VST And DX Plugins In PARIS
With version 3.0 software, PARIS introduced support for "native" (ie VST and DX) plugins to supplement the onboard EDS plugins. While PARIS was discontinued before the implementation could be refined, many users use one or both of these plugin types.
Limitations
The limitations of PARIS' VST/DX implementation include the following (although workarounds do exist for some of these limitations):1) VST implementation appears to be the more robust of the two, and many users choose to disable DX altogether. However, others report good luck with DX plugins, particularly using a wrapper or chainer (see below).
2) 64 plugin slots total are available per submix (four on each of the sixteen channels)
3) Plugins may only be used on channel strips; they may not be used on an aux or across the submix or master busses.
4) PARIS' channel strips are mono; stereo plugins can be used but must be handled with care. They must be inserted across a pair of adjacent channels (open a native plugin on the "left" or "odd numbered" channel and click the "stereo" checkbox in the window's lower LH corner). Users must be careful to edit the corresponding audio in exact pairs since a "left" and "right" channel that contain audio of different lengths can cause havoc such as "ErrorUnequalStereo error in playback 1879048195/70000003".
5) There is no plugin latency compensation in PARIS so users must either a) NativeLatencyDatabase select plugins that don't introduce latency, b) NativeLatencyDatabase nudge audio on the playing field to compensate for the delaying effect of latency or c) use a self-contained framework for relative latency compensation such as Vertex DSP's FaderWorks.
6) Some plugins present particular problems for PARIS and are probably best avoided altogether.
Chainers and Wrappers
Classes of plugins called VstDxWrappersChainers "chainers" and "wrappers" began appearing around the time of PARIS' discontinuation. They offered increased flexibility by serving as a "go-between" between PARIS' fixed native FX architecture and the evolving world of VST and DX plugins.Chainers
Chainers have been useful in breaking some of PARIS' original VST/DX limitations. They all work the same way: chainers are installed into a new folder, separate from your normal VST or DX plugins folders; PARIS is then pointed towards that new folder as its plugins directory. At this point users no longer see any other plugins besides the chainer showing up in their native plugins directory. The chainer is then opened and pointed at the user's normal VST plugins folder.
To use a particular plugin, the user first calls up an instance of the chainer and then accesses the plugin through the chainer's interface. This way, PARIS never sees a particular plugin directly, but only through the intermediary layer of the chainer which seems to act as a sort of "buffer" or "interpreter" for difficult or problematic plugins. Multiple VST or DX plugins can also be run within the same instance of a chainer (incidentally bypassing the "4-native-plugins-per-channel/64-per-submix" limit).
Since several plugins are referred to in the forums as "chainers" and more than one include the word "Chainer" in their title, it can be confusing to find, install and configure them, so here's a graph and links (coming soon - these are "placeholders").
Acon Digital Media Chainer
Xlutop Chainer
FFX-4 Rack
Wrappers
Wrappers also provide a "buffer" between PARIS' VST/DX framework and the "native" world of VST and DX plugins, but (as their name implies) "wrappers" provide that buffer by "wrapping" particular plugins.
FXpansion
Specialized Native Plugins of particular use in PARIS
NativeSubmixSenderellaTut Senderella, currently being developed by Kris Ellis to extend its usefulness in PARIS.
Vertex DSP's FaderWorks
more coming...
