Ableton Live 9 on OSX is excellent. As well as anything by Native Instruments. I only use NI's Guitar Rig when rehearsing or performing even though I have better sounding amp simulations, because I have never had it crash once on me.
One time during a gig, running (pirated at the time) Ableton Live 8 on Windows 7, Ableton crashed. Thankfully Guitar Rig somehow kept running throughout the whole set! Even though the only thing onscreen was the "Ableton has encountered and error... and will now exit. <OK>" prompt. (For anyone who doesn't know these programs, Ableton runs as a host, in which Guitar Rig can be loaded as a plugin).
There are a few other plugins I trust, but not many. I've learned the hard way that "Well it's only crashed once this month, what's the worst that can happen?" means "It will crash 3 times during a 45 minute performance with a few hundred people staring at you." I'm only a hobbyist musician, but I'd still like for that to never happen again.
Edit: I think Reaper, another audio host program, is even more stable than Ableton. Ability to isolate plugins so if it crashes, the whole system doesn't die. Great crash handling/restore. Faulty plugin crashing every time you load your project so you can't even undo adding it? Try it 3 times, and on the 3rd, Reaper will deactivate the plugin and alert you.
Reaper is more "studio" software though, so it's less important. Worst-case scenario in the studio is you admit you've lost the take, apologize, and tell the drummer to go get a cup of coffee while the system reloads, and we'll try again.
One time during a gig, running (pirated at the time) Ableton Live 8 on Windows 7, Ableton crashed. Thankfully Guitar Rig somehow kept running throughout the whole set! Even though the only thing onscreen was the "Ableton has encountered and error... and will now exit. <OK>" prompt. (For anyone who doesn't know these programs, Ableton runs as a host, in which Guitar Rig can be loaded as a plugin).
There are a few other plugins I trust, but not many. I've learned the hard way that "Well it's only crashed once this month, what's the worst that can happen?" means "It will crash 3 times during a 45 minute performance with a few hundred people staring at you." I'm only a hobbyist musician, but I'd still like for that to never happen again.
Edit: I think Reaper, another audio host program, is even more stable than Ableton. Ability to isolate plugins so if it crashes, the whole system doesn't die. Great crash handling/restore. Faulty plugin crashing every time you load your project so you can't even undo adding it? Try it 3 times, and on the 3rd, Reaper will deactivate the plugin and alert you.
Reaper is more "studio" software though, so it's less important. Worst-case scenario in the studio is you admit you've lost the take, apologize, and tell the drummer to go get a cup of coffee while the system reloads, and we'll try again.