I like this shootout but you should only loop a 2 to 4 bars section.

Thanks for shootout. I’ve been usin* Softube Tape and Airwindows Tape for years. However, the shootout didn’t really help as were hearing different parts of the song with different plugins. It would have been far more helpful to just loop the same 2 or 4 bars of different parts of the track for each plugins.

Very interesting video Wytse! It's good to hear your opinion on the different plugins. I have actually had some email conversations with the guys at u-he about the aliasing in Satin and it turns out that the artifacts are not supposed to be there. The issue has persisted since 2015 or earlier, but since apparently no one cared enough to report or point it out, it never got fixed. Since the developer of Satin left u-he last year as well, it will probably take a bit of time until the new devs can get around to fixing this issue. Some experimenting showed that the culprit might be the saturation stage before the actual tape emulation that might not be included in the OS path or have its lowpass filter disabled for some reason. The actual reason is not totally clear yet, these are just educated guesses that might or might not be true.

Ik Multimedia tape machines is oversampled to 384kHz, its personally my favorite. I agree it could use auto-gain, but after doing a shootout myself with them the IK sounded the best to me. Felt like it had more depth and a nicer glue than the others. Great video as always!

I like how the Slate Digital leave all the transients intact! Thank you for sharing knowledge on that!! Amazing vid!

I use the Slate and Softube tape plugs every session. I think the "best" option really depends on what you want the tape to do. Subtle saturation? Fattening? Bringing out the high mids? Blown out tape compression? De-harshing cymbals? Softube (particularly the B tape) really adds smooth fatness to anything. And it shines brightly when saturated. It is AMAZING on hammond and other organ/key sounds when pushed hard. Good on a drum bus. Slate VTM maybe does more than just what a tape machine does. On the master bus it enhances the stereo image, brings things "forward", and does have a bit of tapey HF rolloff. Used at 15ips it has the subtle LF bump, especially on the 456 setting. Good on drums, bass, vocals but not so much kick drums. Where I use it all the time is on hand percussion, acoustic guitar and sometimes snare - it tames transients like no other "soft clipper". Apply it to a clip and watch what it does to the waveform. It does sound pretty screechy when driven hard, unlike the Softube Tape which warms things up. Nice video bruuuh

I loved the way you demoed all the plugins with the music, fantastic idea!!

Okay, due to this video I downloaded "chow tape model". As I know tape machines and actually know what those parameters refer to it is not too overwhelming to set it to my preferences and liking. Gotta say: I love it! I didn't expect it to sound that good! It was the result of a university research project and damn, it is really, really great! The "drift" parameter is pure magic - as long as you dial in tiniest doses and don't overdo it.

ATR 102 isn’t just my favorite tape plug-in but probably my favorite plug-in of all time. Definitely my most used. Very versatile

This is the content we crave, Wytse.

Very cool video! i don't know if is commented in here but what i like about SATIN is the compander (multiband or full band compression -- expansion), you have the mix, encoder, decoder controls, and its magic is that compresses the signal before it hits the tape, and then expands the signal after the tape, then you have the mix control to mix the amount with the original emulating parallel processing, love this how it sounds in percussive elements.

Thanks to your recommendation I went full trial mode on softube tape. The included mixfx version with crosstalk in S1 is crazy! Thanks again.

Wow I was just asking my self this question last week and now this video shows up. Thanks.

great vid but its much easier to compare if you loop the same bars for every emu without the song progressing.

I’ve been looking forward to this comparison. I’m quite surprised there was a definitive answer… Top marks! 👍

I use and am very fond of the UAD Studer A800, which is very versatile and flexible. Helps add warmth to a mix and sounds amazingly good. Many options.

I am using Softube Tape over a year, very handy and good sounding, don’t feel like to change it 😃

8:58 Softube 9:04 Satin 9:09 Chow 9:14 IKM 9:19 Taupe 9:29 Slate 9:39 Real tape 9:49 Slate 10:00 Softube 10:10 Chow 10:20 Satin 10:30 IKM 10:40 Softube 10:50 Real 10:56 Taip 11:04 Slate 11:11 Chow 11:21 Real

Great video man!

Awesome comparisons. Thanks

I was extremely impressed with Chow! Generally I pull back the low end bass boost when using Slate. Softube had a great "syrupy" controlled sound. Taip sounded way too gritty and lofi grainy for me in general use (not what I go for tape plugins to do - it was more like a bitcrusher).

I'm using Softube Tape for a while now, it's almost on every mixes/masters i do when I do feel it needs it. I like to drive the input to get some more character. Really love it. Tried some more, but always came back to that Softube one. It sounds very good to my personal tastes.

