IK Multimedia product management and support are a mess

[Harry_HH]

I've been IKM's client for years, their products are not bad, I have about 40 of those.

But every year their so called product management and support gets worse and worse, its a nightmare for the user.

Before being able to use IKM products, the user has first download and install a authorization manager, and then in addition to that not only one but two separate product managers: The Product Manager and The Custom Shop.

But the worse comes: both the product manager and the custom shop are very unintuitive and unreliable.
I just purchased the Sunset Sound Studio Reverb. When opening the Custom Shop, and putting the Sunset Sound Studio Reverb. When opening the Custom Shop, and putting the "search", it says "no such a product". The user has to know, that that product belongs to the category "T-Racks". Under that you find the products. Why on earth the CS search can't be generic?

Well, once you find the Sunset Sound Studio Reverb, it says "purchased on 2021/05/21". But no download option for the purchased product!
What the f*ck...
I DON'T want to re-download all my products, only this new one.
But how to do it?

And the IKM customer support hides somewhere, if you go their site and to the "support", there are neither link to their support tickets nor a support email address.

IKM, don't be surprized when your customers are pissed off to you and criticitze you. Your product management and support sucks.

[ralfrobert]

Just try to sync your Tracks products in CS. If you have installed the latest Tracks, Sunset should be present and usable after that.

[DJErmac]

I’ve stopped using their products. Everytime I start a plugin it says it’s unlicensed. I have to re-licence it, then it works. Restart the computer, and it says the very same plugin is unlicensed.

[ralfrobert]

I’ve stopped using their products. Everytime I start a plugin it says it’s unlicensed. I have to re-licence it, then it works. Restart the computer, and it says the very same plugin is unlicensed.

I totally understand you. I have Total Studio 2 and decided that this will be the last purchase ever. My reasons are different, though. (Aggressive marketing including purchase options thrown into your workflow, necessity to install the whole pizza mista when I only want one plugin, downloads only for 180 days; furthermore, the stuff is de facto not resellable. Got it for 150 bucks, so I think there is nothing wrong with what I have right here.)

[jancivil]

Odd spot for the post. But ok fine. I hope to move to Big Sur soon, and this will probably mean IKM stuff will all need to be reconfigured. I'm so dreading it. The last time everything was broken in an OS change (! ) I had a password Chrome generated but never stored (I didn't bother, trusting that), repeatedly their prompts for a new password were passwords that didn't work and it was a matter of dumb meaningless luck that finally I got past it (fifth time's a charm?). And it isn't the first time they produce useless passwords. There are other vendors where you have to log in at some point but this is beyond stupid, a website producing useless PWs repeatedly.

There is no way you're going to not install all of it. This is their business model, make you think you're edging so you'll pay money to squirt. There is zero chance they'll ever see another cent from me, it's too high-maintenance. I'm considering abandoning it all. Good, I mean good, products, so it's a shame. Oh, they also care nothing about testing in VE Pro (the point following tends to demonstrate no one has, even the once, or if they did they said, oh well, f**k these users), so if that's your thing, watch out. They change the internal IDs a lot, for fun I guess (that's snark, but the other possibility is incredible stupidity or not being organized in the ways adulthood tends to require). Twice here, any settings are lost for all of time unless I made a picture of it or remember what I did. Sometimes it's not that far off? Pheh, the principle of the thing. Another round of this crap is... avoidable.

[Harry_HH]

Just try to sync your Tracks products in CS. If you have installed the latest Tracks, Sunset should be present and usable after that.

Thank you for the hint, ralfrobert - IK seems to handle Sunset only inside the T-Racks bundle. You have to update your bundle first via the Product Manager, and then synch it via the Custom Shop.

While bitching (for a good reason for their product "management"), to balance this and to be fair, a couple words of their products:
Sunset is a good product, once you get your hands in to it.
This and the Tape Echo are one of the best products of the IK - I like their Leslies, Tape Machines and some of their AT modellings as well.
The Modo-series is not bad, either.

[ralfrobert]

Thank you for the hint, ralfrobert - IK seems to handle Sunset only inside the T-Racks bundle. You have to update your bundle first via the Product Manager, and then synch it via the Custom Shop.
Sunset is a good product, once you get your hands in to it.

You are welcome. Yes, many of their products are good, some great. Stealth Limiter, Modo Bass, the plate reverb for example. I just don't like the marketing and the software architecture. Don't want to sound too negative about IK.

[Harry_HH]

Thank you for the hint, ralfrobert - IK seems to handle Sunset only inside the T-Racks bundle. You have to update your bundle first via the Product Manager, and then synch it via the Custom Shop.
Sunset is a good product, once you get your hands in to it.

You are welcome. Yes, many of their products are good, some great. Stealth Limiter, Modo Bass, the plate reverb for example. I just don't like the marketing and the software architecture. Don't want to sound too negative about IK.

You are correct. But e.g. the IK policy of charging for the existing customers once purchased products for the download, is one of the things I really dislike with the IKM. I guess they consider this of some kind of ”rent for their server space”, that your downloading option expires, but I think that they should give at least for their high-invested customer (lets say for those purchased for $ 400 or more) a free ticket for keeping their IK stuff in their server.