VST Connect & VST Connect SE - Solution Thread

I have looked up the logs of aug 19th.
There are many cases of “key xxx not found” reports (which result in “…is not logged in”).
The reason in all of these cases is, that the Cubase side has been unregistered before the Performer submitted the (correct) key.
This is not good and we’d like to find out what happens.
My first guess is to agree to your suspicion that other Internet related applications and/or connections might get in the way. For instance Skype is also using UDP and under unlikely but possible circumstances it might use the same ports.
But what concerns me is that you have not reported that you were logged out when you returned to Cubase after switching to your browser or whatever. The logs say you were unregistered between obtaining the key, and the Performer submitting it.
So either we need more information, or you to try to not use other programs and see if that works, or drop me a PM and maybe we can sort this out together.
We are not allowed to store any personal information and we don’t, but if you try next time, you may also give us a key where it fails, so we can identify it in the logs. A new key is generated with each login, so there is no harm.
We’ll sort this out like we sorted out every problem so far, thanks for your patience!

Hi Musicullum;

Thanks for checking the logs and for your feedback. Interesting.

Here is how a typical session attempt would work on my end:

  1. I start Cubase.
  2. I initiate a conversation in either Google+ Hangouts or Facebook to facilitate my helper on the other end download and install the software, and to give them instructions on logging in, giving them a key, etc.
  3. End user attempts login and fails.
  4. I generate another code at my end and send it through either G+ or FB.
    etc.

In any case, there is only a few moments between the time I generate the code and when the user tries logging in.

It may be worth noting, though, that the VST Connect plugin on my end - even with two monitors - is never visible when I open up the other browser window (Chrome) to send them a key. However, once I send them the key, the VST Connect plugin doesn’t show that I’ve been logged off. By all appearances, I am still on line with the Steinberg server.

Which, I guess begs the question, how do other people communicate the key to a partner, perhaps on the other side of the planet, other than by telephone or text message? Doesn’t something like FB chat or Google+ chat seem to be a natural go-to for most people?

FWIW, my sessions with Ali and my Sister were done with Facebook chat, so the log is saved. I have itemized these attempts (Eastern Standard Time at my end, near Toronto, Canada) below. My friend Dave (who was the one who actually got in, but got the sample rate errors) and my mom (whose attempts look just like the ones below) were attempted via Google+ chat. Unfortunately, those did not get logged. In any case, maybe these logs from my end could be helpful.

My friend, Ali, running XP. (second day of trying) - Aug 19

monday 21:17 - ali - 16782 38953 - studio key ##### ##### is not logged in
monday 21:22 - ali - 29790 7667 - studio key not logged in


My sister, Deanna, running Win 7. - Aug 20

tuesday 21:32 - deanna - 31718 43126 - Server not responding (deanna side)
tuesday 21:37 - deanna - 31845 77898 - ‘Studio with Key 31845 77898 is not logged in!’
tuesday 21:40 deanna and I both shut down and restarted computers
tuesday 21:49 - no code generated on my side - server not responding (my side)
tuesday 21:49 - deanna - 69265 63873 - Server not responding (deanna side)
tuesday 21:50 - deanna - 82223 53080 - Server not responding again (82223 53080)

^ for the latest one, I didn’t clarify whether it was, in fact, a “server not responding” error if that was just how she put it, but was really a “not logged” in error. I find it unlikely that a server not responding error would generate the key back on her end, would it?

Maybe I’ll try with my sister or my mom again and send them the code via text message.

Thanks for your ongoing assistance. It is appreciated.

Chris

Update:

Just tried with my mom again, running snow leopard 10.6.8. I had neither G+ nor FB (actually, no internet at all running) and gave her the key over the phone.

2:19pm - “studio 70478 65554 not logged in” error.

Chris

Quick reply (more later, I’ll drop you a PM):

  • I can’t find “deanna” at all in any logs (was that the name she put in the name box?), which would simply mean she can’t connect to the connection server at all. That would indicate a general internet problem or a firewall issue on her end.

  • I can see why Ali fails, here is an excerpt of the log (Aug 19th):

2013-08-19 03:54 register: A…, magic: 2851 31410
2013-08-19 03:55 unregister A…
2013-08-19 03:55 register: A…, magic: 89127 77618
2013-08-19 03:55 startSession: 2851 31410 not found

(“magic” stands for the key, obviously. And don’t worry about the timestamps, different country.)