I use Satin almost on every mix on the master and on tracks. Very nice sounding emulation, very useful subtle and musical controls. I recommend to see Dan Worrall’s video about Compander feature in Satin, no any other tape simulation plugin has it. What Satin can’t do is overdriving the tape the way IK tape emulation plugins does. When I need hardly saturated tape sound I can’t get it from Satin. It saturates but in different way. So I use it for clean sounding needs and that’s what Satin does very well. Not having auto gain in IK Tape is very annoying, that’s so true. But it drives very nice and Bias knob works more dirty than in Satin, that can add to character if needed. After this video I really want to try Softube emulation. Seems like it’s very good. Thanks for your video!

ChowTape all the way for me. 😀👍 1. I get to do any type of tape saturation I want [and it used to be just a Sony TC-260 emulation]. 2. It goes up to 16x oversampling. 3. Free of charge. 🤯👍

W !! great breakdown of the old school sounds of anolog tape

Wowwwwww your hardware tape machine is amazing!!!! What a sound!!!! 😳 Incredible. It's the first time I hear a real tape machine, i never liked tape emulation plugins, i think they sound unnatural, but after this video I'm shocked with the hardware. It's like a magic texture. Wow. Great video! Saluti dall'Italia 🇮🇹

Wow your real tape mashine sounds crazy good. I like the Softube a lot aswell. Great comparison!

Man, excelent job!

The best emulation is the one that matches aesthetically with the track you're working on.There's no good or bad with all of the above plugins. Back in the day you use to go to a studio with a specific console and specific gear to acquire a specific sound.The same applies on these too.Great video btw

Thanks for a review!

Thanks for including Chow! For those of us on a negative budget it scratches the itch, even I have to work harder to get there :-)

I have been using Slate VTM almost 10 years now. I have used T-Racks tape machines and at first I had trouble using them. Sounding good but a pain to use, So i created my default presets for example 15ips 456 with different bias, in levels HF LF etc , then 30ips 456 with same variations etc etc etc... took me a few hours to figure out the configurations i wanted. So now I just recall instantly and it has become one of my best tape plugins. Also I did demo satin when it came out, felt it was too much for me. Felt like i was inventing the ideal tape machine from the ground up, didnt think of making my own presets so i didnt dive more into satin. havnt tried the soft tube nor the baby audio taip. Just checked out Chow tape and im impressed by the options. its also free. I have to make my own default presets of custom tape machines - tape stock and see how it goes. For now anything i do just makes my sound more lo fi so i have to be thinkful of what parameters to modify.

Awesome. You did a fantastic job with covering tape👍🏻 Also, if i buy of course i will buy with your affilliate links ✌

Some plugins solve every auto gain issue, but I agree with you. It should not be a big deal to integrate it into the plugins. Thanks for the great review.

Out of all these I liked the sound from slate, & baby audio taip, of course the hardware sounds amazing, but I can’t believe Kramer tape from waves on here that’s my personal favorite tape emulation plugin!

I agree with the other comments on the shootout being difficult to hear the differences on. Having a loop where you can just switch between on the same source audio would be nice, and hearing the difference between NO tape plugin or actual tape and the plugin would be great too. I already have CHOW because it's free, but I was thinking about checking another one out as well. Now I just have to decide if I want the all access for Slate or to just get the Softube one since I already have an account with them from getting the Sat Knob last year.

Thank you for your efforts. Softube! Slate!

“You can use the same screwdriver on both of them” really sold me LOL

Thanks for the video! Great idea! What I like about tape emulation plugins is their effect on the low end. Of course, the high end can be nicely affected too. But, to that end, I recommend trying the Air Windows free tape and related plugins. I think they're pretty darn good and there's a variety (maybe too much of a variety :). Hmm, I think I'll have to give that Chow plugin another test. But some were very punchy on this audio.

Now I'm angry with myself for not giving a +1 to Airwindows offerings in the comment section of your previous video.. I thought they get mentioned enough by others :'( but at least Chow made it. Great stuff, Wytse!

I like the ChowTape. It's in my budget. lol. I also got to use it on some detuned pianos recently and it worked really well.

i A/B'd my old Studer A800 with the Slate and Satin ones. They're both very good

While the I don't work in the audio industry, I do work with software engineers and programmers. It's amazing how a programmer can focus so much on the function of something and they forget that an actual person has to use the thing they are making. So often, user experience is set by the side of a programming project. It's sad for the reasons you've described. I've seen you despair so many time on this one thing and when you get automatic gain compensation it just lights you up with joy.

more of this vids i love it ♥

Softube!Always use that one,sounds magic!😎

Every comparison always forgets about magnetite by black rooster audio! I absolutely love it!

