stab Help

21. Platform guides

Stab on Windows

Stab for Windows is the same app as on the Mac: the same panes, menus and songs, drawn in a window of its own with its menus in the title bar. This page covers what is particular to Windows: installing it, where your songs go, the protection that can keep Stab out of your Documents folder, and how sound and MIDI reach it.

Stab on Windows

Available on Windows. Not on Mac and Web.

This isn’t on Mac.

This isn’t on Web.

Installing Stab

Stab runs on 64-bit Windows 10 (version 22H2) and Windows 11. Download Stab-Setup.exe from stab.audio and open it.

  • The installer needs no administrator: it installs Stab for you alone, in your user folder (AppData\Local\Programs\Stab), and adds Stab to the Start menu. A desktop shortcut is an option, off at first.
  • It makes Stab the app for .stab files, and adds Stab to Open with for Guitar Pro and MIDI files.
  • If Stab is running while you install an update, the installer closes it and opens it again.

To remove Stab, uninstall it from Windows’ Settings › Apps › Installed apps. Your songs stay where they are.

“Windows protected your PC”

Windows SmartScreen can stop an app it hasn’t seen downloaded often, with a blue “Windows protected your PC” box. If it shows for Stab-Setup.exe, select More info, check that the app is Stab-Setup.exe, then Run anyway. Download Stab only from stab.audio.

Where your songs are

Your songs are in Documents\Stab, one file each. If OneDrive backs up your Documents folder, the Stab folder is there too, and synced like the rest. To keep them elsewhere, choose Library Folder… in the Settings menu: see The library folder.

Only one Stab runs at a time: opening a song from File Explorer while Stab is open opens it in the Stab you have. If .stab files open in another copy of Stab (or none), Settings › General says so, and Open Stab Files with This Copy puts it right.

When Windows Security blocks the songs folder

Windows Security’s Controlled folder access (part of Ransomware protection) protects Documents from apps it doesn’t know, and may refuse to let Stab write there. Stab then can’t keep songs in Documents\Stab, and the home shows a card in place of your songs: “Stab can’t open its songs folder”, saying “Stab keeps your songs in Documents › Stab, and Windows didn’t let it in.”

Until the folder can be written, Stab doesn’t create new songs or import files: when you try, it says “New songs can’t be saved yet” and offers the same ways on. Stab Cloud, the demos and songs opened from elsewhere still work. Windows may also show its own notice that it blocked Stab.

To let Stab in:

  1. Select Open Windows Security on the card. It opens Windows Security’s Ransomware protection page.
  2. Under Controlled folder access, select Allow an app through Controlled folder access, and confirm.
  3. Select Add an allowed app, then Browse all apps, and pick Stab.exe in AppData\Local\Programs\Stab (type %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\Stab in the address bar to get there).
  4. Come back to Stab. It tries the folder again each time its window comes to the front, and your songs appear.

Or select Choose Another Folder… to keep your songs in a folder Windows doesn’t protect.

If the folder is on a drive that isn’t connected, the card says “Stab can’t find its songs folder” instead, with Try Again.

Updates

Stab from stab.audio updates itself. The second time you open it, it asks whether to check for updates automatically; if you agree, it checks once a day. Check for Updates… in the Help menu checks now. See Updates.

Sound

Stab plays through Windows’ default output device, the one chosen in the sound icon on the taskbar, and follows it when it changes, as when you plug in headphones or an audio interface. The Audio & MIDI pane’s Audio tab chooses the input Stab records and tunes from (The audio input).

If you hear nothing, open a song and choose Audio Self-Test in the Help menu. It plays the song for three seconds and reports, in a dialog, the output device, its rate and latency, whether the sound reached it and whether the SoundFont loaded; with no output device, it says so. See No sound.

Stab plays your VST3 effect plugins beside its own devices, from C:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3 and the folders you add (Plugins). It doesn’t load CLAP plugins or plugin instruments.

Recordings and video are read through Windows’ Media Foundation. The “N” editions of Windows come without it: Stab then says “This edition of Windows has no Media Feature Pack”, which you add in Settings › Apps › Optional features.

For the microphone, Windows asks for permission in Settings › Privacy & security › Microphone: see The microphone isn’t heard.

MIDI

Stab finds MIDI devices as you plug them in, within a couple of seconds, and lists them in Settings › Audio & MIDI and the Audio & MIDI pane. Windows lets only one app at a time use some devices: if another music app has a device open, Stab may not see it until that app closes.

The Instrument pane plays with the mouse, a touch screen or a pen, or the computer’s keyboard (Musical Typing). Audio Buffer at the top of Settings › Audio & MIDI keeps the output’s buffer short while you play live.

What Windows doesn’t have

  • A YouTube video as a reference: not on Windows yet.
  • Import iReal Pro Link… from the clipboard: not on Windows. An iReal Pro file opens with Open….
  • Mirror on Display for an external display, and teaching Stab an e-kit’s pads one at a time.
  • Open Recent: the home’s shelves hold your recent songs.

Keys and menus

The keys are the Mac’s with Ctrl for ⌘ and Alt for ⌥, and Ctrl+Shift for ⌃. F10 opens the menu bar, and Alt with a menu’s letter opens that menu: see Keyboard shortcuts, and Shortcuts on each platform for the full list.