Steinberg Media Technologies has announced that its new Personal Music Production System, Cubase Essential 4, is now being shipped out to its distributors worldwide.

The availability of Cubase Essential 4 at local outlets may vary regionally.

Cubase Essential 4 features include:

• Composing, recording and mixing tools including 64 audio tracks, unlimited MIDI tracks, 44 included VST3 and MIDI plug-ins, 16 VST instrument slots, full latency compensation and much more.
  
• Integrated HALionOne sampling instrument with over 100 playable instruments including waves from the Yamaha Motif synthesizer.
  
• Built-in Amp Simulator for instant guitar recording with 14 amps and 10 speaker simulations with a new interface.
  
• AudioWarp real-time time stretching and pitch shifting with formant correction for transposition and full tempo matching.
  
• Arranger Track with pattern-based arranging tools stores up to 16 different arrangements for on-the-fly reordering of song sections, experimenting with arrangements or live performances.
  
• MediaBay sound management technology for management of all audio, MIDI and video files, track and instrument presets with in-context auditioning.
  
• Instrument Tracks offer handling of VST instruments and add VST instruments to a project in a one-step operation.
  
• Track Presets can be combined with the MediaBay for instant saving and recall of audio, MIDI and instrument track parameters, including drag and drop into the project or onto an existing track.
  
• Drag & Drop for Insert FX for swapping of inserts and copying/moving plug-ins between tracks in the Cubase Essential 4 mixer.
  
• Cross-platform: Windows XP and Vista, Mac OS 10.4 and 10.5, Universal Binary.
  
• New features for customers upgrading from Cubase SE3 including Track Freeze, VST Plug-in Bridge, a redesigned Sample Editor, Advanced QuickTime 7 Support and much more.
  

Steinberg recently introduced Cubase Essential 4.

Cubase Essential 4 is the entry-level ticket to the world of Cubase.

It comes with the same user interface and Audio Engine as Steinberg’s flagship Cubase 4.

• Audio + MIDI Recording and Mixing
  
• VST3 Plug-In Set (including HALion One and Guitar Amp Simulator)
  
• Professional Technology (32-bit Audio Engine, 24-bit/96-kHz Recording)
  
• Powerful Editors for MIDI and Audio Processing
  
• Media Bay database for sound management
  
• AudioWarp realtime time stretching/pitch shifting
  
• Cross-Platform: Windows and Mac OS X Universal Binary (compatible with PPC- and Intel-based Macintosh computers)

Cubase Essential 4 (formerly Cubase SE product line) integrates a new set of plug-in effects, the HALion One Sample Player instrument, a great-sounding guitar amp and more than 60 other new features and improvements. With a new Arranger Track, linear and pattern-style arranging is now seamlessly integrated. New AudioWarp realtime time stretching and pitch shifting makes working with loops and tempo-based audio easier than ever.