Replace old softsynth with new version?

If anyone comes up with a process, I could write some sort of C# utility program that one could run to rename things and make backup copies of pre/post changed dll's.

It's certainly easy enough to write a program to rename things, it would be the creation of the steps that the program would need to do that would be the hard part, as different vendors do things differently, and sometimes change their methodologies for naming newly-released modules from time to time.

But again, if between us forum folks we could come up with the functionality design, implementing it would not be particularly difficult.  Perhaps vendor or product 'profiles' could be created in all of this, so that the program could follow a particular set of steps depending on the vendor or specific product - per the profile.

I would think that such a utility program could as part of its functionality create a master list of all successfully scanned plugin names, and allow comparison of versions, or that sort of thing, to identify changes in installed dll's.  Such a list would be created from the VST scan path folder names.  I suppose each dll could be queried as well, as they follow the VST spec and do have imbedded information within each such dll, as well.  Just tossing out quick ideas.

Anyways, I am game to help by creating such a utility, but would certainly need to have collective input on what it would need to do.

Bob Bone

I thought Sonar had a "replace synth" option?

See your point. I don't think it is possible. When they release new versions they get a new VST ID or whatever. It's like a different plug. I'm not sure of the technical mumbo-jumbo, that's why I work with something that has nothing to do with programming

But I often wish for the same but when it comes to Kontact, I just save the whatever I have there as a Multi, load new Kontakt and open the Multi and reassign all the tracks to the new Kontakt. A little tedious but It rarely takes more than a couple  of minutes.
 
 
 
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Sorry, didn't read your first post properly
Don't think there's much to do. Personally, I tend to just leave the old version in the project and finish it with that and eventually it will phase it self out of my projects. If there's a new version I need to use a new library or whatever, I just add an instance of the new plug and load what I need, not bothering with the old version.
 
But yes, it would be awesome to just automagically replace the plugin's existence on the DAW-

The thing is - when you update a soft synth, the settings might very well be different from the old version, so when you load an old project, that had the old version - it may not sound the same when you load the new version.

That's usually why the developers call the new version a different name. Usually, if a new version can read the settings from an old version, and not get confused, or make the sound different, they let you overwrite the dll with the new version.

In other words, it's for our own good that we get new versions with different named dlls. I don't think we want a utility to force an old project (with an older version of the synth) to load the newer version.

I hope this makes sense. I know what I mean but am having trouble explaining it. ;-)

I think the only time I lost settings from a soft synth was when I had a primary drive failure and reinstalled the world - Kontakt 5 and Sonar included.  An in-project multi-rack I had set up was lost, because I had never actually saved the multi-rack.  It just kept loading properly when I loaded that project, so I never worried about it - until it was gone.  

From that experience, I learned that if I tweak settings for a soft synth, like creating a multi-rack in Kontakt within a project, with multiple instruments and custom output routings, that it is QUITE prudent to actually save that multi-rack.  

It then gets backed up with my regular backups, and is a matter of a simple reload, rather than a complete rebuild.
Bob Bone

Is it possilbe to save the preset in Kontakt 4 and load it in 5? Not the dropdown menu one but the VST button and save it there? Then open it back up in Kontakt 5.

It would have been nice if someone from Cakewalk had responded.  Maybe next time I won't start a technical thread on the weekend.