Record monitoring and recording during count in?

[KenC]

Is there a way to tell Reaper to let me record and hear output from a VSTi during the count-in?

Often you have a note a bit before the bar you start recording on, but by default Reaper doesn't record that, and I can't hear anything before recording kicks in after the count-in.

I'd like recording to be active during the count-in and let me hear what I play during the count-in

Also, is there any way to add negative bars before bar 1 for things like sending sysex to setup hardware before everything starts or if the song start a bit before bar 1? I could start on bar 4 or something, but that messes up the nice familiar bar numbering.

Any way to set this up? Sorry of this is obvious, I've been at it all day, but I can't seem to find any way to do it.