FabFilter

Hi Nathan,

FabFilter Pro-C comes in four different VST 2 flavors, which are described here:
www.fabfilter.com/help/pro-c/support/vstplugins.html

If you choose the FabFilter Pro-C (SC) version in Reaper, it has four inputs: a normal stereo input and a stereo side chain input.

We didn't enable the sidechain in the regular Pro-C version because at the time Pro-C was first released, some hosts did not properly support side chains and would crash or refuse to load the plugin. We've now found workarounds for that so our latest plugins with a sidechain (e.g. Pro-DS) just offer a single version with a sidechain instead.

Hope this helps!

Cheers,

I didn't have all four versions.

Updated now, v1.23 is the latest, yes?

I presuming in REAPER that I just need the two sidechain versions, I can run them in sidechain or non-sidechain mode? The two non-sidechain versions are for compatibility purposes only?

With the four permutations you do cover all bases for VST2.4 -please accept my apologies for suggesting otherwise -I got completely the wrong impression.

best regards,
Nathan.

Hi Nathan,

The download page always contains the latest version, 1.23 as of now. The non-sidechain versions are indeed for compatibility purposes and you can safely delete them if you don't use them.

Cheers,

Heh, I'm sure I've used them in some previous projects. I'll keep them active in case I have to revisit those, and just use the side chain versions for newer projects.

Thank you for your time Frederik,

Nathan.

So with this being said on the FF VSTs:

"The non-sidechain versions are indeed for compatibility purposes and you can safely delete them if you don't use them."

Does this mean that the Stereo and Mono versions of FF plugins with SC versions are not necessarily needed?

Might it be possible (or better) to have the SC on the Stereo / Mono versions and allow the SC versions to be the optional ones that can be deleted?

Yes, this is also what we're doing with newer plugins (actually we've completely eliminated the non-SC versions). However we can't change it for older plugins for backward compatibility reasons...

Cheers,

Hi Frederik,

Many thanks for your reply.

So for example if I have previously only used the non-SC version of Volcano in projects it is not possible to remove either version from the VST list? (If I want to be able to use the SC in the future).

*Unless Volcano 3 comes around* and has the SC built into the normal version? :)

[ I think for me this is a 'tidiness' issue with VSTs... Volcano and a couple of other FF have 4 VST versions, which I could really do with cutting down to 2, just from a scrolling through a lot of plugins type scenario! ]

Cheers,

If you have only used the non-SC version, you can safely remove the SC version. Just don't remove plugins that you have used in existing projects, otherwise you won't be able to reopen them.

Agree with you on the tidiness thing. :-)

Cheers,

Hi Frederik,

There seems to be an issue on OSX (10.8.5) with removing the non-SC versions of Fabfilter plugins as we were discussing.

I've just setup a new MBP and after removing the non-SC versions from my VST folder the SC versions are not showing up in Live 9, Maschine 2 and in Studio One (when scanning it blacklists the SC versions completely). Rescans don't help either.

So it looks (on OSX) that I have to keep all versions in my VST folder anyway!

Not sure if this is something you could look into?

Many thanks,

Alan

Hi Alan,

You're right. I was referring to the Windows plugins. On Mac, the SC and Mono versions actually call into the regular plugin, so you can't remove that. However, on OS X you can use the AU plugins instead which combine all versions into one file.

Cheers,