Mixcraft Not Responding When Scanning For Plug-ins

[dpaterson]

Hi all.

Don't panic (because of the title)!!! Just some useful (useless???) information below.

Just upgraded to Melodyne Studio and wanted to re-scan all VST folders and plug-ins just to make sure that all was well. At first and on a few occasions Mixcraft would get to a certain point and then simply "bomb" i.e. just close all by itself. What I noticed though was that during the scan: at some point the error "Not Responding" was appearing in the main Mixcraft (window) title bar (right at the top of the screen). Well it turns out: I just now have sooo many plug-ins (and some take longer than others to initialise e.g. AD, BFD3) that Window itself THINKS that Mixcraft has stopped responding while it's scanning and Windows then eventually just closes Mixcraft believing that it's stopped responding / crashed. HOWEVER: the workaround for this is to not move your mouse pointer out of the plug-ins window (it's actually called a dialog box) and when prompted to "Rescan all effects" / "Yes / No" put your mouse pointer on "Yes" but press ENTER and don't click on "Yes" and then move the mouse pointer until the scan is done. Essentially what's happening is that when the main Mixcraft window has focus (not going to go into the gory detail here i.e. what makes you think I used to do this for a living in another life??? LOL!!!): because it is taking so long (in my case) to re-scan all of these plug-ins then Windows believes there's problem and simply shuts Mixcraft down after a period. True: after this Mixcraft will continues where it left off when starting up again EXCEPT it skips and deactivates whatever plug-in it was attempting to initialise at the time that Windows deemed it fit to simply close Mixcraft.

Note: the above is not an error or a problem with Mixcraft i.e. only an issue for somebody like me who is (clearly) "plug-in addicted"!!! LOL!!! (And it's not my workstation either i.e. the thing is FAST. It's just the sheer volume that Mixcraft has to cope with in my case is all BUT it could happen to you!!! LOL!!!).

Come to think of it: the fact that Mixcraft is even able to load all of these plug-ins is no mean feat and quite an accomplishment in of itself!!!

Regards,

Dale.

[grumpysnake]

Hi Dale,
Out of curiosity in regards to your post, how many plugins would it take to cause such an issue?
I'm currently rocking around 540 plugins I think last time I checked, which takes Mixcraft around 13 seconds to load.

Regards,
-J

[dpaterson]

Hello grumpysnake.

Hmmmnnn... The way you ask the question made me think i.e. possibly I'm not being as precise as I should be.

To begin with and to answer your question:

According to Mixcraft there are only 381 plug-ins being initialised (loaded???) and that takes about 2 seconds to happen i.e. that's how long it takes Mixcraft to load and initialise.

I think I may have interchanged the initialising (loading???) process and the re-scan process or not been clear in my first post:

This non-responsive state only appears when RE-SCANNING for plug-ins NOT when initialising them (there's a subtle difference so far as I can tell). And the re-scan takes about two minutes from within Mixcraft. And a rudimentary calculation tells me that Mixcraft has to scan through about 12 folders and around 500 or so files in order to build its list of plug-ins (those relevant to the version i.e. either 32-bit or 64-bit) (I run exclusively 64-bit and I have more 64-bit plug-ins than 32-bit plug-ins so 32-bit Mixcraft does this a bit faster).

In other words and to be clear: it's only when RE-SCANNING that this happens. Once all is scanned etc. then Mixcraft loads and initialises everything in about 2 seconds as noted above.

Also (I wasn't too clear on this either):

This non-responsive state starts and stops during the re-scan process and it seems that there's about 5 or 6 plug-ins that cause it i.e. that take longer to initialise / re-scan (gotta be careful of my choice of words here). For example: the re-scan seems to slow at Melodyne (Studio), Addictive Drums, BFD3 BUT I cannot say for sure if it's these plug-ins or if Mixcraft at this point is simply scanning for more valid plug-ins after loading them and it's the actual scanning process, not the initialisation process, that's taking the time. But Mixcraft "comes back" from the non-responsive state (according to Windows) at certain points during the re-scan.

Dunno if I'm being clear here i.e. just reading through the above it seems a bit jumbled but I don't know of another way to explain.

But I do need to re-iterate that this is not a problem i.e. it's just something I noticed yesterday is all. As I said: worst case scenario is that Mixcraft "bombs" during the re-scan and scans again the next time that you try to run Mixcraft (as noted: it will unfortunately skip whatever plug-in it was busy trying to load at the time is all).

I SUPPOSE, if there was a way (not sure), Mixcraft could tell Windows to give it more time or tell Windows to "get lost I'm still busy" and then this wouldn't happen. That would be a solution really. But I don't think this is something that Acoustica should have sleepless nights about!!! LOL!!!

Regards,

Dale.

[dpaterson]

Ohhh man...

Now you've got me going on this!!! LOL!!!

