v0.4.10 — UI polish: crisp text, full plugin names, the right credit

v0.4.10 — UI polish: crisp text, full plugin names, the right credit

Editors

• Footer credit is now by Yousef Mohiey on every plugin.
• Fixed a clipped VALUE caption and five more text/layout collisions found by a new automated audit: every string is now measured against its box at 96/120/144 DPI and provably fits (48 tests green).
• Denoise stat tiles, EQ and Expander cards re-stacked so nothing overlaps or clips at any scale.

App

• Plugin names show in full everywhere: the browser list and chain rows no longer truncate "Applier Noise Suppression GPU" (before, it was indistinguishable from the CPU version). Format badge moved into the hover tooltip to free up the space; all rows keep a full-name tooltip.

Also in this update

Everything from v0.4.9: all seven editors on the big 640×400 DPI-native kit, Applier branding, hear-yourself monitor without the buzz.

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.10.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.10-win64.zip.

v0.4.9 — big crisp editors for all plugins, Applier rename, monitor fix

v0.4.9 — every editor rebuilt big & crisp, Applier branding, monitor fix

All seven plugin editors, one big readable kit

Every editor is now the large 640×400 panel with big text — including the four older small ones (Noise Suppression CPU, 3-Band EQ, Expander, Limiter, previously 340 px wide). Text is rendered DPI-native (per-monitor aware, ClearType, no bitmap stretching), so it stays sharp at any display scaling — verified at 96, 120 and 144 DPI (640×400 / 800×500 / 960×600).

The family is now Applier

All plugins are renamed from "Yousef …" to Applier … (editor titles, host names, file names, updater). Updates migrate automatically: old files are cleaned up, no duplicates.

Hear-yourself monitor fixed

No more buzz: the monitor now opens your headphones at their native rate (no resampling), uses a proper band-limited path otherwise, trims smoothly and blocks DC. The MONITOR section got a tidy layout too. Verified: route dropouts stay at zero while monitoring.

Denoiser is our own

Editor branding no longer references external projects — it reads "APPLIER DENOISE". Third-party components and licenses live in THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md.

Also in this update

Everything from v0.4.8: Applier Noise Suppression GPU (DirectML), Compressor, Gate, and only Applier plugins bundled.

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.9.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.9-win64.zip.

v0.4.8 — GPU noise suppression, Compressor & Gate, hear-yourself monitor

v0.4.8 — GPU noise suppression, Compressor & Gate, hear-yourself monitor

New: Yousef Noise Suppression GPU

The DeepFilterNet denoiser now runs on your graphics card via DirectML (works on AMD, NVIDIA and Intel GPUs; falls back to CPU automatically if no GPU runtime is present). Measured across the whole pipeline: max deviation from the CPU engine 2.8e-8 (float noise — identical sound), ~6.8× realtime, ~1.5 ms per 10 ms of audio. Ships with its own runtime (onnxruntime + DirectML), no installs needed. Its editor is the new large one (640×400) and shows which engine is active — DirectML with your adapter name, CPU, or OFF.

New: Yousef Compressor and Yousef Gate

Native replacements for the third-party compressor/gate you were using: real DSP (soft-knee, attack/release, 4 dB gate hysteresis + hold), 20/20 unit tests, zero latency, and the same big 640×400 editor. Your chain can now be 100 % Yousef.

New: hear-yourself monitor

A MONITOR toggle under Levels plays your processed voice on your headphones so you can set levels without another app. Off by default, it refuses to monitor into the virtual cable and disables itself if the device misbehaves — the main route is never affected (verified: zero dropouts while toggling).

Cleaner plugins folder: only the Yousef family

The bundled third-party plugins from older versions are retired — this update removes AltDenoiser, Bertom Denoiser, DeeGate, DeepFilterNet, ReaPlugs, TDR Nova and RNNoise from the install and ships only the Yousef plugins. Plugins you added yourself are never touched. (New installs: just the Yousef family.)

