. I got to say that S1 feels like an agile athlete, whereas Cubase feels a bit more like me, older, a bit round in the middle, and a lot slower....


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## jonathanwright (Nov 22, 2018)

EgM said:


> I upgraded from Studio One Pro 3 to 4, I kinda forgot about it since I was mainly using Cubase Pro 9.5 since last year.
> 
> I gotta say, there's something about S1 that's special! Something about C9.5 doesn't feel right to me, the whole choppy UI while scrolling in play, plugin windows not following VEP - S1 does all this and fast!
> 
> ...



I find Studio One's track preset system (for regular instrument presets) second to none workflow wise.

Being able to select several presets at the same time and drag them into the project window is an incredibly fast way to work. I have several folders (such as 'orchestral', or 'hybrid orchestral') that contain a selection of appropriate presets, so I can just drag the whole lot into my project and it's ready to go.

No need for templates at all.

Plus, I use the ability to assign key commands to insert presets a lot. I can select a bunch of tracks, hit my key command for High Pass EQ at 200hz and it's instant. Likewise with FX chains.


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## elpedro (Nov 23, 2018)

After playing around with S1 for a whole day, I’m still impressed.The IPad app is FREE, (Steinberg charges for theirs!) and works really well, handy workflow enhancement. Being somewhat theory deficient myself, I must say the harmonic tools in Cubase are still better than S1. For me the Cubase chord track and pads are more flexible.I think that gap will close in the near future.


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## jonathanwright (Nov 23, 2018)

elpedro said:


> After playing around with S1 for a whole day, I’m still impressed.The IPad app is FREE, (Steinberg charges for theirs!) and works really well, handy workflow enhancement. Being somewhat theory deficient myself, I must say the harmonic tools in Cubase are still better than S1. For me the Cubase chord track and pads are more flexible.I think that gap will close in the near future.



If you haven't already, it's worth looking into creating Macros, they're a huge timesaver, especially being able to add a button to the toolbar.


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## Lukas (Nov 27, 2018)

I changed from Cubase to Studio One in 2010 and will never go back. For me it's much more intuitive and I get faster results because everything is where I expect it to be and basic things like creating instrument tracks with an channelstrip preset (that's called "Instrument+FX" preset in S1), combination patches (layers and splits with only one part in the arrangement) or multi part MIDI editing are really fun to work with. No matter if electronic music or virtual orchestral stuff.

At the beginning I really missed a lot of features especially in the MIDI editing area as well as some convenience functions like track/channel relationships, MIDI note filters, a legato tool for notes, tempo mapping. With V4 almost all of the functionality I've always been waiting for is there. Especially MIDI editing (arranging different events in one view, zooming options) has been highly improved. So, yes, I'd definitely recommend it for composing.



jonathanwright said:


> If you haven't already, it's worth looking into creating Macros, they're a huge timesaver, especially being able to add a button to the toolbar.


Absolutely. The macro bar is one of my favorite tools in S1, e.g. in combination with the new MIDI selection tools.


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## SolarCell (Nov 27, 2018)

I like what see about Studio One, but too late for the BF deal...


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## elpedro (Nov 27, 2018)

SolarCell said:


> I like what see about Studio One, but too late for the BF deal...


No doubt there will be a Christmas deal.


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## lucor (Nov 28, 2018)

How does Studio One handle really big disabled templates? With say 3000+ tracks?


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## MarcusD (Nov 28, 2018)

Tried the demo out, seems like a decent DAW. Far as I can tell there's no feature for building templates, batch renaming or anything for importing pre-made multi tracks? Would be nice to see. One to keep an eye on.


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## SolarCell (Nov 28, 2018)

Found it for half of the price on here: https://www.soundsupplies.nl/Presonus-Studio-One-Pro-4 
Like Lucor (two posts above) I'm curious if it works like Cubases track enabled/disabled template. I'm on Logic now, but really want to switch and Studio One apparently seem to offer the best of both DAW's? Maybe some users can tell more about it?


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## DS_Joost (Nov 28, 2018)

lucor said:


> How does Studio One handle really big disabled templates? With say 3000+ tracks?



Simple answer: nope.

More elaborate answer: nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope... I think you get the point.

Actually useful answer: Studio One doesn't yet handle these large complex templates... because that isn't what it's build to be. It's build as a lean, slim DAW, kind of like a simplified (but no less capable) alternative to Cubase, Logic, Pro Tools, etc.

So, you can't build these big templates as you used to. So what can you do? Use track templates, or divide your orchestras up into projects that you can save, from which you can import tracks from the browser. Sounds strange and unwieldy? It isn't. Not at all. It's just as fast, and just as convenient. Simply put, using track presets, you can literally press a key command to open the browser, another one to open search, type in what you need, press down, enter and boom! Track created. You can even import multiple tracks at once. Simple and easy, and you don't even have to use the mouse to do so. It seriously is a really handy way to do so.

Studio One doesn't handle itself well with 100s of tracks. But using this method, which was clearly thought about, it doesn't have to. One isn't better than the other, it's just a different workflow. Both get you there, and in my opinion, just as easily. With Studio One's method, however, there is less chance of corrupted templates, and in a worst case scenario, less chance of having to rebuild the entire thing.