The important thing I have learned from this video is that OK the hardware is different class, but the others do all sound pretty good

I totally agree with you! What makes Chow great for me is the sound and the "price" (free). Sure, it would be nice if a simple control interface would be added and only if you want to dig deeper to click a button and open this interface. Softube sounded really great, easy to use. Slate is pretty great too, the interface is really good, easy on the eyes.

I thought the IK sounded the best with chow in second place. I know the lack of auto-gain is a sticking point for you but there is a possible solution, because you mentioned being able to use both hands on the physical real machine. You could assign to hardware controller knobs to in and out gain. They probably would be too sensitive for getting it right but there is probably a way to do scaling, so the 128 midi range gives say just 5 db =+/-. There are velocity scaling plugins, there are also probably midi CC scaling plugins or something that comes with your daw. I used to use Nuendo/Cubase and they had tons of stuff like that. I appreciate your video and especially that you knew to just go back and forth between units multiple times without stopping. So many people seem to not know to do this and stop while playing the same section on another device/plugin. By that point your mind has forgotten the sound. Great also you compared against the real machine, which to me showed up most of these plugins other than the IK and Chow. I like softube and use it as a thickener or gloss, but I don't think it sounds like tape at all. Thanks again.

great video!

love the softube one

From Satin manual: • Internal sample rate: 352-384kHz (depends on project sample rate, 8 x oversampling 44.1kHz)

5:05 You can use a MIDI controller with two dial-knobs in parallel. Like Arturia Keypad or NI Komplete M32 instead of a mouse.

Great comparison 😊👍. If you dont want all the hazzle with a real tape machine, I can recommend the Neve 542's, that emulates tape saturation. These are the best hardware I have ever bought and gives so much weight to your sound 😊.

I love u-He Satin for its' capability to do the compander trick :)

I've been using TB Reelbus for awhile, it weirdly makes me feel more confident in my mixes. Don't think I could ever skip out on using a tape sim ever again.

I own TAIP and the default settings are super crunchy on the mix buss. If you turn the drive down to -3 to -6 db, turn the noise off, turn the glue down, and turn the hi.low shape up a bit, and you get a much more subtle effect on master. In this shootout, the glue setting is what I'm hearing and the glue setting is a really powerful tape compression knob, but it is set too high for a mix buss in this example.

Holy shit dude that real tape machine DESTROYED some of my favorite plugins here. You wrecked my future!

All of the Chow plugins are amazing. Quite often using Tape, Matrix Delay and his Centaur clone. (his new "Build Your Own Distortion" plugin is also fun).

Man, that hardware kill it!

I can tell a massive difference in your hardware unit and the plugins. On my system anyways. Holy cow!!

Good video ! Cut to tape.. SketchCassette ...the VST. I like it for quick design ideas.

The little spinning White Sea logo!!! 😃

I have the Softube and really like it, but DAMN your MCI sounds so much better.

Back in the 80's, The thing that caught my attention about Reel to Reel's was the stereo field. You could close your eyes and point at the instruments in the sound field. I don't see that happening with a plugin. I have always listen to music with great speakers and tube amps and preamps.

Used a lot of tape emulator vst's, finally landed on the Softube Tape. Now my go to tape plugin, it just sounds good.

Your MCI sounded amazing for vocals in that it really put them in a position in the stereo field. Made it a bit boxy otherwise, but I would definitely look to that for vocals. Or maybe anything I really needed to put in a spot. It breathes well. None of the plugins really capture the life of it. The Softube sounded really natural and very analogue but didn't do anything "special" for me. It does bring the analogue "depth" so I would only use on the master, its best feature would get lost on individual mix elements. Slate Digital of course brought the pump. Can always count on them to do that. Chow sounded incredible all around, very smooth with great imaging. Satin - I can't believe I forgot about Satin. I've used it on SO many tracks. Like, so many. Ima get back to that in my mixes. tAIp...I guess it is a tape simulator, so it has that going for it. Or something.

Dude, Overloud Tape/Desk! Best I've found (so far).

I've tried every tape plugin listed here and UAD Ampex atr-102 is still the king 💪

I'm surprised the UAD studer a800 wasn't among the most commented, that one seems to be one of the most popular.

I own the 3 UADs and I use Studer for more intense tape coloration and Ampex just for Mastering

the satin and soft tube plugins in this test were my favorites. I have neither so i use the slate one and its pretty good but sometimes i feel like it sounds a bit dry in a way.