Plugin	What it does
Yousef Noise Suppression	AI denoise (CPU)
Yousef Noise Suppression GPU	AI denoise on the GPU (DirectML)
Yousef 3-Band EQ	High / Mid / Low
Yousef Expander	Downward expander
Yousef Limiter	Peak limiter
Yousef Compressor	Soft-knee compressor
Yousef Gate	Noise gate

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.8.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.8-win64.zip.

v0.4.7 — tray CPU fix (a full core reclaimed)

v0.4.7 — tray CPU fix (a full core reclaimed)

Fixed: closing the app to the tray no longer burns a CPU core

Found and fixed a real one: when the window was hidden to the tray (or minimized), the windowing layer kept spinning at ~100% of one CPU core — measured 92.6% → 0.1–0.3% after the fix. Root cause: a hidden window never receives paint messages, and the redraw request that reset the loop could never arrive, so the event loop free-ran below the app's own code. Fixed at the windowing layer (vendored eframe patch: drop pending redraw requests for invisible windows) plus the app requesting nothing while hidden. Visible and minimized behavior unchanged; tray restore re-verified.

Also in this update

• Yousef 3-Band EQ / Expander / Limiter — the three plugins from v0.4.6, now delivered by the updater automatically (wildcard plugin delivery: every "Yousef …" plugin in the package is copied — no more name-list)
• Everything from v0.4.6: any-VST loading (FunkBass 3 works), all plugin loads off the UI thread (no more "Not Responding"), silent crash diagnostics, the updater fix

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip next to your profile → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.7.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.7-win64.zip (app + host DLLs + all four bundled plugins).

v0.4.6 — Yousef 3-Band EQ, Expander & Limiter + chain-editing fixes

v0.4.6 — three new plugins: 3-Band EQ, Expander, Limiter + hang fixes

New plugin: Yousef 3-Band EQ

High / Mid / Low (±12 dB) exactly like the panel you showed: drag the slider, click the ▲▼ steppers for 1 dB steps, dB readout per band. Low shelf 200 Hz, mid peak 1.2 kHz, high shelf 6 kHz. Zero latency, 150 KB.

New plugin: Yousef Expander

The expander panel: Threshold, Ratio, Attack, Release, Output Gain with dB/ratio/ms readouts and steppers. Quiet signals below the threshold get pushed down (that's what an expander does — cleans up background hiss between phrases). Same zero-latency treatment.

New plugin: Yousef Limiter

The limiter panel: Threshold (ceiling, default -6 dB) + Release (default 60 ms). Instant attack — nothing ever gets past the ceiling, so no more clipping in your voice chat. Stereo-linked, zero latency.

All three install into your plugins folder as "Yousef 3-Band EQ" / "Yousef Expander" / "Yousef Limiter" — SCAN, then ADD them to the chain like the noise suppression.

Fixed: "Not Responding" while adding / removing / toggling plugins

Found it for real this time: some plugin loads were still happening on the UI thread — starting the route (a cold FunkBass 3 takes 16 seconds!) and flipping a chain slot's enable checkbox back on. Both now load in the background; the window stays responsive and the route/chain picks the plugin up the moment it's ready. The log also gained per-step timings (chain-remove: … teardown=N ms) so any future slowdown names itself in one line.

Also in this update

• The in-app updater now delivers all four bundled plugins.
• Everything from v0.4.5: loads any VST including instruments (FunkBass 3 works), background plugin adds, silent crash diagnostics.

Updating from v0.4.4 / v0.4.5

Heads-up for one hop: older versions' updaters only knew the plugins that existed back then, so the in-app update brings the new app but can skip the three new plugins. If Yousef 3-Band EQ / Expander / Limiter don't show up after updating from one of those versions, just run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.6.exe once (installs all four), or copy them from the update's staging folder (%AppData%\VstApplier\pending). From this version onward the updater delivers every bundled plugin the package carries — automatically.

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip next to your profile → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.6.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.6-win64.zip (app + host DLLs + all four bundled plugins).

VST-Applier v0.4.5

v0.4.5 — snappier plugin adds, any-plugin loading + quiet crash protection

New: the app now loads instruments and stubborn plugins

Previously the app rejected plugins that don't have a (stereo) audio input — which is every instrument (synths, samplers, bass machines like FunkBass 3): they generate sound instead of processing it, so they have no input at all. That's a perfectly valid plugin and now loads and runs correctly. Plugins that refuse the app's requested channel layout but work on their own defaults are no longer turned away either. And when something genuinely can't load, the message now says the real reason (e.g. "output bus width does not match") instead of a generic error.