I think the philosophy behind Studio One is that the world of composing is changing from big, bulky setups to something more lean and flexible, and more portable. I, for one, welcome that change. It can still do heavy duty stuff, but just in a different way. I like the change. Don't put off by it; it's a very capable DAW that I use daily, and professionally without any hiccups. I've never had a crash, never a corrupted project, never any trouble with anything. Smooth sailing. I just had to adjust to not having a humongous template, but like I said, I don't need it, and frankly, really don't miss it. I have everything ready to import from the browser in a snap, which is IMO just as good.

Jonathan Wright from this very forum has a great article on this, must read material for Studio One users:

http://www.jonathanwrightmusic.com/studio-one-instrument-presets-large-orchestral-projects/


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## jonathanwright (Nov 28, 2018)

ITA. When I first used Studio One I tried to set up massive templates and force it to work like Logic/Cubase, but that isn't where its strengths lie.

I've found http://www.jonathanwrightmusic.com/studio-one-instrument-presets-large-orchestral-projects/ (setting up track presets), as well as assigning key commands for adding my most used insert presets means I can work incredibly fast and intuitively, quickly adding instruments as I go. Which ends up keeping track counts lean and manageable.

That said, I've worked on some pretty hefty projects in S1, with track counts in the 100's and haven't had any issues.

I use a template set up with routing and bus tracks etc, so that's all ready to go when I fire up a new project.

The one thing I miss at the moment is built in articulation mapping.

As with anything though, it depends on your preferred workflow. I've always found I work better with a 'build as you go' or a 'modular' composing process.


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## GtrString (Nov 28, 2018)

For electronic music I would go with Ableton Live. It is made for that.
I changed to Studio One for that very reason (I dont make electronic music)..


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## wst3 (Nov 28, 2018)

I'm working on a hybrid approach - although it feels, sometimes, like I'll never get there<G>!

When Sonar was my only DAW I used track templates - these not only populated the project with tracks, but they would open the associated plugins and pull in the associated presets. Click on "Orchestra Brass" and I get two instances of Kontakt loaded with my favorite brass libraries, and all the necessary audio and MIDI tracks, with all the necessary sends already assigned.

Doing so also gave me time to get a cup of coffee - so it wasn't perfect.

So I bought VEPro, set up all the instances of Kontakt I'd likely need, loaded them purged, and reconfigured the track templates so they connected to existing instances instead of opening them. Much faster - when it worked. I never did get all the wrinkles ironed out.

At which point Gibson shut down Cakewalk, and having owned orphans before (still have an Amiga 3000) I switched to Studio One after evaluating the trials of Studio One, Cubase, and Digital Performer. DP v8 was not stable, and I've just never really been able to wrap my head around Cubase work-flow, so I ended up with Studio One, and for the most part I'm pretty happy with it. Their approach to track templates is similar, and yet different. I started out using the VEPro configuration I was using in Sonar, but have since decided I really need to start from scratch. And I'm just to lazy/unmotivated/busy to jump into that now<G>.

And DP V9 seems to have solved the stability issues, still has the tiny font, but other than that it has been behaving well. There are things I like about DP, and things I like about Studio One. And I am tempted to try the new Cakewalk by Bandlab (or whatever it's called), although I am concerned that their business model could flounder. (Why do I have to worry about a developers business model???)

For most of what I do I find Studio One to be the best alternative on Windows. Today. Subject to change at any time<G>!


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## Lukas (Nov 28, 2018)

I agree with most things that were said about template work in Studio One. There is a "Disable/enable Track" command since Studio One 3.3 which allows to create as many tracks/instruments as you want and then just disable them. I had used this workflow with about 100-150 tracks and did not have any issues with this approach.

I tested it with 500 tracks and it didn't work well on my system. So there's obviously some room for optimization in S1. Fortunately I already had decided to work with the preset workflow that jonathan has described in his great article. I even extended it by creating a Musicloop library for many different strings, woodwinds, brass, percussion sounds and many synth patches. Musicloop is a Studio One container format which includes an instrument preset (similar to a VSTi preset), the performance (note data, similar to MIDI), a set of insert FXs and a FLAC file which contains the audio mixdown of the phrase in the Musicloop. This means, I can take a complete track with an instrument and insert FX, play some phrases with a special sound and then export this phrase a Musicloop. This way I can create a bunch of custom presets from a specific VSTi (or a KONTAKT patch) and because there is a mixdown included, I can browse through the different Musicloops in the Studio One browser and listen to each sound without needing to load the whole patch. If I found a sound I like, I can just drag the Musicloop into the arrangement and the original track + instrument + FX will be loaded.

Pretty easy and comfortable if you've categorized them into a folder structur.


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## rrichard63 (Nov 28, 2018)

JPQ said:


> ... Notation is one thing what I think Cubase [has] ...


For notation, Studio One Pro integrates with Presonus Notion, which costs $150 separately or adds $50 to the price of Studio One Pro if you buy them in a bundle. There are both advantages and disadvantages to this arrangement. Notion is pretty good -- it's not Sibelius but it's a lot more than you can squeeze into a DAW. The degree of integration isn't perfect, but does offer the advantage of doing notation in a real notation program.


