IK Multimedia Tape Machine 24 Is FREE With Any Purchase

Audio Deluxe offers the Tape Machine 24 (€99.99 value) saturation plugin by IK Multimedia as a free add-on with any purchase this month.

Tape Machine 24 is IK Multimedia’s emulation of the vintage MCI JH-24 tape machine. The JH-24 was manufactured in the 1980s and was used in numerous US recording studios during that era.

Vintage tape recorders were imperfect due to their analog nature, resulting in different artifacts like harmonic distortion, noise, and subtle pitch inconsistencies.

These imperfections of yesteryear are now the secret spice we use in our digital audio workstations to make the recordings and virtual instruments sound more alive. Digital vs. analog is an old and worn-out debate, but the general consensus is that our ears prefer sounds that include some of this analog flavor.

So, unless you’re ready to buy a second-hand vintage tape machine on Reverb.org and fit it in your bedroom recording studio, vintage tape machines are the next best bet.

This one from IK Multimedia typically costs €99.99, but you can get it for free with any purchase at Audio Deluxe until the end of June.

Tape Machine 24 emulates all aspects of the original JH-24 while adding modern features like preset management, A/B testing, undo/redo functionality, and not collecting dust in your room. It also requires zero maintenance, which is something you can’t say about a real tape machine from the 1980s.

However, some would say that a real analog tape machine, despite its size and cost, has the benefit of not requiring the IK Multimedia Authorization Manager to operate. Which the Tape Machine 24 does, obviously.

Another point worth considering is the degree to which a tape emulation plugin can truly replicate the sound of a physical tape machine. But if you want to play around with tape-style saturation in your DAW, getting Tape Machine 24 for free is a steal.

To claim your free copy of Tape Machine 24, make any purchase on Audio Deluxe until the end of this month. You will automatically qualify for the freebie offer.

To try some freeware alternatives, visit our list of free saturation plugins and download BPB Saturator.

Get the deal: Tape Machine 24 (FREE with any purchase at Audio Deluxe)

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4113ND3

on June 2, 2023 5:12 pm

I’m so frustrated that I just have to vent how much I hate this company again!

I’ve been trying to get this tape plugin to work for the last few hours. I got the licence from Audiodeluxe just fine, but no matter what I do I can’t activate this plugin. I’ve updated all software (IK product manager, T-Racks 5, custom shop) and I’ve added the serial to IK product manager countless times. The plugin shows at ikmultimedia.com user area just fine, but it doesn’t show up in the product manager (under T-Racks products), not in custom shop and if I load the plugin in my DAW it says it’s unactivated. I’ve tried the usual restore purchases trick in custom shop, but with no help. I’ve contacted their support so we’ll see if they can help me (took me a minute to get even that done as their feedback form kept nagging about invalid characters and whatnot).

This is just the worst big plugin company out there, I think I prefer Waves to them even. I would love to not use any of their products, but it’s a bit too late as I’m already too invested. How can a company this big still be this incompetent on product management. They have like 3 authorization platforms (4 if you count the website), Ik product manager, custom shop and ik authorization manager (discontinued, but what you still need for legacy products). And none of them ever seems to work, nor do they sync up with each other. The registration process is always a big hustle and when you finally got the plugins to work, chances are the GUI is messed up or something. The installations are also as far from customer friendly as possible. You always have to install everything. Buy 1 plugin, great, here’s 4 gigs of other plugins you can’t use. Buy one gear for amplitube, great, here’s every gear for amplitube even though you can’t use them. Oh you updated your software, we’ll just leave this 6gig zip installation file in the ik multimedia folder after you’re done updating.

If you don’t have any IK multimedia plugins, I suggest you stay as far away from this company as possible..

17 Comments

Tomislav Zlatic
on June 2, 2023 11:22 am

Thank you to BPB readers Alex and Numanoid for the info!

THRL
on June 2, 2023 1:20 pm

And PB offers a free copy of Softube’s Dirty Tape at the checkout. I’m drowning in tape saturation effects :D

4113ND3
on June 2, 2023 5:12 pm

I’m so frustrated that I just have to vent how much I hate this company again!

