Plans for VST Adapter Support in Pro Tools 11

[Ask the Developer Guy]

With many of you asking for clarity on Avid's position on VST adaptors, here is how we view things currently.

Our main goals for the Pro Tools plug-in platform are to (1.) Provide a high-performance, integrated, and stable platform that fully supports our current and future product roadmap, and (2.) Foster a healthy 3rd party community of plug-in developers from the most respected brands in the industry along with compelling, high-quality new brands.

Pro Tools 11 running AAX plug-ins offers greatly improved levels of stability and performance. These improvements are provided by plug-ins developed according to the AAX specification. We want to ensure that Pro Tools users get uncompromised performance without any confusion or any doubt as to the authenticity of their AAX experience. To that end we do not plan on supporting utilities that convert VST plug-ins into AAX plug-ins or load VST plug-ins directly into the AAX plug-in menu. For the avoidance of doubt, this means that Avid will not allow an AAX adapter similar to the VST-to-RTAS adapter offered by Fxpansion, and we will uphold our decision not to allow the TransVST product briefly marketed by Sugar Bytes. I can’t emphasize strongly enough that these two companies are invaluable partners to us (and indeed, both are AAX plug-in developers).

We remain open to developers providing access to VST processing in Pro Tools if the products make clear in their interfaces that VST plug-ins are being used as part of an AAX plug-in. For example, a multi-effect plug-in might have a VST plug-in shell implemented within the user interface and accessible within a separate menu of clearly labeled VST plug-ins.

Pro Tools has had a vibrant community of plug-in developers for over 20 years and it is constantly evolving. Over the past few weeks alone, the momentum of developers porting products to AAX is massive. If you come across a VST plug-in that is not available on AAX, we encourage you to put the developer in touch with us to get on board. We offer a full range of support materials and services for developers who want to make this transition and you may refer them directly to me at [email protected].

Thank you, and I will monitor this thread for your feedback. We hope that you agree that this approach is a balanced solution that addresses the interests of end users and developers practically.

[Bill Denton]

Oh, boy...

I hope you are prepared to have every word and nuance beaten over the head with a stick, and word 3 combined with word 27 and word 33 to make sentences that have absolutely no relationship to what you actually said.

Send me your boss' email and I'll recommend you for combat pay...

[YYR123]

Wow this is gonna be a long thread - combat pay approved

[Oblivion777]

Well in a way I think this might be a prudent decision; now I realize that a good lot of you people want VST support in ProTools (either as VST or as an adapter), but on the other hand when the problems would start occurring who would you blame? Avid? The VST bridge maker? And at the end of the day PT stability might suffer because of that and we'd again complain why PT is not stable and is crashing all the time. I applaud Avid's decision to get rid of all the old stuff (RTAS, TDM, etc.) and start anew. It is to be expected that such a cut would be and indeed is met with resistance from the users who have invested much in certain type of plug-ins who are now reluctant to support yet another format. And I understand the frustration. But looking at a larger scheme I think that supporting one format instead of a number of them (even if through adapters/bridges) will ultimately lead to a more stable system. While it is true, that we are still missing quite some PI's in AAX (especially AAX-DSP), they are slowly coming and I'm certain (or at least hope that) we will see more of them in the (near) future.

[rockridge]

Originally Posted by Ask the Developer Guy

We remain open to developers providing access to VST processing in Pro Tools...

Do you mean VST versions wrapped in a dedicated AAX shell provided by each company?

Originally Posted by Ask the Developer Guy

For example, a multi-effect plug-in might have a VST plug-in shell implemented within the user interface and accessible within a separate menu of clearly labeled VST plug-ins

That sounds like VST support in PT 11; what separate menu are you talking about?

Respectfully, I just don't buy the stability argument... when talking about software... ANY software.
This whole situation smacks of desperation on Avid's part.
If AAX was doing SO well, there would have been no need for this thread.

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by rockridge

Do you mean VST versions wrapped in a dedicated AAX shell provided by each company?



That sounds like VST support in PT 11; what separate menu are you talking about?

Respectfully, I just don't buy the stability argument... when talking about software... ANY software.
This whole situation smacks of desperation on Avid's part.
If AAX was doing SO well, there would have been no need for this thread.

Actually with the new 64 bit aax in PT 11, plugins are dual buffer (input-output) to minimize latency. This is not inherent in vst's and this is possible with a wrapper. A shell could possibly do this. I don't see this as desperate whatsoever as it makes more work and money for devs, not avid.

[Jay_uk]

Plans for VST Adapter Support in Pro Tools 11

What Plans

[sonnie]

Hmmm, ask your developer... I already asked two of them for develop a AAX (32 or 64 bit)

Response 1:
Yes, but the release date is unknown and highly depends on Avid, which is extremely slow and unresponsive.

Response 2:
We would, but contacting Avid as a dev for support is nearly useless. Depends on them.

I don't think its the dev's fault that there are just a few cross-platform Plugins.
Just my two cents.

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by sonnie

Hmmm, ask your developer... I already asked two of them for develop a AAX (32 or 64 bit)

Response 1:
Yes, but the release date is unknown and highly depends on Avid, which is extremely slow and unresponsive.

Response 2:
We would, but contacting Avid as a dev for support is nearly useless. Depends on them.

I don't think its the dev's fault that there are just a few cross-platform Plugins.
Just my two cents.

???? There are tons of cross platform plugins?????

[remute]

Originally Posted by Oblivion777

but on the other hand when the problems would start occurring who would you blame? Avid? The VST bridge maker? And at the end of the day PT stability might suffer because of that and we'd again complain why PT is not stable and is crashing all the time.

Having already had a wrapper for a number of years now, I don't recall the forum being clogged with threads criticizing Avid for the wrapper's instability or issues arising from using it.

Anyone with a problem quite rightly went to FXpansion's forum. End of.


The utterly spurious strawman argument that this decision has been made to protect "the authenticity of the AAX experience" would be laughable if it didn't mean that if users upgrade they'll lose access to a whole raft of unique synths and FX unless they shell out yet more money for VEPro.

The whole statement reeks of doublespeak and, in effect, says nothing beyond "we don't want to do this because we don't want to."

With the Fxpansion wrapper available did anyone out there feel their RTAS "experience" was "inauthentic"?