Smoother: adding plugins no longer freezes the app

Adding a plugin to a running chain used to load it on the UI thread — with the bundled denoiser (which carries its AI model) that froze the window for up to ~2 seconds. The plugin now loads in the background: the window stays responsive, and the plugin snaps into the live chain the moment it's ready. Removing plugins was already instant and stays that way. This also removed a hidden crash risk in the old code path (adding a plugin while routing was stopped could hit a bad unwrap).

Safer: crash diagnostics, completely invisible

The start/stop crash fixed in v0.4.4 stays fixed. On top of that, if the app ever dies unexpectedly for any other reason it now records a small diagnostic file on your machine — no window, no message, nothing sent anywhere. If you ever report "it crashed", that file makes it directly diagnosable instead of a guessing game. Old diagnostic files are cleaned up automatically (newest 3 kept).

Under the hood

• Every internal routing restart is now tagged in the log (START (boot|button|space|…)) — if a restart ever happens on its own, the log names exactly what triggered it.
• Internal build cleanups and test hooks (including a vst3_probe plugin-loading harness).

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip next to your profile → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.5.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.5-win64.zip (app + host DLLs + the bundled plugin).

v0.4.4 — 54 MB lighter, and start/stop is bulletproof

v0.4.4 — 54 MB lighter, and start/stop is bulletproof

Two big things: the crashing stop/start loop is fixed for good, and the app itself shrank from 64 MB to 9.7 MB.

Fixed: the start/stop crash

Repeatedly toggling routing (press start and stop a couple of times) could crash the app with the noise plugin in the chain. Root cause: on every stop we unloaded the plugin DLL from memory and on every start reloaded it — the ~4th unload/reload of a 54 MB plugin segfaulted inside its teardown state. Professional hosts (Reaper, Cubase, Ableton) never unload plugin modules; we now do the same — GetModuleHandleExW(..., GET_MODULE_HANDLE_EX_FLAG_PIN) loads the plugin exactly once per process, while plugin instances are still created and destroyed per route. Reproduced the segfault with a dedicated attach/drop harness (died on cycle 4), verified the fix with 20/20 clean cycles, and the harness ships in the repo as a regression test.

Smaller: 64 MB → 9.7 MB

The retired built-in AI denoise no longer compiles its model + inference runtime into the app exe — the Yousef Noise Suppression plugin owns denoising and keeps everything it needs. The installer (~100 MB, was 147) and the built-in updater's download (~50 MB, was 89) shrink with it, and the app starts a touch faster.

Also included (everything from v0.4.3)

• The in-app updater delivers the bundled plugin along with the app.
• All of v0.4.3: updater plugin payload, and from v0.4.2: root-caused audio reliability fixes (resampler tail, silence-path cost, PI servo, own WASAPI capture, self-heal watchdog), DeepFilterNet3-ll denoise + plugin, launcher-style settings, UPDATE chip, rounded corners, Inter/Archivo/Geist Mono fonts, icon rendering fix.

Update

• From inside the app: UPDATE chip next to your profile → Download → Install + Restart.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.4.exe.
• Manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.4-win64.zip (app + host DLLs + the bundled plugin).

v0.4.3 — the updater now brings the plugin too

v0.4.3 — the updater now brings the plugin too

A small, focused release that closes the one gap from v0.4.2: updating from inside the app now delivers the bundled plugin as well, not just the app files.

What changed

• The in-app updater installs the bundled plugin. The release zip now also carries Yousef Noise Suppression.dll; when you press Install + Restart, it lands in Plugins\VST-Applier\ together with the app and host DLLs (same elevated path as everything else — one UAC prompt if needed). The staged-update line in Settings tells you when the plugin is part of the update.
• Older app-only zips still apply: the plugin step is skipped and only the app files are swapped, so nothing breaks mid-flight.
• Everything from v0.4.2 is included — root-caused audio reliability fixes (resampler tail, silence-path cost, PI servo, own WASAPI capture, self-heal), DeepFilterNet3-ll denoise + the plugin, the launcher-style settings surface, the UPDATE chip, rounded corners, the Inter/Archivo/Geist Mono stack, and the icon rendering fix.

Update

• From inside the app: the UPDATE chip next to your profile → Download → Install + Restart. This now brings the plugin with it.
• In place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.3.exe over your current install.
• Portable / manual: VST-Applier-v0.4.3-win64.zip (vst-applier.exe + both native host DLLs + the bundled plugin).

v0.4.2 — rock-solid audio + a fresh look

v0.4.2 — rock-solid audio + a fresh look

The biggest quality pass so far: the dropout/lag/freeze episodes were investigated to the root (measured, not guessed), noise suppression got a real engine, and the whole UI was rebuilt around a launcher-grade settings surface.

