Synchain Frequently Asked Questions

• What is Synchain?

  Synchain is a music and audio collaboration platform you use in the browser. Teams work project by project, and one project holds the Creative Space real-time hi-fi room, the project files, the team calendar and the discussion board — from raw DAW audio all the way to delivery. One thing to clear up first: Synchain has nothing to do with blockchain, crypto or supply-chain software — the name comes from audio sidechaining: keeping your sound in step with your team.

• What is the real difference from sending music through Zoom or Discord?

  The audio chain in those voice-call apps is tuned for the human voice: noise suppression, echo cancellation and automatic gain treat music as noise, so what comes out the far end is muffled, smeared and pumping. Synchain gives DAW audio a lane of its own: you insert the Synchain Bridge plug-in in the DAW, your session audio goes straight into the room, the microphone travels a separate path, and each path gets its own choice of noise-suppression algorithm. You can also set every member's volume individually, the bitrate of the whole chain and the buffer size — knobs that give you room to move where a general-purpose voice app gives you none.

• How does plug-in direct connect (VST3 / AU / AAX) work?

  Insert the Synchain Bridge plug-in on a bus or a stereo track in your DAW and press Start; it opens a WebSocket service on 127.0.0.1, on your own machine. Creative Space in the browser connects to that local service and streams the audio on to everyone else in the room. The full path is DAW → plug-in → local WebSocket → browser → realtime audio server → collaborators, with no virtual cable routing anywhere. The plug-in sends one buffer block at a time, exactly as the DAW hands it over, so it never piles up extra latency; the master volume on the plug-in only touches the copy being streamed out, never the sound running through your DAW track.

• Which DAWs can I use?

  Any VST3 host loads Synchain Bridge — Reaper, Ableton Live, Cubase and more — Logic Pro loads the AU build, and Avid Pro Tools on Windows loads the AAX build (Beta). The plug-in carries manufacturer code Snch and plug-in code Snb1, so your DAW picks it up as a brand-new plug-in. Prebuilt releases ship for Windows x64 (VST3, plus AAX for Pro Tools in Beta) and Apple Silicon Macs (VST3 + AU); the macOS AAX build has not been released yet.

• Is Synchain free?

  It is. Signing up, creating projects, using Creative Space and downloading the Synchain Bridge plug-in are all free of charge during the closed beta.

• What do I need to install on my side?

  Nothing at all on the web side: open a browser, sign in, and you are in the project and in Creative Space — which is exactly why a client or a partner can join with zero setup. The Synchain Bridge plug-in is only needed when you want to push your DAW session audio into the room.

• Where are my files and data stored?

  Account and project data live in Supabase (a Postgres database that handles authentication as well); uploaded audio, images and other files live in Cloudflare R2. Real-time audio and video is relayed through the LiveKit servers we host and never written to disk. Uploads and downloads all go through short-lived presigned links, which keeps the transfer safe.

• How do I get started?

  Sign up, create a project, then generate an invite link to bring your collaborators in. Once you are inside the project, open Creative Space and you can collaborate in real time straight away. If you need the other end to hear what is playing in your DAW, download the Synchain Bridge plug-in from the download page, install it and insert it in your session.

• How are teams and projects organised?

  The project is the unit in Synchain: one project holds its members, its file tree, its calendar, its discussion board and its Creative Space room. Members are admins, members or viewers; a viewer can only look, and cannot make changes or enter the room. You can be in several projects at once and switch between them freely from the Dashboard.

• What are the browser requirements?

  A modern browser with JavaScript support is enough, with no plug-in or extension to install. Real-time audio and video use the browser's own WebRTC, and the DAW audio bridge additionally needs the browser to reach a WebSocket service on your machine, so a current desktop browser is the safe choice. The interface itself is available in Chinese, English and French.

• Is Synchain Bridge open source?

  Yes. Synchain Bridge, the DAW plug-in, is open source under GPL-3.0-or-later at github.com/synchain-oss/synchain-bridge, and the Synchain CLI is open source under MIT at github.com/synchain-oss/synchain-cli. The Synchain platform itself — Creative Space, files, calendar and discussion — is closed source.

• How do I install the Synchain CLI?

  Install it with npm i -g @synchain/cli (Node.js 20 or later), generate a key under Settings → CLI Access, then run synchain login. In CI, put the key in the SYNCHAIN_TOKEN environment variable so that synchain login runs without a prompt. The quickstart at www.synchain.ca/quickstart walks through the first commands.

• Which DAWs and systems does Synchain Bridge support?

  Any DAW that can load VST3 on 64-bit Windows 10 or 11, plus Avid Pro Tools (64-bit, AAX Native) on the same systems through the AAX build, which is in Beta; and VST3 or Audio Unit hosts — including Logic Pro — on Apple Silicon Macs running macOS 11 or later. Intel Macs, hosts running under Rosetta and GarageBand are not supported. The macOS AAX build has not been released yet.

• Is the Synchain Bridge download safe to install?

  Every VST3 and AU release is built in public by GitHub Actions from the tagged source and published on GitHub Releases at github.com/synchain-oss/synchain-bridge/releases, each zip with a SHA-256 checksum you can verify. The AAX build for Pro Tools (Beta) comes from the same workflow and tag and is then PACE-signed by the maintainer, as retail Pro Tools requires, before it is attached to the same release; its Windows code-signing certificate is self-signed, so Windows lists the signer as untrusted, which is expected. The VST3 and AU builds are not code-signed or notarized yet, so macOS Gatekeeper blocks the plug-in on first load; the macOS steps on the download page give the one-off Terminal commands that clear it.

• What is SCVB?

  SCVB (Synchain Vocal Balancer) is an open-source pair of plugins, led by Synchain, that automatically balances pan and level across multi-singer, multi-part vocal arrangements: SCVB Input sits on each vocal track and captures it, SCVB Output sits on the vocal bus, analyses all the tracks together, gives each one a pan curve and a level curve, and can print the result into your DAW as automation. It is a separate product: it needs no Synchain account and runs fully offline. It is available for Windows 10/11 (x64) in VST3 format and is open source under GPL-3.0-or-later (github.com/synchain-oss/scvb). Cubase is the main test host, REAPER has only had its routing verified, and other hosts are not verified yet. The current build, v0.10.0-beta.1, is a pre-release; download and install notes are at www.synchain.ca/scvb.