Gravelflood from Rüpel the song, auto-gain compensation is a must, I 100% subscribe the shoutout ! Grea show !

i love the Overloud Gem Tapedesk and Neold Warble. They sound great!!! 🤯

Thanks for this, very helpful. Being I'm aware that you own a Tegeler Magnetismus, I'm wondering what your or anyone else's view is using it as opposed to a tape plugin?

Opinions on IK tape collection ? For me it is the most interesting, nice warm, glueing together emulation. The best what I ever tried.

I love real one sound and i love your opinion 😁

T-racks is the most natural emulation of this and you can test it by yourself just to try stereo sine wave through it and check natural phase distortions in oscilloscope on output. It's what you see while calibrating heads on real tape machines. Other ones does not have that and sound of that plugins often seems static. Besides, it has a pronounced glue effect. But, yea - slate sounds very, very cool.

Soft tube does something nice to the width. U-he gives a nice presence in the center.

Arturia Tape Mello-Fi, that they give away for free now, is one great sounding tape plugin actually. Because it's a very nice processing FX VST when used at its extreme settings. Maximum 'wear' at a drum bus is WOOOOOOOO

Thank you !! And what do you think about tape's simulations from Fabfilter 's Saturn 2 ??

Chow is one of the best plugins I know to get "lo fi" effects degrading the sound, it´s very complete and free!.

The Chow Tape Model does have presets. You should've used the TC-260 preset in your testing as a baseline. The default settings have everything turned off basically. Also, Chow's plugins are free AND open source, which puts them immediately head-n-shoulders above everything else that is proprietary and DRM-riddled.

A lot more tape machine VST's have come onto the market from smaller developers, really need to do this shootout again with them.

According to Satin User Guide, version 1.2 has 8x oversampling. This seems to be on by default with no option to turn it off.

I have most of these plugs, and use them all for different purposes. The T-Racks is unquestionably the best sounding one of the ones I own as it is the most naturally transparent and most similar to my 2" machine. Real tape machines are set it and forget it... So I don't really understand the argument that you need to be able to get in there and change settings and have automatic level compensation... That actually isn't a reflection of the real world, as nice as that would be to have in a plug-in. Both the Softtube and the Slate I've used for many years now and now they're relegated to duties when I want something to get obviously warmed up or dulled down, which they do very well.

I have to say that I barely heard any difference between the plugins when listening with closed eyes (I listened with the extremely resolving Sennheiser HD800 headphones). Without a blind listening test we have to be extremely careful to not get biased from the interface, the manufacture we like and thus expect better sound or just the simple fact that we expect a change when we see the next plugin playing. Maybe a follow-up blind listening test could be interesting :)

I've tried a bunch over the last few years (Tape, J37, KMT, VTM, etc...). Recently I've been using UAD Studer on every track and IK's 440 on the mixbus. For "mastering," I still use UAD's ATR-102.

Taipei by London acoustics is my current favourite for tone. But Fabfilter Saturn is also amazing for tone and saturation.

Pretty sure the inclusion of wow and flutter is more for sound design and creative production. I'm a big fan of the IK tapes, primarily the 80 which is truly awesome. Also surprised that neither the old faithfuls from Waves aren't here! Both the J37 and Kramer have their places in the toolbox.

I picked a clear winner- the one with the purple spools. Then I realised that your "real" tape machine was in the shootout. The Softube was my favourite from the rest. I agree with another comment here that the Slate can sound a bit harsh (as can the T-Racks) On this track the U-He sounds less punchy than the rest. Difficult to tell with just one track.

I've been using the Waves J37 plugin for a while, and I'm able to get a nice warm distortion with it. Not sure how close it is to the actual Abbey Road machine, but it's useful anyway. Great on a master bus after the compressor to "glue" it all together.

Tried them all, and yes, I agree with all of you here: Taipei from London Acoustics is the one. ;)

You can use automatic gain match plugin for the plug-ins with no built-in gain match.

My personal favourite I have used on all my tracks is 37J by Tim Petherick for Nebula

did you ever make a video going over the group settings and stuff on tape plugins like VTM? I would be interested in that if you havent

What about magnetite by black rooster audio? it sounds amazing to me and it also has a volume compensation if you hold the right click an turn the input knob!

„You can use the same screwdriver on both“ I was like huh??? 😂😂

I love waves Cramer tape. I can use it as delay. Or just add that warm tape sound to guitar plugins. It rocks. Hard to beat for 29 bucks.

Kiive Audio’s Tape Face vs. Tape by Softube etc? I use Softube on the master bus on every beat I make and on the drum bus on its drum bus preset and it makes drums BANG. I also use Taip on a lot of my beats and will run Taip and Softube on drum breaks, sometimes drum bus of programmed drums.