Vst plugin cull

Over the years I've whittled my collection down to the point where it no longer makes sense to organize them by category, since nowadays I'll only have 1 or 2 of each type. Instead, I organize them by vendor, e.g. Waves, FabFilter, Meldaproduction, Voxengo, and a large miscellaneous category called Rarely Used.
 
That latter group holds all the stuff I don't use anymore but hang onto for compatibility with old projects. That's divided into:

• Amp Sims and Distortion 
• Dynamics (gates, comps, limiters)
• Delays
• Filters
• Instruments
• Measurement (various meters)
• Modulators (autopan, chorus, flanger, phaser, pitch shifter)

 

Culling...
 
Wisdom here...  Our next generation will probably hit the zenith of GAS and revert back to a very few tried and true basics. Hope this is the scenerio. Can see some forum up the road shaking their heads about the excesses of the old 2014 dudes.. Many of us here (or sorry, maybe just me...) chasing the latest and greatest, wasting time chasing the sound without actually producing the sound.
 
Was listening to a couple Yardbirds clips from the last so ancient 1960's. Page and Beck.
 
These guys had an amp and a spring reverb. Macho incredible stuff based on raw talent, inspiration and creative juice.
 
Got about every hi dollar plug the Yen can buy, but can't do what they did.
 
Less is more I'm beginning to understand.
 
John
 
 

The sad part is, I could probably get really creative if I started using many of them just because I may have to approach the same problem a slightly different way.
 

When I upgraded to X3 this spring with a new computer, I left all my old 3rd party plugins behind...which I had folders full of...and kept all the installs, etc. Now,  I only use what came with Cakewalk...and the Sony stuff I got with CD arch/Sound Forge/vegas/Acid.  The Sony stuff I basically only use in the Sony programs..if I use them at all.  My machine is so unclutter now in that dept, it is actually great.  I don't need *legacy* plugins, because all my old stuff is already mixed and the few sessions I've revisited, my preference was the newer 64 bit plugs anyway.

It's like the old days in the studio when I had one Eventide, one LA3A, natural reverb chamber and a handful of good mics.  You made decisions and moved on.

Not to mention, I LOVE reading about the new stuff, but the GAS is now gone.  I'd rather have something more useful than another virtual reverb or compressor.  That *something* might be..... another guitar!! ;-D

bitflipper
BTW, I have a little tool that I wrote for my own use that gathers information about all my VSTs and puts it into an Excel spreadsheet. It just occurred to me that others might find it useful, too. Especially while culling. Send me a PM with your email address if you'd like to try it out.

 
yes please!
 
musicroom98 At yahoo

Ed, I didn't get the most recent email. I don't know why, you're not on my spam list, honest. But I do have your email address from previous correspondences, so I sent you the exe.
 
EDIT: I found the email in my spam folder. Note that I had sent the file to your gmail address. If you don't get it, let me know and I'll re-send to the other email.
 
EDIT 2: the email was bounced back, rejected by your email server because the attachment was a zip file containing an executable. I will try re-sending it, this time with the file renamed VSTInventory.txt. If that works, just rename the file to VSTInventory.zip. I'll see about copying it up to dropbox or something.

I rely on the meta data organization already in X3. It has my main plug-ins organized into categories that I simply right click on to go to any designated area. The categories are mastering,eq,drums,guitars and vocals among several others. ...at least my best plug-ins were set up that way. I have a huge misc. folder labeled  and it has all of the odd stuff mostly labeled by manufacturer.
All of my T-racks stuff is in there and a whole bunch of other stuff. I know where it is mostly by memory. I really have no intention to change that system until I replace the computer, and then I might do something similar to mixmkr and trim it down a bit, especially since I keep getting "you're not registered" messages on those T-racks plug-ins and I know darned well I am registered. I went through the process of registering a few of them but it seems they all need to be independently registered AGAIN...
I don't ever see myself not using any third party plug-ins though...I'll always keep the ones I like best.

Hi Bit,
 
Downloaded fine with ie11 and ran without problems on my 32bit laptop.
 
I though it hadn't worked at first so tried again and a then as administrator, it took a little bit of time to compile and so ended up with multiple sheets!!!
 
Great little tool thanks for sharing!

Great bit. Thanks for sharing!!

Hi.. that programs is pretty nifty Bit.
 
Its spotted all my 32bit plugins - cool.
 
1 question though.. it hasn't located any of my X64 plugins. Sorry bout this...
 
(Using Vistax64)
 
 
 

Noice but it only looked at 32bit bit.

Hey Dave,
 
By registered do you mean installed directory?
 
Not at the DAW right now. But email me what you need (i.e. registry entry?) and I'll get back to you.

McQ. No. TBH I have not even tried yet.