I’ve been trying to get this tape plugin to work for the last few hours. I got the licence from Audiodeluxe just fine, but no matter what I do I can’t activate this plugin. I’ve updated all software (IK product manager, T-Racks 5, custom shop) and I’ve added the serial to IK product manager countless times. The plugin shows at ikmultimedia.com user area just fine, but it doesn’t show up in the product manager (under T-Racks products), not in custom shop and if I load the plugin in my DAW it says it’s unactivated. I’ve tried the usual restore purchases trick in custom shop, but with no help. I’ve contacted their support so we’ll see if they can help me (took me a minute to get even that done as their feedback form kept nagging about invalid characters and whatnot).

This is just the worst big plugin company out there, I think I prefer Waves to them even. I would love to not use any of their products, but it’s a bit too late as I’m already too invested. How can a company this big still be this incompetent on product management. They have like 3 authorization platforms (4 if you count the website), Ik product manager, custom shop and ik authorization manager (discontinued, but what you still need for legacy products). And none of them ever seems to work, nor do they sync up with each other. The registration process is always a big hustle and when you finally got the plugins to work, chances are the GUI is messed up or something. The installations are also as far from customer friendly as possible. You always have to install everything. Buy 1 plugin, great, here’s 4 gigs of other plugins you can’t use. Buy one gear for amplitube, great, here’s every gear for amplitube even though you can’t use them. Oh you updated your software, we’ll just leave this 6gig zip installation file in the ik multimedia folder after you’re done updating.

If you don’t have any IK multimedia plugins, I suggest you stay as far away from this company as possible..

- FridaMor
  on June 2, 2023 10:32 pm
  
  Completely agree with you, IK Multimedia is a mess with their License Managers. In fact, I have several plugins, but I don’t even install them because they are disastrous.
  
  - THRL
    on June 2, 2023 10:35 pm
    
    same
    
    - alex
      on June 3, 2023 6:40 am
      
      Well, while I’m not a fan of software managers, I’ve never had a glitch with IK Mulltimedia. All it takes is to reauthorize T-Racks, at least IME.
      
  - JF
    on June 4, 2023 5:27 pm
    
    Open the IK Product Manager app, install T-Racks 5, and it will be installed, together with 100+ plugins you don’t have a license for…
    
    Not joking, their installation procedure is a joke.
    
    - alex
      on June 5, 2023 10:57 am
      
      Yeah, that sucks. But you can delete or, even better, move the plugs that you don’t have a license for to another location. That way, when you get another one, you can just put it back into the folder without reinstalling the whole thing.
      
      - JF
        on June 6, 2023 2:28 pm
        
        I would prefer a download and installation manager, at least one of them, to keep track of things for me….
        
Juniortony
on June 3, 2023 4:59 pm

I have never had any issue with IKmultimedia plugins..
Plugins are great.
Only the updates are very heavy files. It is more like redownloading new installation files

JF
on June 4, 2023 5:32 pm

The tape 24 plugin sounds really great, but it’s huuuuungry, I have a Win 10 machine, i7 4 core 8 thread 2.7, and in a Studio One project with 16ish tracks and an average 35% load running on 2048 samples, one instance if this plugin makes the project hit the bottom right away.

- Michal Ochedowski
  on June 5, 2023 6:05 pm
  
  I expected this plugin to require a lot of CPU power, but not this much. Thanks for the info. I can forget about running it with my hardware specs.
  
  - Tomislav Zlatic
    on June 5, 2023 6:09 pm
    
    Cheers Michal, enjoy the freebie!
    
    - Michal Ochedowski
      on June 5, 2023 8:54 pm
      
      I did not get the freebie. There was no point for me. It would require a new pc purchase which is well away at the moment :)
      
JF
on June 6, 2023 2:30 pm

It sounds really nice though, I would assume they use some sort of oversampling that eats all those dear cycles.

- Michal Ochedowski
  on June 6, 2023 10:10 pm
  
  Definitely. IK Multimedia are known for not compromising on sound quality. Oversampling under the hood with no option of switching it off. It was possible back in the day with older T-RackS plugins, for example EQ-81. I could never quite get this idea of no longer letting the users decide.
  
Aj
on June 22, 2023 12:36 am

I’m selling my copy. I already own a license so no point in owning two.

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IK Multimedia Tape Machine 24 Is FREE With Any Purchase

17 Comments