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## JPQ (Nov 30, 2018)

rrichard63 said:


> For notation, Studio One Pro integrates with Presonus Notion, which costs $150 separately or adds $50 to the price of Studio One Pro if you buy them in a bundle. There are both advantages and disadvantages to this arrangement. Notion is pretty good -- it's not Sibelius but it's a lot more than you can squeeze into a DAW. The degree of integration isn't perfect, but does offer the advantage of doing notation in a real notation program.



Indeed and Logic has nice notation. btw i dont like how Sibelius works but Finale is fine. and to me is not much problem very likely never reeal musicans going pla my music learning instrument and palyers limits is also hard i dont know much these things and is hard see book which tells how often for example trumpet player must breath etc.


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## axb312 (Nov 30, 2018)

I upgraded to S1 V4 recently. And am now trying reaper.

CPU usage is much better with reaper. Yes, the UI is a bit clunky, but I'm finding that it can do almost everything you want it to. And the keyboard shortcuts are worth looking into.

It also has track presets like S1.

I would suggest you give Reaper a shot. S1 is a little screwed up in terms of CPU consumption (comparatively).


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## Zoot_Rollo (Nov 30, 2018)

axb312 said:


> I upgraded to S1 V4 recently. And am now trying reaper.
> 
> CPU usage is much better with reaper. Yes, the UI is a bit clunky, but I'm finding that it can do almost everything you want it to. And the keyboard shortcuts are worth looking into.
> 
> ...



VEP 6 alleviates CPU munching in S1.

among other benefits.


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## chibear (Dec 4, 2018)

jonathanwright said:


> I find Studio One's track preset system (for regular instrument presets) second to none workflow wise.
> 
> Being able to select several presets at the same time and drag them into the project window is an incredibly fast way to work. I have several folders (such as 'orchestral', or 'hybrid orchestral') that contain a selection of appropriate presets, so I can just drag the whole lot into my project and it's ready to go.....


I'm in the process of moving over to S1 pro and loving it. I watched the video on the process you describe and tried it, putting all my Chris Hein winds into a preset. Kind of worked, BUT, the process failed to pick up any busses I had in the mix and also how do you deal with early reflections when using this procedure? I normally set my reverb on send or fx tracks representing different positions on the stage and then send the instruments to those to add my ERs. In the video I saw it at least it appears you have to put reverb on every track, even with the routing available in the multi. Am I missing something?


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## Phillip Dixon (Dec 4, 2018)

hey chibear where did you find video....
would like to view it .. cheers


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## jonathanwright (Dec 4, 2018)

chibear said:


> I'm in the process of moving over to S1 pro and loving it. I watched the video on the process you describe and tried it, putting all my Chris Hein winds into a preset. Kind of worked, BUT, the process failed to pick up any busses I had in the mix and also how do you deal with early reflections when using this procedure? I normally set my reverb on send or fx tracks representing different positions on the stage and then send the instruments to those to add my ERs. In the video I saw it at least it appears you have to put reverb on every track, even with the routing available in the multi. Am I missing something?



I haven't made a video, so I'm not sure what you've watched, but if I can help..

You're correct, using the S1 preset method means the individual instrument presets don't remember their bus assignments when dragged into the project. New instruments will be assigned to the master.

Depending on how you work, you can deal with this in a few ways.


*Build as you Go*
The 'build as you go' method would be to add your instruments, select all the tracks you want to create a bus/send for and then use the key commands to create the bus for all tracks selected, then use another key command to add your send presets (such as reverb) to the bus/fx tracks. Once you've the hang of how all that works, it's very fast indeed. Probably a bit too much work for larger orchestral projects though. Quite repetitive if a lot of your projects are similar.

*Routing Template*
Have a template set up with all of your bus tracks, FX sends and routings pre-configured. So when you add an instrument you can just route them where you want them, which takes a second. You would still need to add send FX and add any additional inserts though.

*Skeleton Instrument Track Template*
If you want a lot of instrument tracks already routed and set up with sends, inserts, EQ etc, but don't want the overhead of having instruments and samples loaded, you can create all the _empty_ instrument tracks you need (Track > Add Instrument Track, then duplicate), then route, color, name the tracks how you prefer. You then have a 'skeleton' of your strings, brass, etc, tracks ready to go. Then you can just drag the preset you want _on top of_ the existing instance, and the instrument will be loaded without affecting routing or any inserts placed on the track. The only caveat with this method is that the track won't automatically get the preset name. Using this method you could set up a huge template, then hide most of the empty instrument tracks until you need them.
Update: After a quick test, I notice method 3 doesn’t create a fader in the mixer unless an instrument is attached. So you would need to have an instance of an instrument on the track, just without samples loaded.


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## chibear (Dec 4, 2018)

jonathanwright said:


> I haven't made a video, so I'm not sure what you've watched, but if I can help..
> 
> You're correct, using the S1 preset method means the individual instrument presets don't remember their bus assignments when dragged into the project. New instruments will be assigned to the master.
> 
> ...


Thanks. I hadn't thought of starting with a routing template. For anyone else following, there are a couple of YouTube videos on this. Search Studio One saving presets.


