Steinberg Cubase Le 4 Manual

41
Playback and the Transport panel
This is explained in detail in the section “Customizing via 
the setup context menus” on page 244.
The numeric keypad
In the default Key Command settings, various Transport 
panel operations are assigned to the numeric keypad on 
the computer keyboard. The keypads are slightly different 
on PC and Macintosh computers:
Operations
Setting the project cursor position
There are several ways to move the project cursor posi-
tion:
By using Fast Forward and Rewind.
By...

42
Playback and the Transport panel
The time display format is set on the pop-up menu to 
the right in the position display.
This setting also determines the time format displayed 
for the left and right locators on the Transport panel.
The left and right locators
The left and right locators are a pair of position markers 
used for specifying punch-in and punch-out positions dur-
ing recording, and as boundaries for cycle playback and 
recording. 
ÖWhen cycle mode is activated on the Transport panel,...

43
Playback and the Transport panel
Select “Disable Track” for tracks that you want to keep in 
the project for later use (but don’t want to play back now).
Select “Enable Track” from the track context menu to re-enable disabled 
tracks.
Playback functions
Apart from the standard transport controls on the Trans-
port panel, you can also find a number of functions that 
can be used to control playback on the Transport menu. 
The items have the following functionality:
About Chase
Chase is a function that...

5
Recording 

45
Recording
Background
This chapter describes the various recording methods 
that you can use in Cubase LE. As it is possible to record 
both audio and MIDI tracks, both recording methods are 
covered in this chapter.
Before you start
This chapter assumes that you are reasonably familiar with 
certain basic recording concepts, and that the following 
initial preparations have been made:
You have properly set up, connected and calibrated 
your audio hardware. 
You have opened a project and set the...

46
Recording
Activating recording in Sync mode
If you are synchronizing the Cubase LE transport to exter-
nal equipment (Sync is activated on the Transport panel) 
and you activate recording, the program will go into 
“record ready” mode (the record button on the Transport 
panel will light up). Recording then starts when a valid 
timecode signal is received (or when you manually click 
the Play button). See the chapter “Synchronization” on 
page 216 for more information.
Automatically activating...

47
Recording
Audio recording specifics
Selecting a recording file format
The format for recorded files is set in the Project Setup 
dialog on the Project menu. There are three settings: sam-
ple rate, record format (bit depth) and record file type. 
While the sample rate is set once and for all when you 
start working on a new project, the bit depth and file type 
can be changed at any time.
Record file type
The Record File Type setting determines which type of 
files will be created when you record:...

48
Recording
Setting input levels
When recording digital sound, it’s important to set the in-
put levels correctly – loud enough to ensure low noise and 
high audio quality, but not so loud that clipping (digital dis-
tortion) occurs.
Clipping typically occurs in the audio hardware when a 
too loud analog signal is converted to digital in the hard-
ware’s A/D converters. 
You need to check the level at the channel strip for the 
track on which you are recording:
1.Locate the channel strip for the track...

49
Recording
External monitoring
External monitoring (listening to the input signal before it 
goes into Cubase LE) requires some sort of external mixer 
for mixing the audio playback with the input signal. This 
can be a stand-alone physical mixer or a mixer application 
for your audio hardware, if this has a mode in which the in-
put audio is sent back out again (usually called “Thru”, 
“Direct Thru” or similar).
When using external monitoring, you cannot control the 
level of the monitor signal from...

50
Recording
Recording overlapping events
The basic rule for audio tracks is that each track can play 
back a single audio event at a time. This means that if two 
or more events are overlapping, only one of them will be 
heard at any given time.
What happens when you record overlapping events 
(record in an area where there are already events on the 
track) depends on the Linear Record Mode setting on the 
Transport panel:
In “Normal” or “Merge” mode, recording where some-
thing has already been...