Kilohearts won't go away? Solved

[Sock Monkey]

I downloaded and installed the KIlohearts free collection ( just the VST 3)  almost a year ago about the time I first switched to Sonar. I didn't really find anything I liked so a few months later I tried to uninstall it. 

I don't remember what I exactly did but it seems I obliterated everything somehow. 

But I noticed they were all still showing in the VST 3  list in Sonars plug in Manager. They did not show on my Plug in lists as I had already excluded them before the attempt to uninstall. 

Here is the message I get when I tried to exclude them again. Note that clicking YES does nothing. 

There is absolutely no sign of them on any of my hard drives. 

I was hoping my fresh install of Sonar would fix this weird bug. Nope.

Then I was thinking possibly I did uninstall it wrong. So I re downloaded and installed the Kilohearts Installer App. I let it re install all the plug ins and then I re booted and then I Uninstalled them all. Nope. Same exact message in plug in manager. 

There is no sign of a way to uninstal the actual installer app?  This is the app and you can see I unchecked them all and it confirms they are uninstalled. 

 

Here's the Apps list it's not listed. I also checked in the Control panel - I think this is the problem.   They all are still showing in the plug in manager. 

I guess once I figured this out I probably deleted all manually in the program folders. I just looked in the Reg editor and it wasn't listed. 

So I need to get rid of it and I think I'll see if the vendor has an answer. 

But if anybody has advice I'm all ears. I really don't like stuff like this lurking in my Daw application folders. 

 

 

Edited Saturday at 09:22 PM by Sock Monkey

[Jeremy Oakes]

I tried to reply to you suggesting a registry clean up manually or with an app but my reply got the pink "needs to be approved"

Good Luck,

J

[David Baay]

The registry entries are made by Sonar when is scans. You just need to do re-scan from Plugin Manager and it will remove registry entries for for which files are no longer present. I just leave Automatic Background Scan enabled in preferences and Sonar keeps track of all comings and goings of plugin files and will update within seconds of a change.

[Sock Monkey]

4 minutes ago, David Baay said:

The registry entries are made by Sonar when is scans. You just need to do re-scan from Plugin Manager and it will remove registry entries for for which files are no longer present. I just leave Automatic Background Scan enabled in preferences and Sonar keeps track of all comings and goings of plugin files and will update within seconds of a change.

Thanks, I had not tried that, I always scan in preferences now. But it does not change the situation. I get the same dialogue when I try and exclude them. I guess it's buried deep in the registry.

 

 I opened Reg Edit and used the Find option and it most certainly found the ghosts. I claims they are still in the VST folder but it is empty. 

 

Is it safe to try and delete them from that list?  I'll do a Registry back up first.

[OutrageProductions]

If the VST3 files have indeed been deleted from your C:/Program Files/Common Files/vst3 directory, then search (as you have) for all "kilohearts" references in the registry and delete the regkeys.

Most of the references will occur in:

Computer\HKEY_USERS\{your user ID}\SOFTWARE\Cakewalk Music Software\Cakewalk\Cakewalk VST X64\Inventory\c:/program files/common files/vst3/Kilohearts/kHs {actual plugin reference}

Then rescan in the DAW and they should be gone.

[Sock Monkey]

I deleted those registry entries shown in my screenshot and that seems to have worked.  

Thanks for your help. 

[David Baay]

Hmmm.... strange that scanning did not fix it. I just checked by removing a file from my VST3 folder, and Sonar detected it within 5-10 seconds and removed the entry from the registry. No fuss, no muss.

[Sock Monkey]

This was a corruption due to the fact Kilohearts doesn’t seem to have a proper un installation system. 
All it does is remove the VST dll from the Common VSt3 folder. It doesn’t clean the register. 
Because there’s no sign of the Installer app in Windows Apps or Control Panel Programs I had to delete the folder in Program Data. 
This doesn’t surprise me being they are freebies. Par for the course. 
I had made the mistake of installing them directly to my main computer instead of my usual habit of first installing them on my testing machine. My bad. 

Edited Sunday at 04:42 AM by Sock Monkey

[sjoens]

Plugins are a bag of worms anymore.  I had plugins show up in the PM that I had physically removed, yet I could insert and use them.  Others weren't in the PM but were in the insert list.  Still others in the PM reported bogus folder paths.   Probably a sign the registry is wonky.

