i'm done for the night, but the problem is now solved and can actually be resolved relatively easily.

to recap:

1) around the 1st of july, i seem to have been hit with a collection of problems that nearly or exactly simultaneously broke the drivers in the soundcard, the firmware in the soundcard, something in the asio layer that affected multiple cards and something in cubase. i initially thought that this was a codec install messing with my streaming, but this no longer makes sense to me. around this time, i came into contact with a worm that i picked up in the library but i cannot otherwise trace it's effects. the cause is ultimately unknown, but the extent of the failure that resulted from it is cause for some thought as to the nature of it. it almost seems like i got stuxneted.

2) as a troubleshooting step, i ran a registry wipe on the 21st of july. the problem became noticeably worse from this point, forcing a reinstall. i understand now that this registry wipe broke my system clock, and that that error was repeated on the reinstall.

3) the system clock remained dysfunctional for some time after it was realized to be a dominant problem and fixed on the software side. the ultimate resolution to this was a firmware upgrade.

4) corruption in cubase of an unknown nature has corrupted playback on 14 of the 17 files for this project, resulting in renders that are both mathematically and audibly different than they ought to be. the cause of this is unknown, but it may be solved by reconstructing each of the projects from their relevant components.

that's a full month. gone. serious work restarts tomorrow.

i shouldn't be surprised. it's the most time consuming outcome possible.

sending each file out individually and recreating the project allowed me to create a file that nulled with the initial render. further, every one of the files nulled with their targets. so, i can create a clean sweep through rendering the files into a new project. meaning, this new project that nulls with the old render is a clean project and the project files are all warped, somehow.

the good news is that means the issue is now solved. i just have to spend the next four or five days doing this.

in some sense it's just...i don't care...fix it...

in another sense, it would be nice if there's just a little checkmark somewhere i can fix. how did i end up with 15 corrupt cubase projects at the same time?

thinking back, i may have done a copy/paste. i can't remember. i'm not going to remember that kind of trivial detail. and, while i sometimes see those "cubase has crashed, save under a different name" boxes, it's generally with midi - and that's not an issue here.

the fact that the different projects are rendering the same files differently indicates that there's either something corrupt that i can't fix or there's a project-specific setting i can switch. best start is to compare the project settings.

so, nothing about this is going to be easy, huh?

when i drop the wonky track into the project and line it up and export it, it nulls with the old file (while not nulling within the project, which seems crazy to me). then when i save it and re-open it it goes back to the new file. further, the identical files that don't null on the direct insert now null after the save and re-open. this is repeatably demonstrable, if still completely incomprehensible.

in order to be sure that what i'm comparing is stable, i have to be able to create a project that will null with the old files repeatedly and predictably. given that everything is resetting on the save, and i think that this is related to the project file, i think the only way around this is to render each track separately and build a new project. then, i'll know for sure that the out on the wonky track is really the out on the old files, and know which one i should be using.

preliminary testing suggests that a new flat render on the wonky track does null with the original file, indicating the error is on the insert. but in order to be sure that i've actually found the problem, i just need to be sure that the old flat render doesn't. if i can't get there - if it nulls through both renders - then i can't be sure i've actually solved anything.

and, if i'm not able to determine that my signal is flat, i'll have to wipe out the project files and start over.

note to the fucker at the mixing desk:

you lose.

fucker...

major progress: i was able to get one of the files to null.

it seems like it is some kind of cubase corruption. and it's the weirdest thing. i've managed to create tracks that are identical (they source from the same file, have the same start and end points, same effects) and yet do not null. but the newly inserted version nulls with the render from last month, whereas the version saved to last month does not.

hopefully, this is repeatable. if it is, i've determined what i need to do to get back to where i was.

the next thing i need to do is figure out which one of these inserts nulls with the original file. that's easy enough - i just need to render them both clean. i know they don't null with each other, against all logic. but, which one is corrupt?

i suspect that it will be the new insert that is corrupt - that is that the renders after the reinstall are the correct ones and the renders before the install are corrupt. if that's the case, i can trust the projects as i make final changes to the mixes. if not, i'll need to modify all the projects and then make final changes.

you can't accuse me of a lack of rigour, anyways.