That means Ali logged in and got given the key 28…, then he logged out, logged in again and got 89…, then somebody tried to connect using the “old” key 28…
Maybe he double-clicked the login button? Have to check if that can happen…but then he should have seen the new key.

As said, I’ll drop you a PM later, maybe we can try a connection if that was ok with you?

Thanks for staying tuned!

Great thread… I actually read all 161 posts :slight_smile:. Musicullum you are a trooper…great to see such involvement from the developer side…bravo!

Moving toward my first VST connect session in a few days…western US to southern France. I set up a session, as far as I could from my end, using the template, which is great BTW. I created an audio channel for the performer’s guide track and output it to the “To Performer” group channel. I’m not clear after reading some posts if I should “send” the guide track to the “To Performer” group via a send slot…or if the “send” references in the posts just mean to route the guide material to the “to performer” channel in the usual, output way.

Secondly…when I play the guide material…the glitches and dropouts are terrible. Like if you’ve ever inserted a 32 bit plug into Cubase 64 bit…that bad!! Thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

It makes much more sense to me to use send levels as you would in a room-to-room recording situation. Only then can one provide an individual mix to the Performer. Routing to the “To Performer” group channel directly (multi-output routing) will work too, but without the benefit of individual levels.

If the dropouts only appear when playback or record is engaged, you should raise the “Remote Latency” setting in the settings page. Usually around one second is ok, if you have to go much higher for seamless operation your connection isn’t really good (high “ping”).
If the dropouts appear all the time (even in “chat mode”, that is, when no playback is active), then you should lower the upstream bitrates for audio and video transmission. If you can’t go lower and still have problems, make sure you use a solid ethernet cable to your router instead of WiFi, and if that doesn’t help either, you may consider to change your IP provider :slight_smile:

same thing:

2013-08-23 20:01 register: p…, magic: 70478 65554
2013-08-23 20:04 unregister p…
2013-08-23 20:04 register: p…, magic: 84482 36578
2013-08-23 20:04 startSession: 70478 65554 not found

so p… registered, got key 70…, unregistered, got key 84…, and then somebody (your mum) tried to connect with the old and meanwhile invalid key 70…
Are you sure the key that was displayed in the VSTC plugin was 70… when you told her the key (well, most probably) but most of all, that you didn’t do anything thereafter? mean to say, when your mum got the “not logged in” error, the 70… key was still displayed in the plugin, and that not magically 84… had appeared meanwhile??

Hi there,

first thx for this good thread. happy to see that a developer is helpin users in such a untiring way.
unfortunately i’m still havin connection problems… still love c7 the most, workin with steinberg since cubasis vst :wink:

no matter where i try, it´s always the same problem. my artist is havin perfect video and sound quality while on my side i get nothin clean - voice is comin in binary trash, video is stuttering or totaly collapsing.
artist can hear the playback, but when i record, i have the same digital trash on the recording track.

i did…

  • open the ports 51111-51113 (not necessary anymore i read)
  • both sides connected with cable, wifi is disabled
  • tried with disabeling ASIO Guard
  • upload is at least 1Mbit/s on both sides
  • both sides closed every other programm
  • tried with disabeling firewall (computer and router)
  • video and audio upstream to lowest quality (without that nothinng works)
  • turned up asio buffering up to 1024 samples
    and more i don´t remember…

i used different internet connections/locations because i thought it´s my router. The problem is everywhere the same.

  • What about Samplerate and Bit settings? are they synced automaticly? do they have to be set the same?
  • What about network remotes like steinberg ski remote, splashtop streamer (desktop streamer), ProCutX remote?
    i turned them off but maybe they´re workin in the background
  • what about soundcards? do both have to connect one because of asio drivers or is the internal with coreasio2 enough?
    (12ms latency on 384samples) - we felt no difference

i’m workin on a 2012 macbook pro, OS X 10.8.4, i5 2,5GHz, 16GB Ram, soundcard is roland ua-55 via usb or allen&heath zed16R via firewire.

hope to get this great feature runnin! would be much less travelling (costs) because of technical problems in the artists studio setup.

thx already

This looks very much like there is a problem on the Performer side in his or her upstream quality.
Did you check the Performer settings to have the audio and video upstream rates set not too high?
If your partner really has 1 MBit upstream provided by his/her IP (Internet Provider)? Many people confuse this with the downstream rate. Usually, when you browse or get emails etc, upstream rate is of no concern, so this can be easily overlooked.
So: the sum of audio and video upstream as set in the Performer settings must not be more than approx 80% of the upstream rate provided.
Try setting the Performers’ cam to “”, and audio upstream rate to 128 kBit. Still distorted sound?

