Reaper Bridge 32This article continues where the previous article about 32 and 64-bit REAPER left off. At the end we recommended the 32-bit version of REAPER with specific plugins running as a separate or dedicated process. This article will explain the difference and how to do it.

Native, separate or dedicated process?
The difference between these is pretty simple but it took some research to find out exactly what it was.

Native is the default setting for all plugins, everything opens and shares RAM with REAPER. Big sampler-based instruments need a lot of RAM.

Running plugins in a separate process will put all the specified processes in ONE other process, like one other program. The RAM will be shared by all the bridged plugins.
Example: 5 instances of KONTAKT = 1 bridge, 1 separate 32-bit program.

Running plugins in a dedicated process will run each plugin in it’s own process, each with it’s own RAM allowance.
Example: 5 instances of KONTAKT = 5 bridges, 5 separate 32-bit programs.

REAPER bridged plugin
A bridged plugin

Crash tactics
Also a factor is what happens when a plugin causes a crash.

With Native (default), if a plugin crashes, REAPER will close too. This is the worst situation but REAPER is still very stable with this setting.

With Separate Process selected, if one of the bridged plugins fails, they all fail. The session should still be safe. You can save and relaunch the project.

With Dedicated Process, if one plugin fails, the session and all other dedicated or separate plugins will be fine. A new bridge will be opened in the dock or task bar for each plugin.

The Dedicated Process option seems to make the most sense, especially if you only need a couple of these programs. But you don’t want to change the default or you’ll easily have 50 programs running and the bridge will drive you insane.

Which plugins should be dedicated?

We recommend keeping the default on Automatic and just run sample-based instruments such as KONTAKT, SSDSampler (Steven Slate Drums 4), SampleTank, BFD or anything really buggy that you don’t want to crash your entire session as dedicated, or Separate if you prefer.

How to
The first thing to do is check the default setting for bridging in the Plug-ins/Compatibility settings. This should be set to Automatic by default. This sets all plugins to ‘Native’ unless otherwise specified.

Plug-in bridging preference
Plug-in bridging preference

Next, open up the FX Browser and click on the Instruments. Right-click and select Run As>Dedicated Process for each of the sample based instruments.

Run As options
Setting dedicated process

We’ve tested this with plugins that were not very stable, and now we can’t make them crash no matter how hard we try. This along with the other stability tip, REAPER is incredibly stable and we can use the latest and greatest plugins.


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14 responses to “Run Plugin as Dedicated Process”

  1. Soniq Avatar
    Soniq

    Thank you so much for this information!

  2. illsoulproduc Avatar

    Reaper at its best!!!

  3. Martin Avatar
    Martin

    Thanks so much for these great tips! My old 32 bit laptop just broke and I bought a new 64 bit computer. If I install the same vst’s I had on the old laptop, but now in 64 bit versions on the new computer; will my old laptop Reaper projects still load? If they won’t I’ll continue using 32 bit and I’ll try your advice with the dedicated process, it seems like a great solution.

    1. Admin Avatar
      Admin

      Your old projects should load fine and swap the 32 for 64-bit plugins, unless the names have changed. That happens occasionally.
      64-bit reaper can load 32-bit plugins bridged.
      I’ve switched to 64-bit REAPER in the past couple months and didn’t run into many problems.

  4. Martin Avatar
    Martin

    Thanks for your reply! I tried running as dedicated process and it worked great but I have 1 problem. Dedicated processes opens as floating FX windows which don’t have scroll bars and I’m using 1024×600 resolution, so I can’t view big GUI’s like Kontakt Player. Is there any way to scroll floating windows, or place Kontakt Player in the regular window?

    1. Admin Avatar
      Admin

      Damn, that’s a tiny screen.
      Kontakt has a resize handle on the bottom right but I couldn’t find a way to get a scroll bar in the floating window. If you resize the gui is anchored to the bottom which may be the part you can’t see already.
      In preferences>Plugins Try Automatically resize: up, down. This helps with plugins that look stretched, or the window is the wrong size. I don’t think this has any influence on the bridged plugins though.
      If you are on Windows, find the plugin in the FX browser, Right-click and choose Embed Bridge UI.

  5. Martin Avatar
    Martin

    Embed Bridge UI worked perfectly, now I’m able to scroll as usual! Thank you so much for your time, and for this great blog!

  6. Norm Avatar
    Norm

    Excellent article. Thank you.

    Do you have any information about potential latency impact with inter process communication between all the dedicated plugin processes and reaper?

    1. Admin Avatar
      Admin

      Hi Norm
      Good question. If I was to give you a rule of thumb for this, a 64-bit plugin that is run as a dedicated process will not have any additional latency or lag on the interface. A 32-bit plugin bridged in a 64-bit environment will have a laggy or non-functioning GUI. I haven’t seen any plugins report additional latency.

  7. Randy Avatar
    Randy

    Hello, I am hoping to run some of the nebula libraries from acustica as a dedicated process as suggested above. However right clicking on the plug in does not give the same options as listed above and I can’t see how to run a VST as a dedicated process. Any ideas on how to achieve this or why I do not have the same options?

  8. I'm Hers Avatar

    I tried this using Sylenth1 in Reaper on Wine (since I’m on Linux, crazy setup right but anyway) and it didn’t help much… at the least, Sylenth1 could crash without causing Reaper to crash, but it still crashed straight away lol. Still, I think this is a useful technique, so thanks! 🙂

  9. Knob twiddler Avatar
    Knob twiddler

    I gave this a test with some midi editor plugins (for my hardware synths). Everytime when I loaded them up and configured the ports, the crashed (and Reaper with them) because some midi signals from the synth were misinterpreted. Now as dedicated processes they are stable as hell and nor the plugin, nor Reaper is crashing anymore.

  10. Gaëtan Avatar
    Gaëtan

    Very useful !!! Thank you, this helps me with a NoiseAsh plugin that always crash projects.

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