WaveLab is a digital audio editor

Digital audio editor

A digital audio editor is a computer application for audio editing, i.e. manipulating digital audio. Digital audio editors are the main software component of a digital audio workstation.-For use with music:...

 by Steinberg

Steinberg

Steinberg GmbH is a German musical software and equipment company based in Hamburg. It mainly produces music recording, arranging and editing software as used in digital audio workstations and VSTi software synthesizers.- History :...

 aimed at the professional as well as the semi-professional market. It supports multi-channel files, DirectX plugin

DirectX plugin

In computer music and professional audio creation, a DirectX plugin is a software processing component that can be loaded as a plugin into host applications to allow real-time processing, audio effects, mixing audio or act as virtual synthesizers...

, VST plugin

Virtual Studio Technology

Steinberg's Virtual Studio Technology is an interface for integrating software audio synthesizer and effect plugins with audio editors and hard-disk recording systems. VST and similar technologies use digital signal processing to simulate traditional recording studio hardware with software...

 and DVD-Audio

DVD-Audio

DVD-Audio is a digital format for delivering high-fidelity audio content on a DVD. DVD-Audio is not intended to be a video delivery format and is not the same as video DVDs containing concert films or music videos....

 creation. WaveLab was for a long time the main competitor to Sound Forge

Sound Forge

Sony Sound Forge is a digital audio editing suite by Sony Creative Software which is aimed at the professional and semi-professional markets....

. Wavelab was started in 1995 and it is mainly the work of one programmer, Philippe Goultier. Cut-down versions of WaveLab include WaveLab Studio, WaveLab Essential and WaveLab LE.

Features

• Red Book-compatible CD mastering as well as DVD-A authoring
• Support for bit-rates 8-, 16-, 20-, 24-bit at up to 384 kHz
• Support for formats including WAV, AIFF, AU, MP3, MP2 (M.U.S.I.C.A.M.), RAW, Windows Media 9, AES-31 Import and Export, ...
• Spectrum Editor with sonogram view
• Phase Scope
• DIRAC Time-stretching and Pitch-shifting (WaveLab 7.1 updates DIRAC from version 2.3 to 3.2)
• Full integration of external effect hardware
• DDP (Disc Description Protocol)
• WaveLab 7.1 adds FLAC
  FLAC
  FLAC is a codec which allows digital audio to be losslessly compressed such that file size is reduced without any information being lost...
  
  (Free Lossless Audio Codec) support

External links

• Steinberg - The software company that developed WaveLab

Reviews

• pcplus.co.uk
• digitalcontentproducer.com
• computervideo.net - A comparison between WaveLab and Soundforge