alt Hacker NewsI'm surprised there isn't a sturdy generic VST-runner box with an interface to configure the MIDI in / out and which VSTs will run. A sort of headless generic synth. My Roland VariOS synth from ages ago which I got for like $50 works like this, you use a WIN32 or Classic Mac computer to load and configure the various synths (it has a couple emulators or workalikes for older synths, plus a crazy synth that chops up and munges incoming audio under MIDI control) and then you only need to power the 1U rack mounted module unless you're designing patches, in which case you have to attach a computer.
Something like this but for VSTs would be killer.
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There have been a whole bunch of them, and most of them fail because they spend so much effort on getting the box and the screen running with low-no latency that the actual control surface is usually an afterthought. Touchscreens are absolute ass for performance but most engineers don't appreciate that you need some sort of note input, at least 16 buttons to function as a sequencer, and at least rotary encoders, and they have to be good encoders because musicians get carried away when they're jamming.
There is/was; the Muse Research Receptor. It might be overly complex for what you are thinking of, but it existed.
https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/muse-research-receptor
https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/muse-research-receptor-...
You can pick them up, often fully loaded with plugins, for a few hundred dollars. I wrote parts of the system. They were running Linux and fun to hack on.
I currently work in the professional audio industry and know of a few modern efforts underway to produce modern version of this, but I am not convinced there is market for such a device anymore.
This exists for CLAP: https://cdm.link/sndstation-linux-distro-for-game-handhelds/; you can watch a preview of what one of the authors created for it here: https://youtu.be/0cHvzRsJg-A.
A couple of these exist in guitar pedal form for lv2 (which is a dead format): Mod Audio Dwarf, and pistomp.
Nothing for VST3 that I'm aware of. Maybe the new Akai stuff?