# Are you using VEP locally with your DAW?



## mjsalam (Jan 1, 2020)

Curious as to how many are using VEP locally with their DAW and why. I have a single slave which gets some use but I know in the past I've read that some folks prefer to decouple the instrument hosting entirely using VEP on their local machine as well. Anyhow, would love to hear your workflows, opinions,. experiences on this.


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## Dom (Jan 1, 2020)

Yes, running Logic and VEP on a trashcan Mac Pro. Have a great Windows-based slave, but once we had everything running on SSDs, I gave up on it for simplicity, and slightly lower latency. It's easier keeping everything update on one machine. Using de-coupled. CPU is fine all on one machine.

I always use a fair amount of instruments directly in the sessions, so previously software / libraries had to be authorised on two computers, which isn't always possible, eg with iLok authorised software. Now it's all on the same machine, ie just one authorisation.


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## ChazC (Jan 1, 2020)

Running Nuendo & VEP on a single Win10 machine. PC has enough grunt for most projects but (auto)save times without VEP are impossible to work with on larger templates.


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## Rob Elliott (Jan 1, 2020)

I have three slaves that run VEP but ALSO running it locally on main puter. With M2 drives now I am phasing out one of the slaves this year. 'Moving' toward fewer slaves - eventually (maybe only one.)


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## Dewdman42 (Jan 1, 2020)

sometimes. There are pros and cons.


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## Allegro (Jan 1, 2020)

Cubase and VEP here. I notice some significant performance difference and because of how often 10.5 is crashing for me, it really is a huge deal for me but took a lot of time to set up.

My workflow involves Lemur, a lot of PLE presets and VEPro Disabled tracks.

I use one instrument per Kontakt instance. For example, Violin 1 of a single library with all articulations on a single kontakt instance. My VEPro project itself loads lightning fast because all instrument plugins are disabled and purged (it's faster than loading up Cubase itself)

As soon as I enable a track from my Cubase project using Lemur, an asterisk gets appended to the track name indicating that it's an enabled track(pressing enable multiple times wont add more than 1 asterisk). Pressing the disable key removes that asterisk and disables the kontakt instance from VEPro.

This opens up a lot of possibilities for me. For example, I can enable as many tracks as I want and when my RAM usage increases too much, all I have to do is press a couple buttons and cubase disables all Kontakt instances from VEPro that don't have data on them and also removes the asterisk sign from all those MIDI track names. I can do this multiple times within a project. If you balance your template using MIDI CCs at the start of your project like me, I made sure Cubase ignores those bars while finding tracks with "an asterisk but no data."

This workflow, while time consuming is much better than using your DAWs built in "disable track" command imo. It doesn't freeze up the GUI while doing so, the project filesizes are also minimized, save times are managable and you can enable multiple tracks in bulk while working on something else in your project.


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## novaburst (Jan 1, 2020)

Running VEpro on local and server, more to do with preference and does appear to be the back bone for stability.

Using VEpro to host all VST effects and library's, groups and bus cant say when i have opened up a VST or library in cubase 10 i think it was way back when i was using cubase 5 i just dont find the need to when tracking and mixing.

Using the DAW to edit, record, and midi.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 1, 2020)

Yes. Among other reasons, that's the way to send audio from a sequencer through to great plug-ins included with v.7.


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## Mishabou (Jan 1, 2020)

Allegro said:


> Cubase and VEP here. I notice some significant performance difference and because of how often 10.5 is crashing for me, it really is a huge deal for me but took a lot of time to set up.
> 
> My workflow involves Lemur, a lot of PLE presets and VEPro Disabled tracks.
> 
> ...



You are using Racks in CB to access the VEPro slave ? and midi tracks for different instruments/patch ? ? I Like your idea of an asterix on enable tracks, is this done via PLE in CB ?

