Ever renamed your VST plugins, reinstalled SONAR and found your carefully chosen names changed?  Want to migrate to a new machine and you know you've got some custom VST settings set that you'll lose?  I have and it bugs me no end.
 
And I've come up with a little utility that backs up key VST settings to an XML file and then restores them.  There's also a single-click backup/rescan/restore option too.
 
https://www.dropbox.com/s/j6o5h6jztammexw/VST%20Settings%20Manager.zip?dl=0
 
Notes:
 
1 - I've tested it on Windows 7 x64 with 32 and 64 bit installations of SONAR X3 and SONAR Platinum, but I obviously can't test on a huge variety of machines.
2 - It needs .NET 4.5 installed (Why .NET?  Because I use it in my real job so it's easy for me).
3 - The .config file lists all VST settings that are backed up; this matches a hard-coded list in the application ("Default settings") which I think are important; you can remove some of these or add more if new ones are important to you or are added by Cakewalk - the file format should be obvious.
4 - Extract, virus scan and double click.
5 - Use at your own peril as it can write to the registry (as I say, I've tested quite thoroughly but...); that said, it's useful just to dump out the key settings as a human readable record.
 
A quick copy and paste from the help screen from the latest version:
 
File
 Backup - Backs up all VST settings from all instances of SONAR to CupCake format XML file
 Restore - Restores VST settings stored in CupCake format XML file
 Export All As
  CSV - Saves all VST settings in a Comma Separated Value file for use in Excel
  Registry - Saves all VST settings in a Registry (.reg) file
Exit - Quits CupCake
 
SONAR
 Every instance of SONAR installed has an entry
  History
   Clean - Deletes invalid files from file history
   [1]...[9] - Removes this file from file history and reorders the list
  VSTs - Lists all VSTs installed in this instance
    Paths - Lists all VST scan paths (click to open in Windows Explorer)
      Clean - Removes repeated paths and path stems
  VST Tools
   Scan - Performs standard SONAR VST scan (no reset)
   Rescan - Performs standard SONAR VST scan with rescan
   Backup - Backs up this inventory to CupCake XML file
   Refresh - Backs up user-editable settings, rescans, restores user-editable settings
   Pro Channel, VST 2 and VST 3 submenus, split by plug-in/synth
    [VST] - Click to open editor in tab; control click to open read-only pop-up window
 
Options
 Hide Excluded - Hide excluded VSTs from menus
 Save Inventory On Exit - Stores current list of VSTs in registry for comparison purposes
 Monitor VST Folders - Monitors VST scan paths and shows changes in Path Monitor tab
 
Tools
 Clear Path Monitor Tab - Deletes all contents of Path Monitor tab
 
VST Tab
 Middle click tab or Ctrl-F4 closes window with prompt to save settings to registry
 Double click tab opens read-only pop-up window for comparison
 * indicates edit has been done

Great and thankyou! Haven't checked yet...
Here's an idea.. why not centralize all these utilities into one app and call them SonarToolbox or something? Cheers...

I will dload this tonight
Thanks for sharing with us. And hello to a fellow .netter!

Many thanks for sharing this. Greatly appreciated

6 - You can edit the saved XML file in Notepad or similar to change names and re-import all changes in one go (quicker than doing it one by one).
7 - The default filename is vstsettings_ddmmyyyy.xml (although this may depend on regional language setings), so you can do some basic version control.

8 - Importantly, it's a 64 bit application so won't run on 32 bit Windows, but does deal with 32 and 64 bit installs of SONAR.

KPerry
8 - Importantly, it's a 64 bit application so won't run on 32 bit Windows,

I regard this bit a great feature. Time 32 bit was dumped forever..

Not for the DAW IMNSHO - too many plug-ins don't work in 64 bit (and never will).  Hence it supports 32 and 64 bit installs of SONAR.

Wow!
 
Can we start sending you feature requests?
 
 
 
 

No :-)
 
Well, yes, but no guarantees if/when they'll get done.