I've installed two VEP7 servers. One several months ago (old), the second yesterday (new).
I have updated the first every regularly (last update was 7.0.1056), the latter I installed freshly, setup version was 7.0.1056 as well.
Although both file versions are the same my old server always says "The file was saved with a newer version of Vienna Ensemble Pro...", when I try to open a server project written with the new server. The problem ist that I need to click an app modal button every time I load a file so loading a project unattended fails.

I found a workaround that may be valuable for someone: I deinstalled VEP7 on the old server and installed the downloaded version 7.0.1056. Problem gone.

I'm a beginner (2019/12/29) as well so please don't expext expert's advice

First of all you must make sure your slave machine(s) all have a static IP address becaus VEP handles the connections via IP addres not Computer Name.
I did it
- by using an extra GBit router and an
- extra LAN-card per machine. Then I
- defined a second LAN (192.168.0.x) side by side with my normal one (192.168.1.x)
- starting with 192.168.0.100 for my Master and 192.168.0.101 for the 1st Slave and 192.168.0.102 for 2nd
- Network cards IP settings for 1st slave IP 192.168.0.101, Subnet Mask 255.255.255.0, no Standard Gateway (leave blank), no DNS server (leave blank).
- Wrote the lines
192.168.0.101 VSL1
192.168.0.102 VSL2
into the HOSTS file (c:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\) on my Master machine. This way the both slaves ar found by PC name (as I don't use a DHCP server in the VSL LAN).
As I have understood so far: You can define a standard setup on your slave and save a VEP server file where all your big libraries and channels are stored in.

Then you steup a DAW project may it be Ableton, Cubase ... and do your routing for the instruments you have defined in VEP server on your slave machine.
You should disable all tracks in the template as otherwise loading for big templates will take forever.
Than you can save the template with all VEP instances coupled (means your template will manage all connections and settings in the VEP server).

When you now want to reuse your template just open and save it under a new name and start to enable all needed instruments/tracks.

I know it is a bit intimidating but in the end you will get a huge payback in terms of usability/managebility of big projects.

P.S. 1: Again, this will only work if you manage to give your slave(s) a static IP address! For me it didn't work with my primary LAN thus I built the second. Use good, shielded cables!
P.S. 2: Saving and loading big templates with VEP connections coupled will take quite a while because  all settings on the VEP server are stored inside the template. When you got mor familiar with the system it makes sense to decouple the instances and save all settings inside VEP server. It speeds up the loading a lot.

Good to hear @Paul. Some vendors start to implement new features in VST3 only.

As I'm a new VEP user I searched the description of VEP and found that VST3 is supported. I didn't get though it was meant for the VSL plugins in DAWs only atm.