I hate to sound cynical, but these things have been introduced into the market every now and then over the years, and they just don’t deliver. Yeah, I’m sure it will alter the sound, but whether one interprets that as “Tape Sound” or not really comes down to what one believes. There’s engineering going on here to be sure -- social engineering. There was a similar device a few years ago and the line in the ad said, “It has everything but the tape.” What? It’s the way the medium behaves that is the very essence of “The Tape Sound.” No tape, no tape sound.
At best what we usually get with these devices is something we could get with a good analog compressor or tube pre, and those devices certainly have their place. If they weren’t trying to sell tape without actually using tape I wouldn’t bristle so much. They could say, “hey, this thing will take the edge off digital tracks” and it may well do that, but it’s not tape.