Is there a way to change the user folder location? By default it’s set to onedrive/documents, and its causing onedrive using 15% cpu.
Update:
Solved by starting rack in a shortcut via:
Rack.exe -u “user folder location”
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I think there is some awful windows way to point “documents” somewhere else. But turning off one drive might be an easier way around it. But maybe this -u does it? Command Line Switches List
- Command line flag can point to a different directory.
- You can move your Documents directory to a different location. Here are instructions
I immediately do this because I run with my Windows system on a smaller SSD, so I move documents to another hard drive.
You can also move big directories out of c:\program files. Instructions here
Apparently you can’t move all of Program Files the way you can Documents, so maybe use a tool to see which directories are taking up the most space, like TreeSize
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Is there a way to change the user folder location for the VST-Plugin on Windows?
I just edited my shortcut to create a user folder for standalone Rack, which is not on my onedrive. When I started the VST in Ableton VCV Rack created the user folder on my onedrive again.
It is not VCV that is writing to Onedrive or having any other default setting then the user/documents folder, it is Onedrive that is keeping your Documents folder “hostage”.
There have been many complaints about this over the last couple of years,
Plenty of resource to google, that will help you to completely disable Onedrive.
Yes, I know. But I am the one out of five million users who actually likes to have the document folder in onedrive…
Most of the programs I have installed are asking me for a location to store content or have an option to move the “library” - Photoshop, Lightroom, Davinci, Ableton and so on…
I think it would be a nice feature to have at least a settings.json where you could edit the location of the user folder… Without -u there seems to be no way to set your library to a different hard drive or even a different location than “Documents”. Oh and the Invoice for my new Synth is a “Document”, but not the awesome modules of Awesome-Dev…
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I have the same problem, moved from the c: to another drive r: , used samples with musical box locally in the same folder. Afterwards moved the whole cinema back to c: because the VST can only use his default folder. Opening the VCV project and guess what? yes, musical box can’t find his samples. So moved everything back to r: to record every different musical sample track to 8 STEMS to use them back in Ableton. When recoding done, moved everything back to default c location,so that i can use it with other projects that are created within the VST. And No , i could not just re-enter the samples in the VST, because how the hell will i know in what order and what chunks i had used 
So BIG sucking with this hardcoded default user folder! Please program something when the VST opens and he can’t find his default folder, that you can choose another one! Thnak you very much!
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Just in case readers are not familiar with the syntax (we don’t need to do this sort of thing very often nowadays…), this is a complete shortcut example where I wanted to set my user folder to D:\Rack2, and the Rack program is installed in C:\Program Files\VCV\Rack2Free\Rack.exe. Note the use of quotes to set folder locations in each case. To create a shortcut, right-click on the Rack program file and create a shortcut on the desktop. Then, go to the properties for the shortcut and edit the Shortcut-Target box.
"C:\Program Files\VCV\Rack2Free\Rack.exe" -u "D:\Rack2"
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Hi all, just had the same problem. Herewith, I just wanted to update this thread (as I do not know when this feature had been integrated into VCV Rack or if this is known to everybody, I am using VCV 2.x): The above solutions are functional in my opinion when using the Standalone program. But when using the VCV PlugIn the solution with the command line parameter is probably not working at the same time.
Best and easiest way in my opinion for changing the “VCV User folder” is, to
create and set up a system environment variable as written in the VCV manual:
“You may also set the RACK_SYSTEM_DIR or RACK_USER_DIR environment variables to override these locations, even as a VST plugin.”
I moved the complete Rack2 folder to the new location, and set a new System Environment variable (should work for windows and LInux). Please note: it becomes valid after restart of VCV standalone program/VCVPlugin. Hope that helps. Please let me know about any topics/problems. Kind regards, Reinfried
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Thanks, this did work. I haven’t yet tried to download new plugins, I am hoping that process will also find the shortcut folder. 
Anyway, thanks!
I have VCV Rack on two computers, one a Windows machine and another on a Mac. I successfully added the -u tag with Windows but do not see a way to do so with Mac. Any ideas?
The environment variables should work. No idea where you set those on a Mac.
there is a file called like .profile in your home folder where you set those with EXPORT statements.
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I’m using the method of changing the folder with the -u tag, which works initially - but then whenever I open the app the next time it’s creating the Rack2 folder in my Documents folder again and reverting back to that location as the User Folder. I’m on a Mac, so this means saving all the modules into iCloud…
You could set up an Automator ‘app’ that always opens Rack with -u.
Instructions on how to do so are listed as the first answer found here, Option 1:
Of course, you will need to change the command line in the Automator script shown there to something similar to the following:
open -a "VCV Rack 2 Free.app" --args -u /path/to/your/rack/user/dir
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That’s genius - I set it up and so far it seems to be working like a charm! Thanks so much, this is is super helpful.
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