Thanks


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## Allegro (Jan 1, 2020)

Forgot to mention that I'm using a single machine but the setup is scalable to multiple slaves. I'm using regular MIDI tracks in cubase and VEP plugin as a rack instrument.

For the PLE command to work, I'm basically using a total of two CCs from Lemur assigned to two Lemur pads. It's important that you use two separate pads in Lemur for Enabling and Disabling and not rely on a single switch for this task. The enable pad (with a value under 64) enables the disabled instrument and also triggers the attached PLE. The disable pad sends out two CC values simultaneously. The first CC is for disabling VEP instrument, same CC as enable but with a value of 127 and second for removing asterisk that triggers a PLE.

This setup gets a little tricky to explain so I might do a proper post explaining how I achieved all that but I've attached a screenshot of how my PLE command looks like for enabling a track.

Shoutout to @Mihkel Zilmer for detailed instructions on his template setup. I suggest you check that out if you haven't already. I'll be able to help you out from then on.


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## InLight-Tone (Jan 1, 2020)

Now that Logic supports 1000 instrument tracks disabled + native keyswitch articulation mapping there's really no need for the added complexity and headache of running VEP whatsoever. Unless you are trying to outdue JunkieXL with the biggest template (balls) ever!


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## Ashermusic (Jan 1, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> Now that Logic supports 1000 instrument tracks disabled + native keyswitch articulation mapping there's really no need for the added complexity and headache of running VEP whatsoever. Unless you are trying to outdue JunkieXL with the biggest template (balls) ever!



I disagree. I hate track enabling/disabling, it’s like waiting for the players to return to the room from the bathroom. I want them waiting to play already and when I change projects not wait for them to-reload.

And I have always seen VE Pro more as aspirin for a headache, not the caused of headaches.


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## Robert Kooijman (Jan 2, 2020)

Yes. Running VEP on the same machine, using normal MIDI tracks.
Like in the old days with outboard MIDI synths & samplers, everything is instantly accessible.


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## Audio Birdi (Jan 2, 2020)

Using it locally, as I got frustrated with saving times within my DAW (Reaper) since it had to save the VI-instance data every time, which stays consistent since I'm use a template. On VEP 6 since the way I use it, one PLAY / Kontakt Instance per VEP Meta Instance would load a heck of a lot slower in VEP 7 and I found bugs when using the enable / disable track / channel feature for MIDI channel 1 per Meta Instance.

I will say that Reaper and using plugins internally is still 10% more efficient than using VEP, but the load time advantages outweigh the CPU efficiency disadvantages due to the disabling / enabling tracks/channels feature.


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## mjsalam (Jan 2, 2020)

Thanks all. For me I primarily work on a laptop using Logic - and given that I am using a slave less and less I'm weighing the benefits of using VEP locally and needing the dongle vs just doing everything in Logic. I haven't really had much in the way of stability issues so I think it comes down to workflow/speed gains.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 2, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> I disagree. I hate track enabling/disabling, it’s like waiting for the players to return to the room from the bathroom



I disagree too - it's the opposite of a headache. But Only Open Plug-ins Needed for Project Playback is a great feature as far as I'm concerned.


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## turnerofwheels (Jan 3, 2020)

My full template is about 130-140 filled up multitimbral instances of Kontakt, all purged, on my local machine with 128gb ram (total ram usage, 60% when all purged) . I've tried loading a fraction that many instances directly in my DAWs and that usually turns into an unplayable mess of CPU spikes. Maybe it's just my computer, maybe VEP has better load balancing for multicores. I don't know.

Also, if the instruments crash, my DAW is fine, and the inverse is true, if my DAW crashes, I don't need to reload everything.

I don't use it for small projects though.


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## Soundhound (Jan 3, 2020)

I use VEP locally, mostly because I'm still trying to squeeze every ounce of life that's left in my 2012 3.47ghz iMac before moving on to something with more horsepower. CPU hungry kontakt instruments bring my iMac to its knees just by looking at it, I can run far more with VEP than I could without it. I originally found it to be a pain in the ass, but have gotten used to it. Depending on how much mac I get next will determine whether I go back to not using VEP.