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## Scalms (Sep 27, 2019)

jbuhler said:


> I find Studio One excellent for arranging songs, moving sections around, using the sketchpad for keeping track of variants and moving things in and out of the song. I have not been able to find a good work flow for midi editing however.
> 
> It may be that I haven't spent enough time to get it set up properly, but adding lanes for editing cc data is a pain and it often changes the lanes that are visible from the ones I set. It also thinks it knows better than I do what resolution I want to view the piano roll in, and so I'm constantly having to reset that. It also crashes about 80% of the time when I close the song if the song has a Kontakt instance in it. Because this bug always appears on close (and after save) it's not a major problem, but I do have to force close the program.



Hey jbuhler, just wanted to confirm if this crash is with Studio one 3 or 4? I experience the same-type crashes but with studio one 3. Wondering if the upgrade will help.


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## tabulius (Sep 27, 2019)

I too tried to build "The Mega Template" with S1 3.5 and realized - nope, not gonna happen. Comparing to Cubase, S1 becomes a slow, lagging mess. Cubase stays fluid even with 500+ or 800+ tracks. I did love the workflow and mixing features in S1 and would love to go back. This thread is great, awesome tips for different style of template building. I have to read the Jonathan Wright's article about this!

Any tips or ideas of recalling the instruments' sends and routing? Or is that still a manual labor? EDIT: Oh, I see this topic was already addressed.

I plan to upgrade to S1 v5 when that comes out and hopefully they have optimized some of that "lagginess" out.


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## jbuhler (Sep 29, 2019)

Scalms said:


> Hey jbuhler, just wanted to confirm if this crash is with Studio one 3 or 4? I experience the same-type crashes but with studio one 3. Wondering if the upgrade will help.


Still having crash on close issues with SO4. Also had some really nasty issues with corruption in scratch pads once the project grew large.


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## rrichard63 (Sep 29, 2019)

jbuhler said:


> Still having crash on close issues with SO4.


This is very common. It happens to me most of the time. Presonus has been aware of it for quite a while. As far as I know, it never corrupts any data, and that might explain why they never fix it.


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## flamestalker (Sep 30, 2019)

I'm using Studio One 4 with VEP7 and it works flawlessly.. all my instances are loaded on a slave PC and I'm connecting my Mac and PC using an ethernet. It can also work in a one-computer setup. 

In terms of articulations.. I'm using an LPD8 pad to change between my instruments in Kontakt.. for instruments with a bunch of separate articulations I'm setting up a multi in Kontakt and changing my 'Notes to Program Change' and switching it through program changes. (C-2 to PC 1, C#-2 to PC 2, etc), never had issues with articulations this way.


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## Lukas (Oct 4, 2019)

rrichard63 said:


> This is very common. It happens to me most of the time. Presonus has been aware of it for quite a while. As far as I know, it never corrupts any data, and that might explain why they never fix it.


There is no one "crash on close" problem. Crash on close can have many different causes. It can be either the DAW that causes a crash or - which is very common - a plugin that crashes while releasing memory and unloading. There were indeed some "crash on close" bugs in S1 some years ago (mostly in the V3 chapter) but all of the issues I'm aware of have been fixed. So are you really sure that it's a S1 problem and not a plugin that crashes? Did you send the crashlog to PreSonus and what did they say (because you say they have been aware of it)?


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## rrichard63 (Oct 5, 2019)

Lukas said:


> So are you really sure that it's a S1 problem and not a plugin that crashes?


Pretty sure, because other DAWs I use with the same plugins don't crash on closing.



Lukas said:


> Did you send the crashlog to PreSonus and what did they say ...


I have not reported this myself, because I have read in multiple places (including other threads on VI-Control) statements by other users who have reported it and had no resolution. Also because the problem is, as far as I know, essentially cosmetic.


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## Lukas (Oct 5, 2019)

rrichard63 said:


> Pretty sure, because other DAWs I use with the same plugins don't crash on closing.


Okay, that doesn't mean anything. A VST plugin crashing in Studio One but not crashing in Cubase does not necessarily mean that it's not a plugin issue.



rrichard63 said:


> I have not reported this myself, because I have read in multiple places (including other threads on VI-Control) statements by other users who have reported it and had no resolution. Also because the problem is, as far as I know, essentially cosmetic.


Okay. So that means what you said is just assumptions  You can't compare this kind of issue with issues of other poeples with other plugins and other hardware and other OS and other settings. It's more complicated. If you're really interested in solving your problem, check WHEN it crashes and submit a crash dump. Is it only on program close or also if you just close a song?


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## rrichard63 (Oct 5, 2019)

Lukas said:


> If you're really interested in solving your problem ...


As far as I know, my problem is essentially cosmetic, at least for me. I have enough to do reporting and troubleshooting other problems that are not just cosmetic. I only commented here because I see crashes on close brought up very frequently in threads about Studio One. The gist of my comment was just that -- this is a common event.


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## jbuhler (Oct 5, 2019)

Lukas said:


> Is it only on program close or also if you just close a song?


For me, both. I've asked PreSonus help about this on various occasions but have never received replies that addressed the issue. I haven't pursued it relentlessly because it doesn't affect anything aside from occasionally requiring a restart. For me, it seems related to Kontakt, in the sense that it only happens when I have a Kontakt instance. And it is pretty regular. If I have a Kontakt instance and work on something for more than 30 minutes, S1 will crash on close 99% of the time. It wouldn't surprise me if Kontakt is doing something wrong, but of all the DAWs I use, only S1 can't handle what Kontakt is doing on close.


