VST2 and VST3 preset change on TH3

[elPaletti]

Hi  , I have been preparing a live guitar show on Cakewalk and I needed to change the presets of TH3 at some places in the show.

So what I did was ,I created an empty midi track and put all the program changes in the right times so that I don`t have to change the guitar sound manually during the show.

The problem is that I can only do it if I use the VST2 version of TH3 not the VST3.

This problem seems to be on many VST3s .

Is there a work around to use VST3 instead of VST2??

Thanks in advance.

Peace

[user 905133]

I was under the impression from a couple of hosts and numerous plug-in I tried that one of the drawbacks of VST3 is that we cannot use midi program change commands (Cn vv in hex). I never tested this with TH3, but it is consistent with all my other plug-ins.

[azslow3]

You can write thanks to Stainberg for killing MIDI in VST3 and making VST2 obsolete... Not a joke.

You can also ask Overloud to change Program Changes to Control Changes (which are still allowed in VST3) or implement horrible workaround to support PC and check it really works in Cakewalk (Steinberg SDK does not really follow Steinberg documentation for that SDK in that part, so no one really knows how to make it work universal way... again, that is not a joke).

 

[elPaletti]

Thanks

I`ll keep using the VST2 till I can

Peace

[Craig Anderton]

23 hours ago, azslow3 said:

You can write thanks to Stainberg for killing MIDI in VST3 and making VST2 obsolete... Not a joke.

You can also ask Overloud to change Program Changes to Control Changes (which are still allowed in VST3) or implement horrible workaround to support PC and check it really works in Cakewalk (Steinberg SDK does not really follow Steinberg documentation for that SDK in that part, so no one really knows how to make it work universal way... again, that is not a joke).

I've yet to find a VST3 amp sim that responds to program changes, although many VST2 ones do. I was told by a developer that it's possible to implement program changes for VST3 plug-ins, but that companies aren't doing it for some reason...I don't remember why. Or maybe it's actually not possible?

[azslow3]

43 minutes ago, Craig Anderton said:

I've yet to find a VST3 amp sim that responds to program changes, although many VST2 ones do. I was told by a developer that it's possible to implement program changes for VST3 plug-ins, but that companies aren't doing it for some reason...I don't remember why. Or maybe it's actually not possible?

I was looking for some GM synth which works under Linux (in fact I was looking for something working under Linux and Windows under REAPER). And since I have found nothing, I have rolled my own from FluidSynth. There is no legal way to write VST2 (there is only "gray" way), but there is GPL3 license for VST3. So, I have tried to use it.

GM synth without program changes is obviously "no go", so I have searched really hard in all forums. As usual, I was also reading  VST3 SDK source code and related documentation (and least for the topic in question). My conclusion I have already mentioned, the source code does not match the documentation...

In all cases, unlike with VST2 it is not possible to deliver arbitrary MIDI messages to VST3 plug-in. They have decided MIDI messages are obsolete. Well, it is still possible to SEND MIDI messages from VST3 plug-in, related functions have "legacy" prefix. That was introduced years after VST3 was published, under heavy pressure from users.

For receiving something, plug-in should organize separate infrastructure for each message type. For PC, plug-in should expose a list of presets. And then Host can (yes, just can, not must...) automatically convert PC messages into preset changes. For 128 possible values on 16 different channels.... yup...   1024 presets should be exposed to the host. BTW for CC, plug-in should create separated parameter for each CC on each channel. At least they do not ask to created something for each value of each CC parameter, for PC they effectively do.

I (and some other) use my FluidSynth VST3 https://github.com/AZSlow3/FluidSynthVST

It does not work in Cakewalk (I have not looked why), but it does work in REAPER. It seems like I have understood the concept right (I doubt it could work otherwise).

 

[jackson white]

14 hours ago, Craig Anderton said:

a VST3 amp sim that responds to program changes

At least two of the PA amp sims support "bank" changes (Fuchs Train II/Chandler). Maybe not the same as a different preset, but useful.

My pet peeve with the VST3 versions is not displaying the loaded preset name, This is a major PITA when working on multiple channels with their console emulations. (only installed the VST3 versions, haven't  checked the VST2.4 versions)

Edited May 21, 2021 by jackson white
clarification