As others have said, for smaller projects I often go without it.


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## jcrosby (Jan 3, 2020)

Using VEP locally with Live and Bitwig... Both DAWs aren't so great at balancing CPU load with VST instruments... I find I get significantly better performance and stability hosting the usual suspects like Kontakt, Play, etc in VEP if using Live or Bitwig...

Logic however I find holds its own with the latest versions...

With the 'track sleep' feature introduced in 10.4.5 (?) load times are MASSIVLEY reduced along with resources, so much so where I don't find myself needing VEP in Logic locally anymore... (I'm sure the case could be made for local hosting... But Logic's got is own VEP-ish mojo happening as of this summer AFAIC... And, although de-couple's quite useful, there's also nothing quite as frustrating as a VEP crash that leaves VEP instances connected...)

Overall I Prefer the stability that comes with hosting in Logic to the tiny time gains decouple sometimes brings... ((I say "sometimes" because VEP's been a quite finicky and less-stable in macOS the past few years... Once you get a crash that causes instances to stay connected then its a wash, and load times in Logic typically win out as of 10.4.5.))


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## Kent (Jan 3, 2020)

jcrosby said:


> But Logic's got is own VEP-ish mojo happening as of this summer AFAIC...


What do you mean?


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## novaburst (Jan 3, 2020)

Soundhound said:


> CPU hungry kontakt instruments bring my iMac to its knees



Dont you practice purge in kontakt that ability in kontakt is very handy, VSL VI does a kind of the same thing, these options can really help and relax your machine, even if you had a powerful machine i still think you should use purge and also inside VEpro.


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## Guy Rowland (Jan 3, 2020)

Yes, longtime single machine / Cubase windows user here. VE Pro is vastly more efficient than Cubase.

After many different methods, I finally found my ideal workflow last year too - a disabled VE Pro template. Takes a while to set up initially, but its pretty dreamy in practice, and a lot better than Cubase's own disabled tracks as it doesn't freeze everything. Have enable / disable mapped to the pads on my keyboard I don't otherwise use, load times are usually just a few seconds. Most projects come in between 10-20gb, I've found. I work decoupled so save times are very quick, and before I shut down a project I just show all active tracks and unmute the enable commands I have on bar 3 of every track, so next time I load the project it just loads up the tracks I need.


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## jcrosby (Jan 4, 2020)

kmaster said:


> What do you mean?



I just mean that Logic runs as lean as VEP now, and the dynamic track loading feature is just as useful as having a few disconnected VEP instances that I used to connect to only if needed... Now all of my patches can be inside a Logic template without using any resources unless activated.


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## J-M (Jan 4, 2020)

Hells yes, couldn't even imagine going back. With VEPro I can have more active tracks and my save times are a LOT shorter than what they used to be.


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## Soundhound (Jan 5, 2020)

Yes I purge like a coked up runway model, as I only have 32 gigs. Once in a while I get some more room with my 2012 mac mini (just 16 gigs) via VEP, but not often.

Regardless, that's about RAM, has nothing to do with CPU, unless I'm misunderstanding your post??




novaburst said:


> Dont you practice purge in kontakt that ability in kontakt is very handy, VSL VI does a kind of the same thing, these options can really help and relax your machine, even if you had a powerful machine i still think you should use purge and also inside VEpro.


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## InLight-Tone (Jan 6, 2020)

jcrosby said:


> I just mean that Logic runs as lean as VEP now, and the dynamic track loading feature is just as useful as having a few disconnected VEP instances that I used to connect to only if needed... Now all of my patches can be inside a Logic template without using any resources unless activated.


I really don't think that people understand how well this works in Logic. I did the same in Cubase, but the performance in Logic is faster and better at well over 750+ tracks. Studio One, well that was a no go past 100. The only thing I'm missing are m2 drives for the samples. The waiting times are negligible at best. Hit the button and write...