Take a look here (try stay awake):

https://youtu.be/YwnPcMOV-gs

First of all note how quick Mixcraft starts up. This is because all of my plug-ins are ALREADY initialised at this point. But watch what happens on a RE-SCAN of the plug-ins i.e. at one point (0:39) the dialog box shows "(Not Responding)" at the very top. The re-scan continues though. Mixcraft "comes back" at 1:57 and the re-scan completes no problem.

Now to be honest and because I cannot leave well alone: I've been testing some more this morning. First of all: this does not happen, nor does it work, every single time. It would appear that this has more to do with caching (disk and other) more than anything else. In other words: if I reboot my notebook and have run all manner of temp file cleaners etc. just before the reboot then the RE-SCAN process is VERY slow and sometimes, in spite of my little "solution" of not moving / using the mouse, Mixcraft does just "bomb" (although I'm sure it's Windows that's doing it i.e. assumes that Mixcraft has become unresponsive and simply closes it). This being said: I have noticed that it "bombs" ALWAYS on the same plug-in i.e. T-RackS CS Classic Multiband Limiter (or, should I say, after Mixcraft has bombed, it's always THIS plug-in that is "<Unable to load>"). This also being said: I don't think it's the plug-in but rather the fact that SOMETIMES Windows has just become impatient and closes Mixcraft while Mixcraft is still looking for the rest of the plug-ins in the folders. Cannot be sure. I suppose I could rename the thing and then run a few re-scans and see what happens although not sure it warrants the effort (I don't even use this plug-in).

Wow!!! Sure got a lot of info. for something that I don't actually believe to be a problem!!! LOL!!!

Regards,

Dale.

[grumpysnake]

Hi Dale,
I see what you mean now sorry for my misunderstanding . I used to have an issue similar to this on my laptop, I run Mixcraft out live so I can use the instruments when playing keys. Whenever I rescanned Windows would crash out on the Waves-Shell dll file one easy to fix is to uninstall and then reinstall while Mixcraft is closed then re-open and all should be well (thus this method eliminates the scan for new plugins as they get automatically loaded).
-J

[dpaterson]

Hello again.

No worries (gave me an excuse to make a little video anyway!!! LOL!!!).

NOW what WOULD be interesting (Acoustica Greg):

Is there any little "switch" or "trick" OUTSIDE of Mixcraft that would force Mixcraft to re-scan all of the plug-ins before loading itself???

Hoping for an "elegant" solution (Greg) I have, in the meantime, discovered one trick to accomplish the above:

Run 32-bit Mixcraft and re-scan from within.
When you then exit 32-bit Mixcraft and run 64-but Mixcraft it is then forced to re-scan!!! (Sure beats uninstalling and re-installing!!! LOL!!!). (And me thinks I've got WAY too much time on my hands!!! LOL!!!).

Regards,

Dale.

[Acoustica Greg]

Hi,

I generally try to avoid rescanning, because I'm impatient. I just add the new VST folder (if there is one) and then restart Mixcraft. If you're just installing a new plugin into a VST folder that Mixcraft already knows about, just restart Mixcraft and it will find it.

A convenient way to add a new VST folder to the list of recognized VST folders is to just drag and drop the DLL file for a plugin that is installed in that new VST folder from Windows into Mixcraft (and then restart Mixcraft).

Greg

[Mark Bliss]

Yeah, like Greg, I try to work around the rescan.

You have it right, if you dump the temp files, the rescan becomes more "involved'
We wouldn't want it to do that automatically upon opening the program would we!

Personally, I try to thin the collection to what I actually use..... That means regularly purging the stuff I never use, and "quarantining" the stuff I only occasionally use, or just think I might use sometime.....
Loading up a bunch of stuff I don't need just goes against my grain I guess.

But yeah, I know some plug in collectors just don't want to hear it......

But as several recent forum threads have shown, there's no shortage of distractions to potentially get in the way of getting anything constructive done!

(Guilty of it myself at times! )

[dpaterson]

Thanks for this:

But as several recent forum threads have shown, there's no shortage of distractions to potentially get in the way of getting anything constructive done!

Now I feel guilty too!!! You got me!!! LOL!!!

Regards,

Dale.

[Acoustica Greg]

Hi,

I mean, the rescan shouldn't just freeze, but that kind of thing can happen when people include non-VST folders in the list of VST folders, or install non-VST DLL files into a VST folder, or have some buggy or corrupted plugin.

But it's not that hard to manually maintain your list of VST folders by going into Preferences > Plug-Ins > Edit VST/VSTi Folders.

Greg

[rrichard63]

... or install non-VST DLL files into a VST folder ...

Most (or even all) Izotope plugins require this. Since I have most of them, Mixcraft 8 spends about 12-13 seconds re-scanning them every time it starts up.