Virtual Tape Machines : Excellent way to add coherence and warmth to a mix

This is a superlative product. The effect of instantiating VTM across a batch of mixer channels, plus the main buss, is subtle but thoroughly discernible: the mix coheres immediately, and depending on your setting of the virtual tape speed you can take advantage of "head bump" at 15ips to get a nice bass boost. Saturation and harmonic content can be dialled in across the whole mix extremely easily, and the instances of the plug-in can be grouped and linked so that everything can be controlled with one set of knobs.

I have this running alongside the Slate Virtual Console Collection, to give the combined effect of multitrack tape running through an old valve-style console into a master 2-track. The results are gorgeous. The warmth feels far more "real" than plug-ins were managing even a few years ago; it's not an in-your-face effect, more of a gentle glue and firming up of the soundstage. Really impressive. It's not CPU light, though; you'll want to run instances across all of your DAW channels, and that means an up-to-date computer spec. But if you can run it, it's worth every penny.