Audio reliability — root causes found and fixed

• Resampler tail growth in the noise plugin: the tail-keep formula kept the whole buffer after a full emission, so the per-block memcpy grew quadratically at 44.1 kHz — 4–10 ms of work per 10 ms block after minutes, which is what starved the ring, flooded dropouts and froze the UI. Fixed: 44.1 kHz went from climbing 876→2504 µs to a flat ~15–300 µs.
• Silence was the most expensive input: the denoiser ran its full path on dead-silence (5–7× cost, denormals). Now: a −70/−60 dB silence gate plus FTZ/DAZ on every audio thread.
• Own WASAPI capture replaces the previous input path — capture teardown can no longer wedge; it now has a bounded stop (1.5 s, then the thread is terminated as a last resort) so stop/restart and route healing can never hang the app.
• PI servo instead of P-only: the controller now learns the exact mic↔cable clock drift (250–550 ppm on USB mics) instead of parking the ring at whatever ramps happened to cancel out.
• Self-heal watchdog: sustained starvation or a frozen render counter restarts the route automatically (at most once per 30 s), with a toast so you know it happened.
• Startup dropouts (boot churn) are now counted separately from live ones, so the counter reflects what you'd actually hear.

Noise suppression

• Built-in AI denoise now runs the low-latency DeepFilterNet3-ll model, fed at true 48 kHz (with the fix above it is genuinely cheap on untouched signal).
• The denoiser also ships as a chainable VST2 plugin — "Yousef Noise Suppression" — with a rebuilt editor: flicker-free painting, correct slider dragging, and a credit footer that opens the project page.

The new look

• New Settings surface in the launcher style: app icon header, five labeled sections, square checkboxes, theme selector, credits — compact (460 px), always dead-center over a dimmed backdrop. DONE closes it (Esc and clicking outside work too).
• Update chip: when a newer release exists, an UPDATE chip appears next to your profile in the header — one click opens Settings, where the download and install steps live. It also tracks downloading and restart to update states.
• Rounded window corners on Windows 11.
• New typeface stack — Inter for UI text, Archivo SemiBold for titles, Geist Mono for the small labels (embedded, OFL licensed).
• Fixed small icons that could render as letter lookalikes (a font collision), the brand logo now keeps its true aspect ratio, and the sidebar cable badge text is complete.

Update

• In-place: run VST-Applier-Setup-v0.4.2.exe over your current install — this is also what delivers the new bundled Yousef Noise Suppression plugin.
• The app's built-in updater (the UPDATE chip) updates the app itself; if you update only that way and want the plugin, run the Setup once.

Portable/updater payload: VST-Applier-v0.4.2-win64.zip (vst-applier.exe + both native host DLLs) for manual updates of the app files.

v0.4.1 — Low-latency pipeline

v0.4.1 — Low-latency pipeline

Same app as v0.4.0, with the whole audio pipeline retuned for low latency.

What changed

• Pipeline preload: the audio pipeline buffers two DSP blocks + 10 ms of margin instead of a flat 100 ms — the single biggest latency cost in the old design.
• Low-latency output stream: when the output device supports it, the render side now opens Windows' low-latency shared mode (IAudioClient3) at the smallest period the driver allows. On VB-CABLE that is 2.67 ms periods with a 5.8 ms buffer — previously ~10–20 ms. Devices that are locked to 10 ms periods (many stock drivers) automatically keep the standard stream.
• The status bar shows "low-latency output" when that path is active.
• Everything from v0.4.0 is included: 100% Rust host layer with hardware-fault isolation, chain autosave, instant settings save, System default theme.

Measured (mic → VB-CABLE, 512-sample blocks)

The app's status line went from ~83 ms to ~32 ms; the tone-loop test path from ~124 ms to under 20 ms. Zero dropouts across the tone loop, a denoiser chain, and live chain edits.

Tip: the cable's own buffer

VB-CABLE ships with a large internal pipe (7168 samples) chosen for maximum compatibility. If everything you send through it uses small buffers (like this app), lowering Max Latency to ~3072 in the VB-CABLE Control Panel cuts the cable's own share of the delay. It can be changed on the fly, and the panel's statistics will tell you if you went too small.