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## Alex Fraser (Jan 6, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> I really don't think that people understand how well this works in Logic. I did the same in Cubase, but the performance in Logic is faster and better at well over 1000+ tracks. Studio One, well that was a no go past 100. The only thing I'm missing are m2 drives for the samples. The waiting times are negligible at best. Hit the button and write...


I concur. It's fast. Over standard SSD Thunderbolt Gen 1 (!), a complete Spitfire multi-articulation section (complete with articulation mapping) loads in the time it takes for a swig of coffee or a quick yawn. And that's without any Kontakt purging. Easy and simple.


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## InLight-Tone (Jan 6, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> I really don't think that people understand how well this works in Logic. I did the same in Cubase, but the performance in Logic is faster and better at well over 750+ tracks. Studio One, well that was a no go past 100. The only thing I'm missing are m2 drives for the samples. The waiting times are negligible at best. Hit the button and write, no routing nightmares,...


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## InLight-Tone (Jan 6, 2020)

Alex Fraser said:


> I concur. It's fast. Over standard SSD Thunderbolt Gen 1 (!), a complete Spitfire multi-articulation section (complete with articulation mapping) loads in the time it takes for a swig of coffee or a quick yawn. And that's without any Kontakt purging. Easy and simple.


That's great to hear. I can't wait to get the drives and off these platters but it's plenty fast already. My bottleneck is NOT waiting for samples to load, it's having phenomenol musical ideas! No purging here as well...


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## jcrosby (Jan 7, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> I really don't think that people understand how well this works in Logic. I did the same in Cubase, but the performance in Logic is faster and better at well over 750+ tracks. Studio One, well that was a no go past 100. The only thing I'm missing are m2 drives for the samples. The waiting times are negligible at best. Hit the button and write...


Absolutely. Apple did something right this time around. Brilliant feature!


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## novaburst (Jan 7, 2020)

Soundhound said:


> Regardless, that's about RAM, has nothing to do with CPU, unless I'm misunderstanding your post??



Oh yer thats all about ram ooops my bet well once purged the library's do load faster so it must be better for cpu as you do get a bit of a cpu spike when loading your apps at least i think you do .... am i digging a deeper grave.........


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## Soundhound (Jan 8, 2020)

Keep digging! It's a favorite pastime of mine.  One of these days I'll make it to China.




novaburst said:


> Oh yer thats all about ram ooops my bet well once purged the library's do load faster so it must be better for cpu as you do get a bit of a cpu spike when loading your apps at least i think you do .... am i digging a deeper grave.........


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## Eugenic (Jan 8, 2020)

I just moved to VEP with this Black Friday sale, because I was hitting a wall with CPU performance (I had a first-generation i7 with 48GB RAM). The improvement in CPU/RAM performance was little, but it helped, as the "low buffer size clicks" stopped and I was able to increase the number of tracks in the template.
Eventually I replaced the whole PC with a Ryzen 3800 and 64GB RAM. It performs well for my needs, I am not pushing it so far as to verify the whole "Cubase woks better with Intels" point.

I think all in all VEP is worth its money, even only for streamlining your process and project loading times.

I am digging the PLE explanation, by the way, thanks to all contributors for that!


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## mjsalam (Sep 8, 2020)

Soundhound said:


> Yes I purge like a coked up runway model, as I only have 32 gigs. Once in a while I get some more room with my 2012 mac mini (just 16 gigs) via VEP, but not often.
> 
> Regardless, that's about RAM, has nothing to do with CPU, unless I'm misunderstanding your post??


Super late...but


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## DigitalMetal (Oct 4, 2020)

I run a 32bit server instance to host my TC Electonic Powercore plugins that are 32bit only but my DAW's are 64bit only, its useful for those 32bit plugins you just dont want to give up and i find VEP much more stable at hosting 32bit plugins than JBridge, DDMF, Bluecat Patchwork or MB7.


