How to Remove an Ableton Plug-In

Third-party plug-ins in Ableton Live can be removed if they become corrupt.

Ableton Live, often called simply "Ableton," is a digital audio workstation (DAW) application that can host third-party VST plug-ins. Occasionally, VST plug-ins become corrupt and cease to function properly due to compatibility issues with other plug-ins, with Ableton itself or because of faulty programming by the plug-in producer. In that case, the plug-in will have to be removed.

Instructions

1. Open the Plug-in Device Manager by clicking on its icon on the left side of Ableton's default screen. The Plug-in Device Manager window will appear.

2. Click on the button labeled "Rescan." This will rescan all previously installed VST plug-ins. Ableton has no in-program mechanism to indicate which plug-ins are having problems when performing a scan. If it detects a corrupt or otherwise problematic plug-in, Ableton will instead quit automatically.

3. Restart Ableton. As it loads, a dialogue will appear listing all corrupt or incompatible plug-ins. You will be given a choice to either rescan the problematic plug-ins again, or to make them unavailable, thus removing them from Ableton's list of active plug-ins.

4. Take note of all plug-ins that appear in the list of problematic plug-ins list incase you want to attempt to reinstall and scan them again later. This will often resolve problems with plug-ins that have become corrupted.

5. Choose "Make Unavailable" for all plug-ins listed. Ableton loads as normal, but the problematic plug-ins no longer appears in your list of available plug-in devices.

References

• "Ableton Reference Manual Version 8"; Dennis DeSantis, et al; 2010