Plug-ins not showing in Ableton

[justinwcharles]

Hi friends - looking for some help here with plug-ins that are in the right folders, but are not showing in Ableton. The folders the plug-ins are located in are:

MacHD>Library>Audio>Plug-Ins>VST - .vst files are located here
MacHD>Library>Audio>Plug-Ins>VST3 - .vst3 files are located here

In Ableton's preferences, I have the 'Use VST2 System Folders' and 'Use VST3 System Folders' set to ON. I have also rescanned for plug-ins. I have uninstalled/reinstalled the plugins. I see the files located in those folders, and some from those folders are showing, but most are not.

Any ideas what I'm doing wrong? Thanks in advance for your help.

[Rivanni]

What version of Live are you using?
Did you perform a deep plugin scan: While holding the Option key down, press Rescan in Live's settings.

Are you on a Intel Mac or an Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4) one?
If the latter, are the plugins all Apple Silicon compatible, and are you running Live natively, so not in Rosetta mode?

Make sure you don't have multiple versions of Live open. If so, close all and only start one.

[justinwcharles]

I just updated to Live 12, and after that I'm missing some plugins. Maybe they aren't supported. That would be pretty raw - now I can't use any of my previous projects.

Did the Option + Rescan, no luck. I'm on Apple silicon. Confirmed they are 64 bit plugins. Running Live natively I think - I don't know what Rosetta is.

[Rivanni]

You say you updated. Did the plugins work in Live 11?

64-bit is not relevant to check these days. More important is to check if the plugins are compatible with Apple Silicon (M1 etc). So make sure you check this on the vendors site and download and install the correct version of the plugin.

The information on this page might help you.

https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/artic ... -with-Live

[justinwcharles]

thanks for that helpful link. i'm guessing some of the older plugins i have just aren't supported. the au's still are coming through, which is good since i'm on mac, but my old projects are toast

[Rivanni]

You wrote on Reddit that you came from Live 10. Live 10 automatically runs in Rosetta mode because it does not support Apple Silicon. In Rosetta mode, Live can recognize the plugins that are also not compatible.
Based on the information provided here and on Reddit, you likely know how to proceed.