I’ve seen a variety and sometimes conflicting info about ASIO Guard in the forum. The manual is pretty good at explaining how it works but not on when to use it. What are the pros and cons of using it? When is appropriate to turn in on or off? As I understand it ASIO Guard can be turned on but only enabled for certain plugs - what would distinguish one plug from another in this situation?
Probably VST3s, since they can switch them off when no signal. Just guess, maybe some of Steinbergs techs could chime in.
I just thought about it while reading this thread, but using the option can be a good way of checking how much latency is introduced by the VST(i) s currently active, even if bypassed.
This can be useful in determining which plugins, like reverb for vocalists, can be used while recording, without making it difficult to perform with foldback.
When you enable ASIO-Guard, the ASIO-Guard Latency shows the ms that the signal chain introduces. You may not leave it on, but at least you know the effect that the aggregated plugins are having.