Installing a VST from an *.exe installer is a little easier but if we want to use our own folder then we have to use a few steps extra this also make it easier to find and verify that Reaper can find our newly installed VST plugin whether that is an Effect or Virtual Instrument.
First download your VST plugin – (make sure you download form a legal and reputable source – be safe – executable’s can come with hidden viruses or trojan horses – they can also come with extra software – if not sure don’t install it.)
I am using a plugin that came free from Plugin Boutique called Synth Master Player. I am also using a 64 bit plugin and installing it to my own folder.
Then in the Reaper folder in file Reaper-VST.ini check for all plugin entries that just have a code next to them, no name, no developer. These plugins move them to a temp folder from your VST folder. Then in Reaper refresh the cache. It should run through quick without problems. Then VERY IMPORTANTLY: Restart your computer! Depending on whether you are using the 64-bit or 32-bit edition of Reaper, add the folder for the 64-bit or 32-bit editions of the Kontakt VSTis to Reaper's VST plug-ins path. When you installed Kontakt you should have had the chance to pick the folders; if not, then Search your complete disk for 'Kontakt' to find them. Go to Plug-ins VST. Under “VST Plugin Path,” make sure that the path where you placed your plugins is listed (if not, add it) see the screenshot for how I added C: REAPER UserPlugins VST after the other two default folders. Click on Re-Scan and your instrument should be available within Reaper. In Reaper, the Native Instruments software is used via the VST plug-in interface. In order to use your NI plug-ins in Reaper, you must ensure that it scans the folders where your NI VST plug-ins are located. This article describes this procedure for both Mac and Window systems.
Go to your downloads folder and double click on the file you downloaded.
The *.exe file needs extracting form the zip archive file – Winrar is a good program form this. You can download it here. Winrar Page
If your file is an exe go to part 2 if it’s a rar or zip file follow the next few steps.
Right Click your file.
A new folder should now be created.
Double click the folder to open it. Inside should be you *.exe
Double click the file. Old vst plugins.
Do you want to allow this app to make changes…
Click yes on the warning.
Choose your plugin version.
Click Next.
Click Next.
Click Next.
Now we choose our folder.
If you’ve not read it already then check out my article:
Find or Create VST Folder for Reaper
If you set up your own folder or made a note of the default folder set up by Reaper you can enter that in the box below by deleting the previous entry above.
Then when you’ve done that click next.
When you you have completed the installation you can check the results by running a rescan of the VST folder.
Open up reaper and it should scan all new VSTs – if it’s already open press:
CTRL-P to bring up Preferences in reaper.
Rescan your VST Folder
To test if the install went ok follow my article called
For Effects VSTs
Watch the Video in the following article:
Guest post by Brandon S. Hire of The Noise Floor. Brandon recently went hell with getting his Waves VST3 plugins all into REAPER. He got through it and I asked him to share the experience to help others in the same situation. Any clues to solving problems like this are gold.
Waves recently announced a new subscription plan which allows users to subscribe to their Silver and Mercury bundles. I decided to give this a try and download the Mercury Bundle. As a long time REAPER user and long time Waves user, I didn’t anticipate any problems.
To put it bluntly, I had problems. But the problems were neither the fault of Waves or of Cockos. The folks at Waves’ tech support team were awesome at helping me figure out the problem, and I want to document the issue here in case any of you are experiencing something similar.
Note that I’m not advising you to take these steps yourselves. If you’re having issues, there may be other factors that are causing your issues. Your best bet is to contact support at Waves or Cockos and see if you can get assistance with the issue. With that being said, here’s what happened:
To make a long story short, I noticed that about half of the Mercury bundle plugins weren’t showing up in VST3 format in REAPER. The same plugs would show up in VST and AU formats, which indicated that the plugins were in fact installed on the system. So I decided to clear the cache in the plugins preferences and rescan the plugins folder.
As it scanned the VST3 plugins from Waves, it stalled at Greg Wells MixCentric. Then REAPER flat out crashed. When I re-launched REAPER, there was still no sign of the missing VST3 plugins, and MixCentric was one of them.
So I contacted Waves support. After trying a couple of things, we were able to remedy the problem with a clean install. This required that I go through a few steps to uninstall everything Waves related on my system, and then allow only the newest versions of everything to be installed by Waves Central. The whole process took a couple of hours, but by the end of it all I was back up and running. When I loaded REAPER again, I cleared the cache and re-scanned again. This time there was no crash, and at the end of the scan I had all of the missing plugins.
Waves Tech Support Representative
As a long-time waves user, I’ve been slowly accumulating a collection of plugs prior to this subscription being available. That means I’ve been installing them intermittently over the last two years on this machine, and there have been updates since then. Those updates most likely were conflicting with previous files I’d installed, causing some to go missing and others to trigger a system crash. That’s why performing a clean install of everything worked. There was no longer old stuff mucking up the works and conflicting with the new stuff.
As mentioned above, if you’re having an issue with the new subscription working properly in REAPER, you should be certain that you’re using the VST3 version of the plugin in question. If it didn’t show up, a clean install may be the answer. I would do this with Waves tech support, as there may be further issues. Now that I’m up and running with the supported VST3 plugins, everything is running exactly as it should. I couldn’t be happier.
Thanks to Brandon for writing this up and sharing the info.
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