pc setup:
nuendo 3.0
motu ultra lite
motif rack es
m-audio oxugen 8 midi controller

hey everyone, i currently bought the motif rack es to use with nuendo 3.0, its already connected via usb, i changed the setting in the motif rack to midi=usb like the manual said. i have the output of the rack going to the inputs 3 and 4 in my motu. now basically in nuendo whenever i record in a midi track itll record the midi messages and would play back fine, until i tried to export the composition in the midi track to an audio mixdown mp3 format. once that was done i went back to listen to the mp3 and there was no audio playing??? this works fine whenever i use a plug in but why not with the sounds coming from the rack? i went back into nuendo checked the mixer view and realized that the midi track was receiving audio( the volume meter was responding) BUT the master audio track meter was not budging like if no signal was going through it, which im convinced is why when i exported the mixdown nothing was recorded. is there any specific routing i have to do with the vst connections in nuendo? i thought i had it properly connected. any help would be highly appreciated, i usually just use plug ins to make tracks but decided to get the motif rack es for its great sounds that way i can lay off some cpu usage.

Re: help with midi recording in nuendo 3.0

The Motif Rack ES (you posted in the wrong forum by the way… but no biggie), as you may have noticed is not a Plugin. So you only have MIDI data recorded in Nuendo. And unless you have it routed so that it is transferred to an audio track it will not be in your AUDIO MIXDOWN.

There are several ways to proceed… and even more than being a Motif Rack or Motif Rack ES question, what you have is a Steinberg question.

OPTION 1:
I assume your MOTU ULTRA LITE is your audio interface. And since you have inputs from the Motif Rack ES going into Nuendo, it should be these you use to actually print audio tracks… You could play the MIDI data from the MIDI Tracks to the Motif Rack ES and arm the audio tracks set to receive from your MIDI interface. This will place waveforms on those audio tracks… now they can be exported using AUDIO MIXDOWN. (But you must actually print the tracks as audio data… MIDI tracks are not exported - even if you hear them. You must print them to Nuendo AUDIO Tracks.)

OPTION 2:
Alternatively, you could set the Motif Rack ES up as an “External Instrument” which will let you treat it as a “virtual” VSTi - that is, even though it is hardware, you can setup the Motif Rack ES as an External Instrument - which will let you address it via specific ports from your interface… This requires that you are using Yamaha Studio Manager and the Motif Rack ES Voice Editor and that you have the latestest version of Nuendo 3.2

In short, Nuendo will address the Motif Rack ES Editor as if it were a VSTi, the Motif Rack ES Editor will, in turn, address the hardware. This External Instrument function was added to Nuendo at version 3.2.0

Please see: the Manual addendum about new features in Nuendo 3.2 _ New Features Manual Addendum [3.939 KB] Here’s the link:  [url=http://www.steinberg.net/439_1.html]http://www.steinberg.net/439_1.html [/url]

for details on the External Instrument function.

If you decide to set this up, you can treat your Motif Rack ES as a VSTi. You will select it on the (F11) VST INSTRUMENT rack, and you will create both a MIDI track and an “invisible” audio track, same as any plugin. You will be able to user FREEZE and AUDIO MIXDOWN and use Nuendo AUTOMATION just like you can on any internal to the computer VSTi… You will be able to see the inputs from the Motif Rack ES on the same mixer as your other VSTi.

When doing audio mixdown, however, it will take place in real time (this External Instrument setup only lets the computer address the hardware as if it were internal to the computer… ie, like a plugin. But it is not, it is, of course, still hardware).