Please help ! I want to take all the dll files of plugin on a usb thumb drive and then just ask any daw to look for plugins in the usb drive. Is it possible ?

 

First, your question and the content of your thread are 2 different things bro. Moving the vst dlls to a USB is not going to make it portable. It is going to make your system slower. With that said, if you want to move the vst dlls to a usb do the following.
Use symbolic link. Move your vst folder to USB. This will become the link source. Delete from hard drive the vst folder. Drop in hard drive as symblolic link. Your DAW is going to think that the vsts remain in your C: drive. But the problem is that USBs are very slow. Better to use and external SSD. Even better would be to leave them in your C: drive bro.

 

Last edited: Jun 8, 2019

what about waves plugins ?

 

What about them? Read what I wrote. You are not gaining anything in performance bro. You will affect performance. All your doing is gaining extra space in your hard drive. The Waves libraries should be on an external drive (NOT USB THUMB DRIVE). In fact, it is a good idea to move any large library to an external drive (NOT A USB THUMB DRIVE). This will increase performance unless you are moving them from a SSD C: drive to a regular hard drive. But to answer your specific question about Waves. If you want to overlook what I have told you, you can always use the non install release on a USB thumb drive.

 

Last edited: Jun 8, 2019

The Pirate, is it possible, by using symbolic links, not to install the plugins after a fresh OS install? Instead I could just copy the symbolic links in place. My guess is that it would work for some plugins but is not guaranteed to work for most of them. What do you think?

 

try to install it on a laptop then is portable everywhere you go.

 

You can use symbolic links for almost anything. The question is not whether it can be done. With careful planning you can do it.The question is, what is there to be gained by it. Nothing. Are you going to have symbolic links for the registry hives? Are you going to be spending time creating symbolic links or making music? Again, the programs data can be, and should be moved to a different hard drive. But program files are better left in C: where they belong.

 

To actually make most plugins portable, one would have to fully sandbox them.

For plugins that don't require activation, nothing special is necessary. Just copy plugin binary and preset files. This also applies to any portably pre-activated cracked plugin.

Moreover, there a plugins that need activation but don't lock it down to machine. Here one just needs to copy the machine dependant registration info. Example: plugins that don't rely on online activation and use keyfiles instead.

For any other plugin, it's necessary to have valid registration info on any machine you'd like to use a "portable" plugin. Registration info is often dependant on user's machine. So such a sandbox would even have to emulate that machine info (MAC address, disk size, motherboard, whatsoever; depends on plugin). Otherwise, plugin would consider reg info invalid on another machine.

Of course sandboxing would slow down plugins and might not be compatible with anti tampering solutions.

 

That is the reason why a portable sandbox is not a good idea. What the OP wants can't be achieved as he asks , and as we have explained it doesn't make any sense performance wise .

 

@The Pirate Thanks for the replies ! I guess we aren't there yet in terms of pirating technology.

 

An ideal example would be Konkakt 6 Portable

 

Bro as we have told you, it can be done for some plugins and already has been done. The problem with this thread is that you asked
How to make a vst2/3 plugin portable ? This is a VERY good question and one that I would answer differently if you had not said, I want to want to take all the dll files of plugin on a usb thumb drive. As I said those are 2 different things. You didn't say, I want to take the program on a USB wherever I go and use it on different computers.

 

The simple answer is, no!
The reason: some plugins create registry entries and without them they don't work.

Is it possible to code a portable version from an install version? Yes. N.I. Kontakt and Cockos Reaper (just to name a few) already proved it.

 

Thanks to all ! Got my answers !

 

The simple answer is yes. You can move almost every dll from VSTs to wherever you want. You move them to a thumb drive? Make sure the DAW plugin scanner is pointed to it OR use symbolic links.

 

Last edited: Jun 8, 2019

Does this even work with pluggies which create reg entries (serious question, I never tried)?
And even if yes, it doesn't work like with portable Reaper which you can 'install' on a stick, plug it in any comp you want and start it from there, does it (for plugs with reg entries)?

 

I used to have a list of vst that didn't like to get moved but the number was very small. There was a couple that after moving their respective dlls you needed to reinstall. You are 100% correct when you say that moving the dll is not going to be like a portable Reaper. The portable Reaper is a true portable app. Just like Pro Tools 12 portable is a true portable app, too. However, simply moving a dll to a USB thumb drive does not make a vst portable. That is the reason why I said, that it is possible to move dll to a thumb drive. I didn't say that you could take that thumb drive plug it into another computer and use all the VST's in it as if they were portable. The OP should have asked: How can I make a vst portable? And leave it at that.

 

It's possible to install VST2 pligins anywhere you want. But sometimes they require reg entries, access to files (presets, additional components, pictures for GUI etc.) in the fixed folders that you cannot manage.

VST3 plugins MUST be installed in a proper folder. In Windows for x64 VST3 plugins it's C:/Program Files/Common Files/VST3. Your DAW won't find them in another place.

 

Correct but you can either use symbolic links or junction points, before or after installation, to move them wherever you wish. Or hack the registry.

 

Last edited: Jun 9, 2019