\

  • i did…

You are successfully connected, so none of the port/firewall business applies. Means, it works perfectly. This has nothing to do with connection quality, a connection is either established or not. If it is, all router/firewall/port forwarding issues are solved already.

  • upload is at least 1Mbit/s on both sides

I don’t know what you mean by that. If you set Performer upstream to 1 MBit for video, for instance, it comes to no surprise that there are problems…?

  • video and audio upstream to lowest quality (without that nothinng works)

ah, ok, sorry, so you did it right (lowest quality => lowest bitrate)
But then it should really work…

  • i used different internet connections/locations because i thought it´s my router.

The problem is not on your end, but on the Performer side.

  • What about Samplerate and Bit settings? are they synced automaticly? do they have to be set the same?

Unless you get a message, samplerate is automatically set to Cubases’s rate on the Performer app.

Again, you were trying loads of things on your side but the problem is really on the Performer.

Hope that helps - have to go…

We’d appreciate any tips or help regarding the occasional glitch in the audio stream while recording via the VST Connect SE.

The Performer in our case is running a Win 7 machine, while the recordist is on a Mac; both users are running an RME interface, although we did try the Mac’s built-in sound card as well, to no difference.

We set up all the right I/O’s and connect fine; we’ve set the audio upstream to mono, set the lowest quality for video at the recordist’s end (the Performer does not have a web cam), and have gone through various audio quality settings, including the lowest and the highest. In each case, there have been digital drop outs in the recorded signal.

The recordist noted that while in the pre-record mode, glitches weren’t apparent; it is after punching-in that they would sometimes occur. And, quite unusually, it seemed a higher signal modulation seemed to increase the drop-out rate (ie., when the performer uttered a louder sound, a glitch – not signal clipping, that is – would be likely to occur).

Thank you for any help!

If there is silence or lower signal, glitches may just not be as appearent maybe.
The only other thing that comes to mind is cpu Performance on the engineer/recordist side, because the audio decoder has a harder time when a signal is present. OTOH, if audio quality is fine when in chat mode, it means the problem appears to be due to a combination of decoding and recording (writing to disk maybe).
My first test would be to try to write to a different medium, like an external HD or for testing maybe even a USB stick. Also you may want to monitor Cubase’s performance display to see if there are peaks on cpu or disk end.

Cubase 7.0.6 and VST Connect 1.3.0 performance issue.


Its to early to say if it just random. Internet speed is on full on both ends.
I don’t know but somehow it seem to degrade the performance after the update?

Now its not even workable? :confused:
Communication are really bad between the “Studio” and “Performer”. Work flawless before the Cubase 7.0.6 update? :unamused:


Best Regards
Freddie

There hasn’t been a change in VST Connect to the Cubase 7.0.6 update afaik, so it must be something else, some performance issue with another plugin maybe? If audio is disrupted it doesn’t help to have the best connection…

Hi There

Is there is any way to connect 2x cubases together via this software ? So for example
I can collab witch my friend playng vst midi and he will record this and when he play back i can record ?

Always open for ideas…and working on some, so stay tuned :slight_smile:

I will Thanks

Found out one strange thing today by accident: if both sides use the same name (like “John”), it will fail because the server disconnects the “first John” when the “second John” tries to log in. Nobody ever appears to have tested this…you’ll never know.

i know a solution thread is not really the place for this because i cant offer any solutions (because it works flawlessly for me), but i still wanted to say this out loud, and be it only so that people who still have connection issues know that its worth getting those fixed:

VST connect is to me probably the best audio innovation of the past 10 years. ive now used it on a regular basis for quite a while, and its just downright amazing. you gain so much from this on a personal and a musical level, its just great, great, great.

  • for me, its so stable and troublefree that i am now up and ready to record in an instant. i have a couple of long term clients, and with them, i can basically go out of a skype call and into cubase recording mode within 20 seconds (the time it takes to open the template). it took a while taking care of general gain structuring and levelling on all sides, it took a while until they all had a combo of mic/interface/headphone they liked, but now that its all there, its just the best thing since sliced bread. and with many younger clients who all have some sort of setup anyway, its also pretty much “could you please install this little tool and enter this number, then we can start” “huh???” “no, im serious”. i recorded people in their kitchen, on their balcony, from a neighbour city to the other end of the country.

