Carla

Audio plugins can help you enhance the overall sound output of streams played on your computer. Unfortunately, these utilities are not standalone and need a base program that supports them.

Carla is a handy piece of software that can help you host a multitude of audio plugins, so that you can use each driver as you please. In order to properly work, the application requires ASIO4All installed and running on your computer.

The program provides you with a stable environment for hosting audio drivers and plugins. It supports multiple audio plugin formats, such as LADSPA, LRDF, DSSI, LV2, VST, GIG, SF2 and SFZ. In this manner, you can open and use various plugins for processing or playing audio files without having to use a host application for each plugin.

Carla uses JACK as the default audio driver, although it offers support for other native drivers such as ALSA, DirectSound or CoreAudio.

Carla offers three types of engine processing, each one with its own advantages and drawbacks. The multi-client engine registers Audio and MIDI ports as needed for every plugin, exposed as a new JACK client. The single client engine processing is similar to the multi-client one, with the difference that all JACK ports belong to a single master client.

Ultimately, the rack engine processor processes plugins in order, from top to bottom, forcing a stereo option for unsupported non-stereo audio channel plugins.

Carla is ideal when it comes to hosting all sorts of audio plugins that can help you process or play sounds, providing features such as automation of parameters via MIDI CC and full OSC control. Using the application, you will have no trouble hosting your favorite plugins.