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## Lukas (Oct 6, 2019)

Okay, indeed that speaks for Kontakt doing something wrong here. But I myself never had such problems with Kontakt in Studio One (neither on Windows nor on Mac) so it's not just "Studio One + Kontakt".



jbuhler said:


> but of all the DAWs I use, only S1 can't handle what Kontakt is doing on close.


Studio One is not exactly as tolerant as some other DAWs in terms of supporting plugins that don't conform to the VST specification. This is also the reason for that some plugins won't always be detected correctly while scanning plugins: If a plugin crashes during scan Studio One doesn't accept this plugin while Cubase let it pass anyway.


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## Phillip Dixon (Oct 10, 2019)

Lukas said:


> Okay, indeed that speaks for Kontakt doing something wrong here. But I myself never had such problems with Kontakt in Studio One (neither on Windows nor on Mac) so it's not just "Studio One + Kontakt".
> 
> 
> Studio One is not exactly as tolerant as some other DAWs in terms of supporting plugins that don't conform to the VST specification. This is also the reason for that some plugins won't always be detected correctly while scanning plugins: If a plugin crashes during scan Studio One doesn't accept this plugin while Cubase let it pass anyway.


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## Phillip Dixon (Oct 10, 2019)

i use studio one have done since version one, now on 4.5 never had a problem with crashing. i use multible libraries and plugins in a track..and never had a crash
your problems might lie with your pc
studio one is a great daw and only getting better


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## JPQ (Oct 13, 2019)

i Logic Pro->Studio One i miss only few plugins and samples (Logic ES2 and Delay Designer for example but sampled stopped workking i talk pan flute and accordions i dont know why i know there is better but sometimes synthy but not too hardware rompler sounding is exactlyy what i want my hardware rompler has accordion what has similar timbre i feel but bad loop when is compared its thinner compared most samples what i heared) but this is faster even my mac but i switched to pc. becouse modern softsynths and even modern samples with my mac mini are not nice idea. Logic Pro crashed much more with me.


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## GtrString (Oct 13, 2019)

Studio One has been rock solid for me.

If you have issues, you could look into these optimation guides for win/mac from Sweetwater:


https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/?s=Optimization+Guide&sc_submit=Search


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## Babe (Oct 19, 2019)

I've gone from Cubase to S1, back to Cubase. Expression maps were the reason for going back. I like(ed) S1 and have not update to 4. I work only in midi. The way track and region automation is handled is excellent. My far, the best I know of and DAW. However, each automation parameter is assigned to a specific channel, not a track. If you change the channel of the track, the automation doesn't follow. This is a game changer. As my projects grew, I couldn't deal with it any longer. Also, you can't assign a track to 'all' channels. Didn't use to be for me, but today, is a game changer. Changing note length by a number of ticks is also a pain in S1, as is automation parameters. I was able to make some macros which made the situation acceptable.


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## Aceituna (Oct 28, 2019)

chibear said:


> Consistant crashes if I try to change from 44.1 to 48khz in any way. Need to do a cold boot on computer to get program to work again.



My problem is, when working at 48khz, I can´t watch Youtube videos (tutorials) at the same time. They are stopped.
How could I solve this?



jonathanwright said:


> it's worth looking into creating Macros



I am not familiar with macros in DAWs.
How difficult is it in S1?
Could you recommend any tutorial?



flamestalker said:


> In terms of articulations.. I'm using an LPD8 pad to change between my instruments in Kontakt.. for instruments with a bunch of separate articulations I'm setting up a multi in Kontakt and changing my 'Notes to Program Change' and switching it through program changes. (C-2 to PC 1, C#-2 to PC 2, etc), never had issues with articulations this way.



Interesting.
Does it work with EW libraries (Play)?
Do you consider it better than the Presonus Atom?



jonathanwright said:


> The one thing I miss at the moment is built in articulation mapping.



How do you manage articulations in S1?




chibear said:


> I normally set my reverb on send or fx tracks representing different positions on the stage and then send the instruments to those to add my ERs.



How do you configure ERs?


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## Geeve_NT_NastY (Nov 3, 2019)

Hi, this is my first post on this forum, as I found this thread when searching for "Studio One freezes every time I use it".
For the last month or so, I have used Studio one with about 15 tracks, all but one being virtual instrument or instrumentless MIDI record tracks. The other an audio track used only sparsely. The Studio one hogs all the RAM, then all the swap and then freezes after only 45 minutes or an hour of recording at most 2 hours of recording in a session before it freezes. Anyone with this problem with the Ram and Swap? I get almost complete use of 16 GB of RAM and I have no way of monitoring Windows' SWAP use in my specially designed SWAP partition, which I set to 20GB but I assume it is not being used as I intended by Windows. RAM/SWAP indicator often goes above 90% for both, in fact to 99% a couple times recently for the SWAP, and there is very little info on how to make SWAP work with S1. Then in task manager it often has said 12GB+ memory next to the Studio One task. 

