Issue
Ableton projects crashing due to Channel Strip 2 /4K B/ Bus Compressor 2 plug-ins.
Before You Start...
Always ensure you are running the most up-to-date version of SSL 360° and 360°-enabled plug-ins (Channel Strip 2, 4K B and Bus Compressor 2) by visiting the SSL 360° Release Notes and Downloads page here.
Likely Cause
The session contains a mixture of VST/AU formats of Channel Strip 2/4K B/Bus Compressor 2 plug-ins
Important Things to Note
- The recommendation is always to use VST3 versions of Channel Strip 2/4K B and Bus Compressor 2 plug-ins in Ableton, as it provides the most comprehensive integration between the DAW and the SSL 360° Plug-in Mixer/UC1. This is what we officially test and support. Mixing and matching plug-in formats (VST and AU) is unsupported.
- Quite often, it's easy to accidentally add in an AU instance of a 360-enabled plug-in into the session without realising it.
- For example, some customers had all their Channel Strip 2 and 4K B plug-ins as VST3 format but didn't realise that one instance of Bus Compressor 2 was AU and this was causing the the whole session to crash.
- Or, a single instance of Channel Strip 2 was AU amongst a session full of VST3 format Channel Strip 2s and 4K Bs.
- Normally, a warning message is displayed in the SSL 360° Plug-in Mixer to warn that mixed formats of 360°-enabled plug-ins have been detected but in SSL 360° v1.4 there is a bug where it doesn't always show this, therefore making this issue harder to identify.
How To Fix
All Channel Strip 2, 4K B and Bus Compressor 2 instances need to be VST3 format to avoid these crashes from happening. Making sure this is the case should avoid the problem.
What To Do if an Ableton session is being affected by the crash and you can't open the session
Some users have struggled to open sessions that are crashing because of this issue. A helpful tip is to kill/stop the SSL360Core process in Activity Monitor on Mac or Task Manager on Windows. This should help you open up the offending Ableton session(s), remove any SSL 360°-enabled plug-ins that are VST2/AU format and replace with VST3 to get a stable session again.
Long-Term
- In the next release of 360° we will ensure the warning message in 360° appears to warn of when a session is mixing and matching plug-in formats.
- Beyond that we will be investigating improvements to help prevent these crashes, should sessions accidentally contain a mixture of plug-in formats, although mixing and matching formats will remain officially unsupported.