MicForge

A real-time microphone processor for Windows. It captures your mic, runs a deep, fully configurable DSP chain, and outputs to a virtual audio device so any app (Discord, OBS, games, browser, calls) uses the cleaned-up, shaped signal as its "microphone".

Written in C# / .NET 10 / WPF using NAudio for WASAPI capture and render. All DSP is hand-written (no VST/plugin host). The tray and settings UI use DotNetLib.Tray; processor controls remain custom.

See ARCHITECTURE.md for the code layout and design, and ROADMAP.md for where it's going.

Highlights

• 23-stage DSP chain, every stage toggle-able, tunable live, and drag-to-reorder.
• Crafting tab — stack "voice character" cards (Deep, Bright, Radio, Megaphone, Robot…) with intensity sliders to design a voice with no technical knobs; JSON-configurable, with a built-in preview voice so you can hear it without talking.
• Meters/analyzer tab — live spectrogram, signal-flow diagram, and a full loudness suite (momentary / short-term / integrated LUFS, LRA, true-peak).
• Presets — built-in voice profiles + your own preset folder that auto-loads; plus quick EQ-curve presets on the equalizer.
• Reliability — device auto-reconnect, follow-the-default-mic, an audio watchdog, crash logging, and single-instance launch.
• Daily use — global hotkeys, push-to-talk / push-to-mute, a mute overlay, a live tray icon, and minimize/close to tray with an optional "Start with Windows".

Signal chain

Input gain ─▶ Auto gain ─▶ High-pass ─▶ Hum remover ─▶ De-plosive
  ─▶ Noise suppression (RNNoise) ─▶ Gate ─▶ Expander ─▶ De-click
  ─▶ Keystroke suppressor ─▶ De-reverb ─▶ Echo remover ─▶ Equalizer
  ─▶ Compressor ─▶ Multiband ─▶ De-esser ─▶ Saturation ─▶ Exciter
  ─▶ Voice changer ─▶ Comfort noise ─▶ Limiter ─▶ Output gain ─▶ Loudness ─▶ virtual mic

The order above is the default — you can rearrange stages by dragging their cards. Everything runs internally at mono, 32-bit float, 48 kHz.

The tabs

• Processor — the chain as cards (Sliders ⇄ Graphs view). Interactive EQ curve + spectrum, compressor transfer curve, gate/de-esser/limiter meters, in/out level meters, clip indicators, mic-health readout.
• Crafting — character cards, filterable by category (Tone / Polish / Fun / FX), with a live preview voice and per-card info + "technical peek".
• Meters — spectrogram, signal-flow, loudness suite.
• Shortcuts — configure global hotkeys and push-to-talk.
• Settings: one scrolling page with section cards, responsive jump navigation and save feedback. Includes monitoring, reliability, startup/tray, profile export/import, presets, undo/redo and updates.

Requirements

1. Windows 10/11 (x64).
2. VB-CABLE (free) — creates the virtual mic. After installing, MicForge sends audio to "CABLE Input", and in your app you pick "CABLE Output" as the microphone.

The installer is self-contained (bundles the .NET runtime), so no separate .NET install is needed to run it. To build, you need the .NET 10 SDK.

Usage

1. Install VB-CABLE and reboot.
2. Run MicForge.
3. Input = your real mic. Output = CABLE Input (VB-Audio Virtual Cable) (auto-selected if found).
4. Click Start, speak, and tune. Pick a preset to get going fast.
5. In Discord/OBS/etc., set the microphone to CABLE Output.

To monitor yourself while tuning, enable Monitoring in Settings and choose your headphones (expect a little latency — normal for the two-device WASAPI path).

RNNoise AI noise suppression

A 64-bit rnnoise.dll — built from the official xiph/rnnoise source — is bundled in native/ and copied next to the exe on build, so the Noise Suppression stage works out of the box (BSD license in native/RNNOISE-LICENSE.txt). You can also point the app at a different rnnoise.dll via the card's Load… button; the loader validates the exports before enabling the stage.

Where your data lives

Everything is under %AppData%\MicForge\ so it survives uninstall/reinstall:

• micforge.json — your full setup (chain params, devices, stage order, hotkeys, crafting, last preset, theme)
• craftcards.json — Crafting card definitions (editable; built-ins refresh on update)
• presets\*.json — your saved presets (auto-loaded into the dropdown)
• samples\*.wav — your own Crafting preview voices
• logs\micforge.log — rolling log + crash capture

Building & packaging

# restore (requires read:packages credentials for the dotnetlib source)
dotnet restore MicForge.csproj

# build / run
dotnet build -c Release
dotnet run   -c Release

# compatibility, tray state and WPF settings tests
dotnet test tests/MicForge.Tests/MicForge.Tests.csproj -c Release

# formatting (CI runs these with --verify-no-changes)
dotnet format MicForge.csproj
dotnet format tests/MicForge.Tests/MicForge.Tests.csproj

# self-contained publish (what the installer bundles)
dotnet publish -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained true

# installer (Inno Setup 6): installer/MicForge.iss  ->  MicForge-Setup-x.y.z.exe

The bundled preview voice clip is a CC BY-NC excerpt — see assets/VOICE-SAMPLE-LICENSE.txt for attribution.

Notes

• Capture and render run on two independent device clocks; a 500 ms input buffer plus overflow discard absorbs the drift. Great for voice; not sample-accurate.
• The Echo Remover targets slap-back / speaker-bleed echo of your own voice (single-channel, no far-end reference) — it is not full duplex acoustic echo cancellation.

License

PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0 — free for noncommercial use.

Shared tray and settings kit

DotNetLib.Core and DotNetLib.Tray 0.4.1 come from the private GitHub Packages feed in nuget.config. Set credentials for the dotnetlib source in your user NuGet configuration, or provide NuGetPackageSourceCredentials_dotnetlib in the environment with Username=<GitHub user>;Password=<read:packages token>. Keep credentials out of this repository.

The tray opens MicForge on a left click. Its menu shows processing status and provides start/stop, mute, bypass, Settings, startup and theme controls. System, Light and Dark apply without restarting; high contrast follows Windows. Existing settings files default to Dark when they have no theme field. Settings and presets stay in the same AppData folder. The migration does not install or publish an app release.