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## mscp (Oct 4, 2020)

mjsalam said:


> Curious as to how many are using VEP locally with their DAW and why. I have a single slave which gets some use but I know in the past I've read that some folks prefer to decouple the instrument hosting entirely using VEP on their local machine as well. Anyhow, would love to hear your workflows, opinions,. experiences on this.



Yes. It gives me the ability to switch between Cubase sessions without having to wait for everything to load up each time.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 4, 2020)

jcrosby said:


> I just mean that Logic runs as lean as VEP now, and the dynamic track loading feature is just as useful as having a few disconnected VEP instances that I used to connect to only if needed... Now all of my patches can be inside a Logic template without using any resources unless activated.



But it still doesn’t spread the load throughout the cores as well, and personally I still want all the players already seated in the studio


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## Simon Ravn (Oct 4, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> Now that Logic supports 1000 instrument tracks disabled + native keyswitch articulation mapping there's really no need for the added complexity and headache of running VEP whatsoever. Unless you are trying to outdue JunkieXL with the biggest template (balls) ever!



Nah, not true. Saving projects when hosting plugins like Kontakt inside Logic takes time. Hosting VEP takes literally no time. Logic autosaves in the background all the time without me noticing it and I will always have the latest changes saved (give or take). As soon as I host just a couple of Kontakt instances inside Logic, the project becomes less responsive and you have to wait for saving all the time.

I am moving towards only using VEP on my local machine, but currently sometimes also using a slave. So many benefits to VEP, very few headaches.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 25, 2020)

So for those ITB Logic users on a single machine, VEP running locally still worth it these days? Considering upgrading to VEP 7 even though I never really used the previous versions. Rather than monolithic templates too, I'm moving towards modular ones more and more thanks to Logic's great Library patch feature.


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## Kent (Nov 25, 2020)

absolutely.


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## Ashermusic (Nov 25, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> So for those ITB Logic users on a single machine, VEP running locally still worth it these days? Considering upgrading to VEP 7 even though I never really used the previous versions. Rather than monolithic templates too, I'm moving towards modular ones more and more thanks to Logic's great Library patch feature.



Absolutely. The big Kontakt multi for Afflatus Chapter 1 that you see and hear in my Grusinesque example struggles on my 2018 Mac mini six core i7 in Logic Pro but runs fine in VE Pro 7.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 25, 2020)

kmaster said:


> absolutely.



Curious why? What are the benefits for you?


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## JonS (Nov 25, 2020)

mjsalam said:


> Curious as to how many are using VEP locally with their DAW and why. I have a single slave which gets some use but I know in the past I've read that some folks prefer to decouple the instrument hosting entirely using VEP on their local machine as well. Anyhow, would love to hear your workflows, opinions,. experiences on this.


Yes, I do. The amount of instrument and effects tracks I can use inside DP is substantially bigger when using VEPro locally.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 25, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> Absolutely. The big Kontakt multi for Afflatus Chapter 1 that you see and hear in my Grusinesque example struggles on my 2018 Mac mini six core i7 in Logic Pro but runs fine in VE Pro 7.



Interesting! I would've thought Logic would be more efficient than a third-party program - I wonder if that'll be more true in the future with those M1 chips coming out.


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## Dewdman42 (Nov 25, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> So for those ITB Logic users on a single machine, VEP running locally still worth it these days? Considering upgrading to VEP 7 even though I never really used the previous versions. Rather than monolithic templates too, I'm moving towards modular ones more and more thanks to Logic's great Library patch feature.



The advantages and features of VePro have been explained already on this forum ad infintum. Do some searching here and find lots of info about how VePro can contribute to your workflow.

Its true it is not as mandatory as it once was because of some of the features in LogicPro you mentioned, but it still has other advantages...and may be worth it to you, it just depends on how you want or like to work.