It will eventually resolve as long as it is stopped, after 1/2 hour is the longest example, a couple of days ago, and then can be saved. I have been using a lot of MIDI and a lot of automation to VIs. Also many plugins chained after the several VIs. I need to solve this as S1 is my go to DAW these days. Today I couldn't stop the program from playing, as I had a VI GUI open over the stop button, and there was no way to push stop. I tried space bar. Unfortunately space bar didn't work, as was evidenced by continued playback of previously recorded MIDI. The current recording had a length of about 15 minutes when I first tried to stop it, using the space bar. However it went up another half hour and was still playing back previously recorded stuff, and I assume was still recording 2 tracks of audio over that. 

It's a real problem I don't know how you call cosmetic. It's real. Today's final recording is lost, as I couldn't stop playback, and just had to kill the process. The other day, the whole computer had to be killed, as the screen started flashing black, and the desktop went black, and the task manager couldn't even be run with Ctrl+aLT+DEL. The CPU was super hot that day. Not very hot today though. I have been using about 4 vi's. I have been running at 48kHz.


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## EgM (Nov 3, 2019)

Geeve_NT_NastY said:


> Hi, this is my first post on this forum, as I found this thread when searching for "Studio One freezes every time I use it".
> For the last month or so, I have used Studio one with about 15 tracks, all but one being virtual instrument or instrumentless MIDI record tracks. The other an audio track used only sparsely. The Studio one hogs all the RAM, then all the swap and then freezes after only 45 minutes or an hour of recording at most 2 hours of recording in a session before it freezes. Anyone with this problem with the Ram and Swap? I get almost complete use of 16 GB of RAM and I have no way of monitoring Windows' SWAP use in my specially designed SWAP partition, which I set to 20GB but I assume it is not being used as I intended by Windows. RAM/SWAP indicator often goes above 90% for both, in fact to 99% a couple times recently for the SWAP, and there is very little info on how to make SWAP work with S1. Then in task manager it often has said 12GB+ memory next to the Studio One task.
> 
> It will eventually resolve as long as it is stopped, after 1/2 hour is the longest example, a couple of days ago, and then can be saved. I have been using a lot of MIDI and a lot of automation to VIs. Also many plugins chained after the several VIs. I need to solve this as S1 is my go to DAW these days. Today I couldn't stop the program from playing, as I had a VI GUI open over the stop button, and there was no way to push stop. I tried space bar. Unfortunately space bar didn't work, as was evidenced by continued playback of previously recorded MIDI. The current recording had a length of about 15 minutes when I first tried to stop it, using the space bar. However it went up another half hour and was still playing back previously recorded stuff, and I assume was still recording 2 tracks of audio over that.
> ...



I think your processor might not be fast enough for the required task. Also, if you're running at 13 on 16Gb of ram, you might need more RAM, Windows swap shouldn't have anything to do with VI handling.


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## Geeve_NT_NastY (Nov 3, 2019)

EgM said:


> I think your processor might not be fast enough for the required task. Also, if you're running at 13 on 16Gb of ram, you might need more RAM, Windows swap shouldn't have anything to do with VI handling.



I set the System Advanced Performance Advanced Settings to:
CPU: for best performance of PROGRAMS
PAGE FILE: Windows managed

I had been trying to run with the best performance of background services (I think this is recommended by AVID, but every other place says to run for Programs unless you are running a server), and no C drive page file, and put the page file on another partition, which I don't think was working. And the page file was starting at 1GB. Now it is set at ~3GB. This will probably work better. Will have to wait and see.


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## Havoc911 (Nov 4, 2019)

Geeve_NT_NastY said:


> I set the System Advanced Performance Advanced Settings to:
> CPU: for best performance of PROGRAMS
> PAGE FILE: Windows managed


Shouldn't the CPU be optimized for background services for music production?


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## DAW PLUS (Nov 4, 2019)

Havoc911 said:


> Shouldn't the CPU be optimized for background services for music production?


No. This was a very old workaround for a 32 bit RME card which was solved with a driver update. However, it is the biggest myth in the industry.
We have tested this on various systems, setting it to (better said: keeping it at) programs has a slight advantage and is the routine which software expects, even though a few DAW developer sites still recommend this tweak. Probably due to well meant tweak lists not being counter checked in QA in the last 18 years.


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## Havoc911 (Nov 4, 2019)

DAW PLUS said:


> No. This was a very old workaround for a 32 bit RME card which was solved with a driver update. However, it is the biggest myth in the industry.


Interesting. I always assumed it had to do with streaming audio/samples. I'd be interested in reading the data from your testing if you have it available.


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## DAW PLUS (Nov 5, 2019)

Unfortunately I don't have that data anymore. It was between 1 and 5% on different systems. Some users on Gearslutz have reported a minor advantage when setting to background services, but some of them also had worse performance with HT active so I simply cannot trust their system setup as a reference.
RME has confirmed themselves it was a Digi96 32 bit driver fix and that otherwise, the setting should be left alone.

EDIT: I just see I messed up that sentence: it should read like this:
"Some users on Gearslutz have reported a minor *advantage* when setting to background services"


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## brenneisen (Nov 5, 2019)

DAW PLUS said:


> HT active



what's that?


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## EgM (Nov 5, 2019)

brenneisen said:


> what's that?



Hyperthreading


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## EgM (Nov 5, 2019)

I've been running DAWs since the early 90s, with Windows and Mac machines. The only tweaking I do when installing Windows 10 Pro on a DAW machine is setting up Power options to High performance, disable USB Selective suspend, disable automatic Windows update then making sure no apps I don't use run in the background or are enabled at startup.