  • i save HUGE amounts of time that i would otherwise have spent away from home, away from the kids, doing vocal recording sessions for many days in a row for whatever particular LP i would be producing at the moment. the extra time this gave me with my family alone is worth more than pretty much all workflow and audio feature business that was introduced say in the last 4 major updates combined. i mean, how often does it happen that a feature in an audio daw actually ends up improving your overall life quality! this is no joke. people with kids will know what i mean, this is highest priority stuff, and im not talking about some audio daw blablabla priority but “overall-life-priority”.

  • what used to be a stressful event in the calendar (vocal recording in studio XY! you got X days! better get shitloads of awesome vocal tracks done in that time!) is now the equivalent of casual skype meetings in the evening. with everybody pretty much sitting in their private comfort zones.

  • and its not just a question of convenience - that very setting i just described also leads to way better vocal takes. its all so relaxed and pressure free, you can just hear it. you get takes that are natural in a way where youd have to work your ass of to get the same thing in the classic “studio! vocal tracking time!” environment.

thank you charlie steinberg and whoever else was responsible for this. thank you so very much.

that is all :slight_smile:

A few comments and an easy request:

First: Love it! Very stable for me and so many possibilities.

Second: Read this whole thread and there are several excellent suggestions as to functionality enhancements.

MIDI would be cool but it would have to come with audio, whatever the performer is hearing as they play for reference (it’s a delay thing - you could not generate audio on the studio side for performer monitor, obviously). Then sounds/performance could be edited as MIDI on the studio side. Nice.

Stereo would be great. At first I thought it would do this until I realized that the addition of the “Inst” track just gives you a separate talkback mic on the performer side. Needed, in some circumstances, though (mic on a guitar amp, FI).

Cubase/Nuendo Networking capability - in kinda real time - would be great. Either side records something and the other side sees it happening and could hear it too. That would require various delay compensations on both sides - a full+ version of VST Connect. And identical plugins. Of course jamming is impossible. It would get complicated: An audio recording on one side would be recorded from it’s compressed web version on the other. Perhaps marked as such for possible future integration. Or - as an option - MIDI could be transmitted and recorded AND played back by the remote by any plugin. Whatever - A BIG jump . . . but a cool one.

That last idea is a big extension of the whole VST Connect concept, extending it beyond a remote performer to complete integration and mirroring of 2 running instances of Cubase/Nuendo.

My last comment: It seems to me that there are - without major changes - 2 basic uses for VST Connect.

  1. The obvious. somebody far away adds a couple parts to whatever you are working on. Works pretty excellently as it is.
  2. Obvious - but not properly implemented: Working together on a project.
    And the thing is, this use only requires one little change in VSTC to be MUCH more do-able.

And it’s already been mentioned: A rehearse mode.
Specifically, allow transmit of the full cue mix from the Studio side - including sounds/MIDI VSTis being currently recorded on the studio side - to the performer side in “Full” fidelity without the additional delay compensation on the studio side. The performer would be listening only. Again, no “jamming”. Easy. All the functionality is already there.

This would allow real time (one side at a time) collaboration for songwriting and such, but ALSO . .
Some people (like me) have mentioned using VSTC as a way to play “ideas in progress” for Film and TV work to clients. This would allow the composer/editor (Studio side) to try new things in real time while the client listens! Brilliant.

Just ONE button: Activate cue send AND turn off additional delay compensation on Studio side. During play OR Stop. Piece of cake.

PLEASE don’t wait for the BIG FULL VERSION to do this. Do it now, call it VST Connect SEplus, and I’ll pay for it (hey . . I’ll even beta it . . just sayin).

Hugh

I can’t reveal what’s coming, but rehearse will be included.

Some other comments:

  • in the Performer settings, there is one that can be set to mono, stereo, or dual mono. This way you can record 2 mono signals indepenently (dual mono). If you want to record a stereo instrument, the instrument channel on the performer side should listen to a stereo input. Recording 2 stereo sources independently is not supportet as only 2 channels are transmitted at a time.

2 side operation: I don’t see how this should work. Do you mean both sides have the plugin, and at one time one side records, and at another time the other? That would of course be doable, but both recording each other at the same time isn’t possible.
As for the first case, yes, it could be done, but we only have limited resources, so you will have to switch from time to time, sorry. Maybe someday :slight_smile: