User Guide

Chapter 1: Welcome to Band-in-a-Box!

The Synth Track tab edits

Synthesizer settings, and the

Audio Track tab edits Band-in-a-

Box audio track DirectX plug-ins.

Select your desired DXi synth in

the top plug-in Insert Slot 1.

To apply DirectX audio plug-ins to

the synth, insert DX audio plug-ins

to Insert Slots 2, 3, or 4. This can

be useful to add EQ, Reverb,

Compression, or Peak Limiting

plug-ins, if the “raw sound” of the

synthesizer needs sweetening.

VSTi Instrument Synthesizer (VST plug-in)

To add VSTi synthesizer plug-ins, please make sure the Synth Track tab is selected, and use the plug-in menu on the

top synthesizer slot.

VST plug-ins appear at the bottom of the plug-in list below the DirectX plug-ins. VST plug-ins and synthesizers

have the text “<VST>“ prefixed to the name of the plug-in or synthesizer.

To select a VST plug-in for the first time, select the “Add VST plug-in...” item at the bottom of the plug-in Menu.

Select a VST plug-in .dll file in the following Select a VST plug-in dialog, and it is added to the plug-in list. After

you add each VST, the plug-in is permanently added to the list. You only have to add each plug-in one time.

Note: Some VST host programs scan for all available plug-ins every time they start up. We decided not to use that

method, because the scanning can take a long time if there are many plug-ins on your system. Additionally, a badly-written

or corrupt plug-in could cause program malfunctions. Therefore, we feel the method of selecting only the plug-ins you wish

to use is both safer and faster.

VST/VSTi Additional Panel Controls

VST is necessarily different from DirectX/DXi, and some extra controls are available for VST plug-ins.

DirectX/DXi plug-ins save their presets to the Windows Registry and only one setting is “alive” at a time.

VST/VSTi plug-ins save their presets to disk files. VST/VSTi plug-ins contain a bank of presets in memory. You

can switch between presets while editing, and each edited preset is remembered in the current bank. If you save the

bank, it will save all the presets you have edited. You can save individual presets, or you can build a custom bank

by loading individual preset files into different preset slots, and then save the new bank file.