I don't think there should be anything else to "tweak", Windows 10 isn't Windows XP.


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## BezO (Nov 6, 2019)

I'm new to S1 as of a few days ago and haven't done much aside from some basic setup while I finish off some projects in Logic.

I thought I researched my choice well, but now I'm seeing folks talk negatively about templates in S1. Is this only an issue for large templates? Should I be OK with 16-32 VI track templates, busses for instrument & effect groups, and 5-10 effect plugins on most tracks? I'd of course purge samples (Kontakt / Komplete Kontrol) from all VIs and deactivate effect plugins.

Sounds like the alternatives are working for folks, but it complete defeats my purpose of a template; to load a new project and start recording.


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## EgM (Nov 6, 2019)

BezO said:


> I'm new to S1 as of a few days ago and haven't done much aside from some basic setup while I finish off some projects in Logic.
> 
> I thought I researched my choice well, but now I'm seeing folks talk negatively about templates in S1. Is this only an issue for large templates? Should I be OK with 16-32 VI track templates, busses for instrument & effect groups, and 5-10 effect plugins on most tracks? I'd of course purge samples (Kontakt / Komplete Kontrol) from all VIs and deactivate effect plugins.
> 
> Sounds like the alternatives are working for folks, but it complete defeats my purpose of a template; to load a new project and start recording.



I have no issues with 50-60 tracks full of VIs with busses/groups and many fx running. As long as you have a decent fast machine with adequate RAM you'll be just fine.

Just try the demo and you'll find out for yourself


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## Lukas (Nov 6, 2019)

BezO said:


> I thought I researched my choice well, but now I'm seeing folks talk negatively about templates in S1. Is this only an issue for large templates? Should I be OK with 16-32 VI track templates, busses for instrument & effect groups, and 5-10 effect plugins on most tracks? I'd of course purge samples (Kontakt / Komplete Kontrol) from all VIs and deactivate effect plugins.


Most people haven't got any issues at all (including myself). Some have issues and talk about them in forum threads. I'd highly recommend to try it out for yourself instead of relying on if people think you could have issues with your own projects.



BezO said:


> Should I be OK with 16-32 VI track templates, busses for instrument & effect groups, and 5-10 effect plugins on most tracks? I'd of course purge samples (Kontakt / Komplete Kontrol) from all VIs and deactivate effect plugins.


I've been working with templates in Studio One since version 1.6 (now version 4.5) and I never had serious issues. Of course the features set got better with every bigger update but basically everything worked from the beginning. My templates have between 80 and 150 tracks.


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## BezO (Nov 6, 2019)

EgM said:


> I have no issues with 50-60 tracks full of VIs with busses/groups and many fx running. As long as you have a decent fast machine with adequate RAM you'll be just fine.
> 
> Just try the demo and you'll find out for yourself





Lukas said:


> Most people haven't got any issues at all (including myself). Some have issues and talk about them in forum threads. I'd highly recommend to try it out for yourself instead of relying on if people think you could have issues with your own projects.


Great to hear. Thanks! I'm on the recent iMac, 3.6GHz, 8-core i9, 64GB RAM.

Yeah, I just need to dive in and get over the discouragement of starting from scratch with some things. Even though mine are relatively small compared to most here, templates are a necessary PITA.


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## Lukas (Nov 6, 2019)

BezO said:


> Yeah, I just need to dive in and get over the discouragement of starting from scratch with some things. Even though mine are relatively small compared to most here, templates are a necessary PITA.


Not necessarily necessary  I changed to another workflow so my current template contains only about 10 standard instruments. The rest of my favorite patches and instruments are stored as Studio One Musicloops which means you can store an instrument with an effect chain with a demo phrase (for auditioning the instruments in the browser). To add the whole thing into your song just drag it from the browser into your arrangement. The same can be done with instrument presets (without the preview phrase):






I have to admit that I'm quite happy with this approach. I like it to have a slim song file with only the things I need in every project. And I can easily search for an instrument, preview it without having to load the whole instrument and if I know it's the instrument I want to use dragging and loading it into the song takes not much longer than aready having it in the song and re-activating the track.

But in the end both methods make sense


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## BezO (Nov 6, 2019)

@Lukas yeah, that seems quite efficient. I will likely incorporate that to some degree. But my templates are relatively small, usually 16 instrument tracks; not much more than your 10 standards. Your method will help here when I inevitably need to swap instruments out.

I do have a couple of 32 track templates for my "cinematic" stuff, still small for this forum. Relying on keyswitching keeps these compact. Maybe I can scratch these and build the smaller templates up with presets when necessary. Things to think about...


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## Geeve_NT_NastY (Nov 6, 2019)

Upgraded yesterday after I got 16GB additional RAM, upping from 16 to 32, and it has solved my freezing problem. 

Wheras 1 week ago I was experiencing half hour freeze times, while the program would resolve after an hour of recording 10 MIDI channels at once, now I have just experienced 1 - 2 minutes for the same thing. I took a look inside the task manager while this was taking place and found that the Studio One process was occupying 24,345.5 MB in the Memory tab.