Kontakt is the worst.  I used to have 2 different versions installed that scanned and worked fine with all 6 plugins (3 each) until recently.  Now I can only get one or two of the 3 to show up in PM.

[Sock Monkey]

Yep I’ve had all kinds of problems over time.  Last year it was every older project I opened said Addictive drums and You Lean meter were missing? 
I am a person who always uses default location other than the sample libraries. So how could they be missing if they are right where they always were .
 I only use the Common VST 3 folder and The Steinberg folder.  Then each Daw has its own default plug in  folder. 
I always exclude plugins that I don’t use regularly. If I need it it’s easy to add it back in. 
 

Oh well got rid of these turkeys. 🦃 

 

[David Baay]

2 hours ago, Sock Monkey said:

This was a corruption due to the fact Kilohearts doesn’t seem to have a proper un installation system. 
All it does is remove the VST dll from the Common VSt3 folder. It doesn’t clean the register. 

As I said, the registry entries belong to Sonar. A plugin installer/uninstaller doesn't know or care what DAWs you have installed or what/where they write to the registry when they scan. Sonar's scan should have detected the file was no longer in place and removed the registry entries.

[Sock Monkey]

9 hours ago, David Baay said:

Sonar's scan should have detected the file was no longer in place and removed the registry entries.

Thanks for the clarification. That would explain why there were no Reg. entries for my other Daw’s.   

It’s another reason why I wanted to remove them as they were cluttering up a lot of other plug in managers. 

 In the dialogue I would get when I choose exclude the plug in, it asks if I want to remove it from the register. I did this dozens of times since like last July!
 nothing would happen. This seems like the root of the problem. 

It’s still an odd system that Kilohearts uses. 
You download the installer which actually doesn’t install on your computer. No icon, nothing in Apps. Nothing on program list. 
I had to drag the file from my download folder to the desktop. 


But now you have explained how it’s actually your Daw that makes the Reg entry all that makes sense. 

There seems to be 3 types of plug ins.

1- The ones that use their own installer and they give you options as you install. 
If you no longer need it you can uninstall it using  the Apps list. This is advisable as these often create multiple files spread in a dozen locations. 

2- Ones that are a simple dll that you drag into the plug n folder of your choice. 
When you don’t want it you simply delete it or move it to a folder that is not scanned by your Daw. These  are usually downloaded in a folder that contains the different formats and instructions. my favourite. 

3-Plug ins that require a download manager that installed with a desktop icon. Like Melda. 
These give you access to free, paid and demo’s of all of their products in a convenient location. This is what I assumed the Kilohearts were but I guess it was something else. More like #2. 
 

 

 

Edited Sunday at 05:25 PM by Sock Monkey

[Amberwolf]

BTW, depending on what options exist in newer versions of the plugin manager, you may have to select the option to rescan existing plugins for it to check to see if they're still there.   If it's not even checking for that, it isn't likely to remove entries for missing ones. 

 

FWIW, I despise that category 3 type--I don't want anything on the system other than the actual programs that are doing the work I need done.  Anything else is just one more layer of crap to break and keep me from using the things that do my work, and one more layer of crap between me and getting them to work again.   Same thing with "authorization" and "licensing" programs.   If plugins or software has those, then regardless of how "good" they are, or cost (even "free"), they're not worth the heartache they're going to cause me at some point, if not immediately.   

I have not had *any* program using one of those schemes that did not have a serious problem at some point, causing me hours, days, or weeks of grief trying to get it fixed, usually with little or no help from the company that supplied it or made it--and for some of them that were no longer around, it wasn't even possible to fix, especially the ones that require their servers to be working and accessible to even use the program.     

So...I pass on all of those.   Just give me files I can unzip into place and run directly, or stick in my VST/etc folders to be scanned, etc., and I'll be much much happier.    

[Bristol_Jonesey]

Don't forget the power of the RESET button in the VST scanner

Hit this before running s scan.

[Sock Monkey]

Yes good point! 
I generally just use Manual scan and if I install a new plugin I run it right away before I forget. 

I only open the older plugin manager when I need to check if something is missing or to exclude stuff that is causing clutter. I don’t think I’ve scanned from there in years.