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Why does IK Multimedia generally have a bad reputation?

José Herring said:
.......generally have a bad reputation?

On a whim I bought their Mixbox a while back. Just getting around to it and honestly, I'm quite impressed. Definitely not subtle stuff but it can make a bass synth rip like no other plugins I have.

I've generally avoided them all these years because of the "bad" reputation but that was a mistake.
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Dude, Mixbox is brilliant. So are T-Racks effects (which Mixbox is based on). The reputation is understandable due to their marketing / sales and “invasive installer” antics mostly. Like the way they install ALL of their fx even if you buy just the one. And their sales which are kind of weird, where they sometimes do groupbuys where they give away tons of stuff, and then one week later it turns out you might just as well have bought their Studio MAX collection, because they go and discount it even more. And they charge money for redownloads of samples (which is like 10 bucks but people act as if all hell breaks lose when they need it). And yes, Sampletank is more like a Korg Triton maybe… I consider it to be more of a 20 year old really sophisticated rompler than as a true sampler. But it does have quite a few good sounds. Same goes for Syntronik, but I like my synths to be non-sampled ;) - and like Saxer says: MODO Bass and Amplitube (and Tonex) are awesome. And I haven’t even been near them, but I did notice the new piano range seems to have been met with praise too, by some of the forum’s most critical experts.

TL;DR
They kind of earned that rep. But their stuff is (and sounds) awesome. I mean just check out that Sunset Sound reverb. As usual, some of the hate is there for a reason but at the same time the way people discard their actual plugins borders on the ridiculous. File under: the internet.
 
IK may not have the cachet of some other developers, but I don't think they have a bad reputation.

Their installer and some of their business practices annoy people, but a lot of their products are almost universally praised. I've never heard anyone with less than stellar comments about their Hammond, Leslie, or the Sunset Studios Reverb, for instance. In general, the T-Racks products and Amplitube stuff is excellent.

I do absolutely hate working with Sampletank/Miroslav etc, however, so if that's your exposure to IKM, I can understand being soured on them.
 
cfodeebiedaddy said:
Their installer and some of their business practices annoy people
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When Sunset came out, I created an enthusiastic post on this very forum and people actually came in and attacked me and ridiculed the post. So IKM are like Waves. Better not mention them for a hassle-free forum life, lol. I don‘t get why people get so worked up.
 
The thought of installing SampleTank again actually makes me feel sick…

if you have performed this task of hell, then you know…

Upgrade paths are none existent…and support is crap…

That is just the tip of the iceberg….

Dont get me starting on invasive pop ups in Amplitube and Custom shop…

Better tools exist…with better upgrade paths and better support…
 
The market is saturated….there is literally no reason for anyone to put themselves through such torture…

Just use another developer that actually listens to customer feedback.
 
doctoremmet said:
And they charge money for redownloads of samples (which is like 10 bucks but people act as if all hell breaks lose when they need it).
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They used to charge for re-downloads after a certain period - I think it was 6 months. Annoying, but easy to avoid by simply keeping the installer files on a separate drive, which is good practice anyways. But they changed that and now you can download the files anytime. :)
 
Marko Zirkovich said:
Maybe I was just getting lucky, but during the insane group buy (2 years ago?), when I got most of my IK stuff, the install went rather smooth for me. But yeah, if there are issues, I can understand that this can be annoying.
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Yeah it was very smooth for me too with Mixbox. So smooth that for weeks I forgot I had it. That's how uneventful the install was for me.
 
I read that they have stopped charging for downloads now after the initial six month period which is a good step.
As well as the niggles listed above, what bugged me personally was them charging a transfer fee for a £125 hardware synth.
The synth wasn't bundled with any of their paid software, just access to firmware updates and possibly a very basic utility to connect with the synth.
These kinds of nickel and dime practices left a bad taste in the mouth on top of everything else.
I ignore them nowadays as I'd rather deal with companies that create good will rather than bad.
They do have some decent software but so do many other companies.
 
They make some really, really good stuff. And they make some pretty awful stuff. But I think their reputation is driven by other factors as well:

  • They seem to be trying too hard to be successful at pro level sales and prosumer sales simultaneously, and I think that’s a difficult edge to ride. I’m sure many pros see IK as prosumer grade and avoid them.
  • IK’s installer installs a lot of hidden bloat. They’ve explained that their rationale is that by doing so, it facilitates easier reinstalling. But still, it’s not clear that it’s happening.
  • Their online sales platform is not well thought out. They have so many different versions of the same product and it isn’t always easy to distinguish them. And they don’t clearly show you what you already own (Spitfire and UAD are quite good at this).
  • Their almost perpetual sales likely lead to frustration over buying something and then seeing it much cheaper almost immediately.
  • No “complete your bundle” path to their full product catalog.
  • Their Amplitube and ToneMax line is super confusing. They don’t really make it clear how they integrate. And from a sales standpoint, they both have Max versions, which can lead people to believe they are buying “everything.” But no, there’s add on after add on after add on.
But again, overall I think they’re a good company with some really good offerings, but their identity crisis and lack of transparency around their marketing and installation process are the primary drivers of their sometimes poor reputation.
 
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