VSTs : A day in the life

spantini

COO of me, inc.
I'm looking for a free plugin.. a heavy, thick, smooth and syrupy fuzz tone for a rhythm guitar part. Nearly all I have tried are just too "metal" and crunchy. The Diode Overdrive stomp box which came standard with my AmpliTube Fender Collection has the sound I'm after, but it's distortion needs to be cranked all the way and, unfortunately, that adds unwanted "crackly" sounds as the rhythm chords decay in a couple of quiet passages - I can't lower the volume or cut them out because I need the decaying guitar chord there. Adjusting parameters in the amp sim or stomp box does remove the "crackles" but also alters the sound I'm after.

I can remove that "metal" and crunchy, smoothing it out in the above examples, but it requires dialing in quite a bit of low end (bass) and that's not what I'm after.

I imported several free VST distortion/fuzz plugins and they weren't much better. In fact, they all sound just about the same whether they've got 2, 3 or X number of knobs - all the same to my ear. Reaper's distortion/fuzz are about the same.

Then I imported Klanghelm's IVGI2 distortion and that was the closest yet, but no cigar. Then I tripped across Fuse Audio Labs' Big-Sur. This is the closest yet, but I'm still looking for the right one..

Now for compression on my bass track, I did try all of Reaper's options and didn't take to them very well. Then I imported Klanghelm's MJUCjr.. easy 2-knob, 1-switch and that's doing a good job of fattening up the sound, which is the main effect I was after.

So that's my VST story for the day. I haven't given up on Reaper's compressors or distortion/fuzz plugins.. just not for this project.
 
Thanks, [MENTION=20426]Paj[/MENTION]. I'm going over these now. I downloaded the Temper Distortion first but it doesn't make itself available when inserted into any of the usual folders. I'll have another go with fresh brain cells in the morning.

Update :

Still no luck getting Temper Distortion to show up in Reaper's FX window no matter which folder it's in.. even with a rescan.

So I moved on to FuzzPlus 3 and... whammy! it's no longer available.

I'm giving up on this Best 16 Free Distortion VST/AU Plugins that sound Great! from June 2020
 
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okay . . .I downloaded Temper Disortion.

When you click on the 'download', you download a zipped folder.

In the folder are two exe files, one for windows and one for mac.

So I just ran the exe file for windows, and followed the prompts, accepting the defaults.

I then ran Reaper and there it was.
 
Exactly what I've done... a dozen times, and still no VST showing up in Reaper's FX window. Everything is in the folders and I've even shuffled the .dll to various plugin folders but nothing is working. It's got me.

During this period I have installed other VSTs and they show up no problem.

The only unusual thing is when trying to run the .exe file after unzip, I get a warning of possible harm to my system. I have to plow through that to get to the .exe file and it all goes well after that - but no show in the FX window.

This is labeled as a VST2. Looking in Reaper's FX window, in the left column, VST2 does not appear.

Update :

Just downloaded Tube Saturator from the same page and it went right in no problem. Shows up in FX window. So it doesn't appear to be a problem on Reaper's end.
 
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So far, I've gotten Tube Saturator, Plusdistortion and Face Bender downloaded and operating in Reaper. Still not having much luck on most of the rest from that Best 16 Free Distortion list though. Facebender is giving me a lot of what I want, maybe too much, I don't know yet, I'm still massaging it.

They don't all work out of the same folder. Some remain in VSTplugins, some go to Steinberg.
 
They don't all work out of the same folder. Some remain in VSTplugins, some go to Steinberg.

Are you simply saying that they install to different folders?

Or that the ones that install to one folder work, but the ones that install to another don't?

If it is the latter, then that should be easily resolved. Just go to Options/Preferences/Plugins/VST and add a path to that folder
 
All the possible paths are set up in preferences. I even went so far as to add VST2, though it's not required.

They all install to the VSTPlugins folder. Some work from there, some must be moved to the Steinberg folder to work. Some don't work from either folder.

Some come with an installer and some don't, just the .dll file. There's little consistency and no pattern as to which will work.

It's a mess :drunk:

I'm wondering if Windows versions may have something to do with it. Some of these VSTs only show working up to Win 7 or 8. It's unlikely, but maybe these really aren't compatible with Win 10 yet. Just a longshot there..
 
A lot of the VSTs are 32 bit. If you are running W10 which is 64bit, you may need to put the 32bit VSTs in a vst folder somewhere inside the Program File (x86) folder.
 
I'm having this problem with some that are labeled 64-bit, but I'll give the Program File (X86) folder a try - though it's already in the file path for installs.
 
I installed it (Reaper6.14/64-bit) and used the FX search filter. It's there. Temper came up under the following categories: All Plugins, New, VST, VST3, and Developers---Creative Intent.

Paj
8^)
 
I'm cursed :facepalm: :p I've been trying that same search on each one and I get a blank screen - nothing there. The weird thing is they all appear to install in all the correct folders but Reaper doesn't see some of them.
 
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Amplitube is the way to go. Beyond the fender. Try the different amps and pedals for free. I got it with my Axe i/o and it has everything I need. But I will be adding the Satch bundle as well, nice tones. My 2 pennies.
 
I managed to get most of what I'm after with a combination of:

Distorque Audio - Face Bender
Amplitube - Diode OVERdrive pedal

The Face Bender is one of the free VSTs referred to in this post's 16 Best List. The Diode OVERdrive was included in my Amplitube Fender Collection. I set the OVERdrive distortion at about 4:00, but the Level at 7:00 (level 1). That gave me it's smoothness without the "crackling" in the decay. The Face Bender just ramped all that up keeping the "crackling" at bay.
 
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