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## EgM (Nov 6, 2019)

Lukas said:


> Not necessarily necessary  I changed to another workflow so my current template contains only about 10 standard instruments. The rest of my favorite patches and instruments are stored as Studio One Musicloops which means you can store an instrument with an effect chain with a demo phrase (for auditioning the instruments in the browser). To add the whole thing into your song just drag it from the browser into your arrangement. The same can be done with instrument presets (without the preview phrase):
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I've also dropped the idea of massive templates and use track presets just like you


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## waveheavy (Nov 11, 2019)

I'm using the latest update of S1 4.5. 

I want to use a subject header without it being a track. For example, I want to make a folder for my Strings, but I don't want the header showing the colored bar with no data across the main display. I want only tracks with data showing in the main display, i.e., tracks that would be in... the folder. How to do this?


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## chibear (Nov 12, 2019)

I don't think there is a way to do that. What I do is to minimize the size of the folder track so it is a mere stripe compared to the data tracks.


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## Geeve_NT_NastY (Nov 13, 2019)

Re my post 3 above here, does no one blink an eye that Studio One is using 24 GB of RAM? Is it recording the audio of my MIDI instruments to RAM? How does this get to 24 GB? Seems a tad high for a load of MIDI tracks being recorded with a few instances of vi's. Is there a way to conserve RAM in S1? I don't want my RAM to always be getting unnecessarily decimated every time I do a long recording.


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## DAW PLUS (Nov 14, 2019)

Geeve_NT_NastY said:


> Re my post 3 above here, does no one blink an eye that Studio One is using 24 GB of RAM? Is it recording the audio of my MIDI instruments to RAM? How does this get to 24 GB? Seems a tad high for a load of MIDI tracks being recorded with a few instances of vi's. Is there a way to conserve RAM in S1? I don't want my RAM to always be getting unnecessarily decimated every time I do a long recording.


Either you load a library which is huge, your Kontakt RAM preloading is accidentally set to a large setting or there is a memory leak somewhere. Remove instance by instance and check when it drops (keep taskmanager open while doing so).


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## Geeve_NT_NastY (Nov 15, 2019)

DAW PLUS said:


> Either you load a library which is huge, your Kontakt RAM preloading is accidentally set to a large setting or there is a memory leak somewhere. Remove instance by instance and check when it drops (keep taskmanager open while doing so).



It's just the thing. If I don't do a record, then it stays around 3 GB. I can play for hours and it stays at 3 GB. But after a 45 min record on 10 or so (MIDI only) tracks, it will shoot up around 24 GB. This is what makes me think it could be recording the audio, holding it, maybe waiting for me to take an option on freezing the audio from the record. I don't know if this is something that S1 users do, since I almost never record audio except as it is streamed to external devices.


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## DAW PLUS (Nov 19, 2019)

I would write Presonus about it...maybe they have an idea what might be triggering it.


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## chocobitz825 (Nov 19, 2019)

no response on the PreSonus forums. Has anyone had problems with the studio one blacklist? on mac, I have a ton of plugins that are getting blacklist for reasons I'm not sure...


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## waveheavy (Nov 19, 2019)

Lukas said:


> Not necessarily necessary  I changed to another workflow so my current template contains only about 10 standard instruments. The rest of my favorite patches and instruments are stored as Studio One Musicloops which means you can store an instrument with an effect chain with a demo phrase (for auditioning the instruments in the browser). To add the whole thing into your song just drag it from the browser into your arrangement. The same can be done with instrument presets (without the preview phrase):
> 
> 
> 
> ...




So how do you do this, and it looks like from your image you did it in your Instruments section, not your musicloops section.


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## DAW PLUS (Nov 20, 2019)

chocobitz825 said:


> no response on the PreSonus forums. Has anyone had problems with the studio one blacklist? on mac, I have a ton of plugins that are getting blacklist for reasons I'm not sure...


Not the forums, support.


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## Macrawn (May 29, 2020)

Lukas said:


> Not necessarily necessary  I changed to another workflow so my current template contains only about 10 standard instruments. The rest of my favorite patches and instruments are stored as Studio One Musicloops which means you can store an instrument with an effect chain with a demo phrase (for auditioning the instruments in the browser). To add the whole thing into your song just drag it from the browser into your arrangement. The same can be done with instrument presets (without the preview phrase):
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I want to thank you for this. I switched over about a month ago from Cubase and built a pretty large template. I notived after using it once 2 things. One, it was actually faster just to load a contact instrument from that side panel than searching and finding an instrument. Two, when studio one saves it takes forever. Maybe there is a settinig to improve that but I noticed that if I have a large template open even if just one track is active it takes forever to save vs having no template and one track open. That was annoying me to no end coming from Cubase which saves a large project quickly. 

Also a template just clutters space up. 

The only reason I can see for wanting a template at all is just to have instruments balanced the way I want but it seems like you can do that with your method just saving as a preset. Being able to save presets like you did seems like the best of both worlds. Keep a small core template and drag in the precreated presets that you have balanced with whatever effect chain you want already done. That is so much faster than trying to search through a template, finiding the instrument, unhiding it perhaps, activating it if it was deactivated and so forth. I just hated that. 

I just loathe working in Cubase now. I still have some unfinished projects in it I need to finish. 

The only negative though is video work. I think Cubase handles that better. It's the only thing I'd do in Cubase over Studio One at this point. I refuse to mix in Cubase. I'll export stems to Studio One.


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