Ableton Forum

I use a VST EQ plugin on my main out in Live for corrective equalization.
I set the required parameters as the default inside the plugin. So every time the plugin is loaded, it's already doing what it needs to do (and I don't use this plugin for other purposes).

The problem: the plugin settings are stored in the Live project file. So if I later decide to use different settings (for different speakers/headphones), I'd have to manually change this in every existing Live project. Yikes!

This could be avoided if I could tell Live to NOT save the state for this plugin and instead to always load it with its default settings.
Is this possible by any chance?

If there's no viable solution, please move this to the wishlist forum.

I don't expect to have a GUI option for such a feature, but perhaps a setting in options.txt, like: Or alternatively, if the plugin always loaded with a specific preset file, like:

I guess it could be done with max for live.

Yeah, maybe. I don't know much about Max, but I did give it a try.

The manual says you can load a VST plugin and a preset with I was able to load the VST plugin, but not the preset. If I enter a preset name that's displayed in the plugin, the console gives me an error "can't find NameOfPreset". Where exactly is Max looking for the preset names?

Alternatively, could I make Max load the VST "from scratch" every time I add the Max device or load a Live project, which would load the default VST preset?

"Where exactly is Max looking for the preset names?" normally max is looking in the folders that are set under "File Preferences".

Can you group the plugin and save it so it has preserved settings and you just slap the saved group everywhere?

doubleUG wrote: ↑

Thu May 29, 2025 2:29 pm

"Where exactly is Max looking for the preset names?" normally max is looking in the folders that are set under "File Preferences".

Yep that was it, thanks. One caveat is that Max doesn't load .vstpreset files, which Live uses for VST3 plugins. Looks like a bug.
Anyway, it does load VST2 .fxb files, which is fine too. So Max loads the VST2 plugin+preset. But once it's loaded, the VST parameters are baked in the Max device and the VST preset file doesn't get reloaded again, not even when adding the Max device in a new project.

So the real challenge is to tell Max to load that preset (or the default plugin state) every time the Live project is loaded.

Cypeace wrote: ↑

Thu May 29, 2025 4:53 pm

Can you group the plugin and save it so it has preserved settings and you just slap the saved group everywhere?

If you mean slapping it everywhere manually for every project, it's a bit cumbersome.

At this point I'll probably just use a system-wide EQ, it's going to make things much easier...

just_in wrote: ↑

Thu May 29, 2025 9:30 pm

So the real challenge is to tell Max to load that preset (or the default plugin state) every time the Live project is loaded.

Without seeing your Max patcher in detail, my first guess is that the loadbang object could do the job.

I just tried with loadbang. It works as intended when loading the Max device into the project.
But it doesn't work when loading a saved Live project that already contains the Max device; it loads the old VST parameters.

just_in wrote: ↑

Wed May 28, 2025 5:40 pm

The problem: the plugin settings are stored in the Live project file. So if I later decide to use different settings (for different speakers/headphones), I'd have to manually change this in every existing Live project. Yikes!

This could be avoided if I could tell Live to NOT save the state for this plugin and instead to always load it with its default settings.
Is this possible by any chance?

What I don't get is this doesn't solve your problem, if you need new corrective EQ settings saving the EQ to a it's default settings means you will still have to load different EQ settings for different speakers and headphones. A more logical solution would be a to save multiple templates for each speaker and headphone setup you use, with appropriate names that warn you of the EQs settings.