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## Kent (Nov 25, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Curious why? What are the benefits for you?


Off the top of my head, for me it boils down to three things:

1. Decoupled/preserved—the template is loaded up once and all I have to do is connect a project to it. No waiting for things to load each time.
2. Increased 'non-live' buffer multiplier—I can run many more instruments than otherwise.
3. Doing the dirty work—I can make VEP as ugly as I need to so that Logic looks and behaves the same project-to-project. Everything comes in at Unity at the correct volume/spatialization/etc.


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## Ashermusic (Nov 25, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Interesting! I would've thought Logic would be more efficient than a third-party program - I wonder if that'll be more true in the future with those M1 chips coming out.




It has nothing to do with that, it has to do with Logic's "Live mode" architecture, that allows you to load more virtual instruments then other DAWs, but does not spread armed multis throughout the cores well, which VE Pro 7 does better than _any_ DAW, un my experience.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 25, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> It has nothing to do with that, it has to do with Logic's "Live mode" architecture, that allows you to load more virtual instruments then other DAWs, but does not spread armed multis throughout the cores well, which VE Pro 7 does better than _any_ DAW, un my experience.



Does that apply if you don't use multis then and only record arm a single track at a time?


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## Ashermusic (Nov 25, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Does that apply if you don't use multis then and only record arm a single track at a time?



I have not encountered a single instrument so demanding that it was problematic.


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## Leigh (Nov 25, 2020)

The amount of time saved both in saving projects and in switching between projects is quite significant.

And I'm like Jay, "I still want all the players already seated in the studio."

**Leigh


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

This would be a lot more useful to me if Logic properly supported multi-port.


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## Al Maurice (Nov 27, 2020)

After struggling to wait for plugins to load or choke my DAW, why not use VEPRO? I've tried a demo previously, and can see the benefit of being able to switch easily between the DAW and notation apps.

Also some of these newer plugins, tend to write lots of files to disc which consequently affects performance. With the ability to balance load between an SSD and RAM too, can only be of benefit in the long term. Also you can shift the load between several SSDs so they not all trying to be read from simultaneously.


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## Ashermusic (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> This would be a lot more useful to me if Logic properly supported multi-port.



Personally, nowhere near the top of my priority list.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> Personally, nowhere near the top of my priority list.



Surprising given you like articulation maps like me. How do you handle multis for a single instrument right now? For example, with Spitfire Symphonic Strings, I want to control the performance legato, core, and decorative patches from a single track (and single articulation map). The only way I’ve found that works is to use different MIDI channels to switch between them (in the articulation map). However, this requires the Logic instrument track to be set to ALL channels it seems, which means if I then put let’s say CSS violin 1 into the same Konrakt instance at midi channel 4, the SSS track will also play that if I play notes in live.

So then that means I have to have a VEP instance solely for SSS violins 1 it would seem which seems like it would get unwieldy quickly. With midi ports, I could put all my violin 1 patches into the same instance and ensure they used a different port from SSS.


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## Ashermusic (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Surprising given you like articulation maps like me. How do you handle multis for a single instrument right now? For example, with Spitfire Symphonic Strings, I want to control the performance legato, core, and decorative patches from a single track (and single articulation map). The only way I’ve found that works is to use different MIDI channels to switch between them (in the articulation map). However, this requires the Logic instrument track to be set to ALL channels it seems, which means if I then put let’s say CSS violin 1 into the same Konrakt instance at midi channel 4, the SSS track will also play that if I play notes in live.
> 
> So then that means I have to have a VEP instance solely for SSS violins 1 it would seem which seems like it would get unwieldy quickly. With midi ports, I could put all my violin 1 patches into the same instance and ensure they used a different port from SSS.




I don't put instruments from different Kontakt libraries in the same Kontakt instance, I use a couple and create a Summing Stack.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> I don't put instruments from different Kontakt libraries in the same Kontakt instance, I use a couple and create a Summing Stack.



So then you have a different VEP instance per instrument per library? Or do you have all instruments from a library within the same instance?


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## Ashermusic (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> So then you have a different VEP instance per instrument per library? Or do you have all instruments from a library within the same instance?



Different instances.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> Different instances.



Interesting - couldn’t that get fairly unwieldy in VEP (with like a few hundred server instances)? Though I think I did read on the VSL forums that Mac and Logic benefit more from many small instances than fewer large instances.


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## Ashermusic (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Interesting - couldn’t that get fairly unwieldy in VEP (with like a few hundred server instances)? Though I think I did read on the VSL forums that Mac and Logic benefit more from many small instances than fewer large instances.




I probably am using fewer libraries in my templates than you.


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## Kent (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Surprising given you like articulation maps like me. How do you handle multis for a single instrument right now? For example, with Spitfire Symphonic Strings, I want to control the performance legato, core, and decorative patches from a single track (and single articulation map). The only way I’ve found that works is to use different MIDI channels to switch between them (in the articulation map). However, this requires the Logic instrument track to be set to ALL channels it seems, which means if I then put let’s say CSS violin 1 into the same Konrakt instance at midi channel 4, the SSS track will also play that if I play notes in live.
> 
> So then that means I have to have a VEP instance solely for SSS violins 1 it would seem which seems like it would get unwieldy quickly. With midi ports, I could put all my violin 1 patches into the same instance and ensure they used a different port from SSS.


Use the UACC key switch on the same midi channel.


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## Kent (Nov 27, 2020)

Alternatively, flexrouter by @tack is a great way to unlock the B C and D 1-16 channels.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

kmaster said:


> Use the UACC key switch on the same midi channel.



Thanks! Yeah, that's what I ended up landing up but I noticed that Spitfire's performance legato patch doesn't response to UACC it seems (maybe a bug). Even if I set it in the Kontakt, it will always play that patch regardless of UACC.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

kmaster said:


> Alternatively, flexrouter by @tack is a great way to unlock the B C and D 1-16 channels.



Thanks! Yes, going to be looking into this today. Hopefully relatively easy to figure out for my solution. Though I wish Apple would just make multi-ports for AU3 work right!


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## Kent (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> Thanks! Yes, going to be looking into this today. Hopefully relatively easy to figure out for my solution. Though I wish Apple would just make multi-ports for AU3 work right!


What’s working wrong, other than tempo-sync?


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

kmaster said:


> What’s working wrong, other than tempo-sync?



You know what - clearly I hadn't set it up right yesterday, but it seems to be doing what I want now! What are the known drawbacks of using the AU3 plugin at the moment?


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## Kent (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> You know what - clearly I hadn't set it up right yesterday, but it seems to be doing what I want now! What are the known drawbacks of using the AU3 plugin at the moment?


No tempo sync, only 8 instances (but each instance can support over 700 channels so...who needs all that?)


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

kmaster said:


> No tempo sync, only 8 instances (but each instance can support over 700 channels so...who needs all that?)



By instances you mean VEP server instances? I was thinking of doing one instance per instrument group (violin 1, violin 2, etc), but if it is limited to 8, I would need to rethink that. And is there a workaround for tempo sync (for example, CSB has tempo-synced repetitions)?


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## Ashermusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Anything that needs to tempo sync, I generally leave in the DAW instead of in VE Pro. My common sense tells me it is safer.


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## Dewdman42 (Nov 27, 2020)

Not sure what you meant about only 8 instances?

AU3 currently supports 127 source tracks per vepro instance, of which you can have as many instances as you want. Despite what Vsl says, incorrectly, you can use more then 8 ports, up to 48; but only 127 source tracks per instance. 

those source tracks don’t have to be sequential midi channels and ports 1-8, they can be spread all over the range of 48 ports and 16 midi channels each....but only 127 of them.

If one of those source tracks happens to be generating multiple midi channels then you could theoretically address more then 127 midi channels in one vepro instance, up to 768. But you cannot have more then 127 source tracks feeding any multi-timbral instrument in logicpro. Or else it blows up, like TNT.

i haven’t tested 10.6 yet to see if they have fixed any of this stuff, but I doubt it


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## Dewdman42 (Nov 27, 2020)

ALittleNightMusic said:


> By instances you mean VEP server instances? I was thinking of doing one instance per instrument group (violin 1, violin 2, etc), but if it is limited to 8, I would need to rethink that. And is there a workaround for tempo sync (for example, CSB has tempo-synced repetitions)?



see above

I think maybe tempo sync could still work with AU3 and CSB, try it. Specifically what doesn’t work in AU3 is that if you have a plugin inside vepro that has its own sequencer then it won’t play when you hit play on your daw. But I have noticed that tempo changes are still recognized inside vepro. So if csb is using kontakt scripting to accomplish stuff without the transport actually moving, it still may work fine though I guess it might not be able to detect the click. Anyway put that instrument in a smaller instance using AU2 and 16 midi channels, where transport works fine


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Ashermusic said:


> Anything that needs to tempo sync, I generally leave in the DAW instead of in VE Pro. My common sense tells me it is safer.



Right - or I guess I can manipulate the Kontakt tempo directly instead of looking for the external sync. Tried that and it seemed to work as expected.


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## ALittleNightMusic (Nov 27, 2020)

Slowly working my way through creating a locally hosted VEP template. Few nice things I've found so far:
- Mapping the channel disable / enable function in VEP to my MIDI keyboard. Just need to select the track in Logic and hit the button and it enables in the VEP instance. Allows me to keep VEP fully disabled and never need to swap to that window.
- Volume balancing between libraries can occur in VEP (and any permanent EQing) so in Logic I can focus on the rest of the mix.
- If I do decide to work in Cubase one day, I can re-purpose the same server project in VEP.
- AU3 seems to be working fine for my purposes so far. I imagine I'll run into some bugs, but hopefully no show stoppers.
- I can make an instance project for a library that is not necessarily something I want in my core template (like Abbey Road Orchestral Foundation or British Drama Toolkit), set that up in its own Logic project, save that as a Logic template, and then when I want to use it, I load in the instance into VEP and import tracks from that template in Logic. Thought once Logic gets nested folders, maybe I'll want everything in there.


Not sure if this is entirely better than just building a disabled Logic template, but I'm hoping VEPro has some performance gains. If nothing else, maybe it is better for stability. I was contemplating going the fully modular route via Logic's library and track presets, but I think I need "reminders" of what I own (obviously have spent way too much time on Vi-C and bought too many libraries as a result) and the immediacy of having the track right there in front of me is something I won't get with the modular aspect (you have to know what you're looking for to search for it vs. serendipitously trying out a library you may have forgotten about - assuming it is in your template).


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## rmak (Nov 27, 2020)

Hi I'm a bit to new orchestral libraries. I know the Vienna pro is on sale currently, and it is suppose to help with load times. Does it only make sense to start using VE Pro when your template starts to have more than say 5 Kontakt multis. If you haven't accumulated enough libraries, you shouldn't consider it yet because it also takes a while to set up I hear.


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## Leigh (Nov 28, 2020)

I'm mostly using only VSL SYzd Special Edition and UVI Falcon. If time is money for you, I think it would be worth it even with only a few libraries.

**Leigh


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## ketomiu (Mar 13, 2022)

novaburst said:


> Dont you practice purge in kontakt that ability in kontakt is very handy, VSL VI does a kind of the same thing, these options can really help and relax your machine, even if you had a powerful machine i still think you should use purge and also inside VEpro.


I feel in many posts a confusion between CPU usage and RAM usage: purge affects only RAM usage. Please comment and explain if I am wrong.


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