This question has bugged me for a long time.  
 
I can buy an Eventide, TC, Lex... reverb and spend $1000s.  Or I can buy a plug in for a couple $100s.  
 
Reverb is algorithmic or impulse based.  it would seem that whatever the box is doing, the software could do.  
 
yet boxes still sell.  
 
I have decided that the plugins - no matter how good they may sound - have to be inferior in some way or all of the boxes would be out of business.
 
Any thoughts?
BTW - I love my UAD reverbs.  Maybe my ears cannot tell the difference.  And I sold my rack boxes.  I had TC and Lex reverbs before.  
 
 

How about this. Some really well known incredibly famous engineers and people who are better than us at production have gone all in the box. Does that tell you something or not.
 
Its all about skill and talent. Not really dependant on whether something exists in hardware or software.
 
Hey I am an experienced synthesist who has owned at some stage all the synths that many only dream of yet I have slowly replaced most of that with software.  The software sounds fantastic, end of story. 
 
Average engineer in a room full of hardware = average result
Great engineer all ITB = great result.
 
I was reading about an interesting situation where a famous band sent multitracks out to 5 engineers. The mix they picked and loved the best was done ITB and it was the only done ITB as well. All the others were done on hardware. So that also says something as well.
 
I think with reverbs and things yes they are all software in fact even inside the hardware. So yes I agree you should be able to match the sound. BTW the Lexicon top of the line software is not just a few hundred dollars either. More $700 to $800 but still worth it in my opinion. 
 
I agree with AT below though. Tracking through nice hardware does not hurt. But the OP sounded more like it was on the mixing end. Although I don't doubt that you could record direct through a rather transparent Mic Pre and add colour and warmth later with plug-ins but tracking through hardware is surely faster and easier as it is already printed.

Most of the pro mixers get tracks that are recorded thru high end hardware by pros whose hearing is trained to use said hardware.  I was testing the new Warm mic today with a guy with various gold records hanging in the hallway.   he could describe the differences between it and his pair of c12a's and original c414 eb's in exacting detail - slopes and frequencies etc.  (ps. The warm won on 2 outa 4 sources).  so much of the pro recorded material already has a lot of the tone built in, or should.   good hardware might not be needed when mixing, but it sure helps when tracking.

It's a though question as myself I have a Lexicon MX 200 and it immediately sounds amazing. I wish the software they made for it worked in W10, They had it so you could use it via USB and stay digital. They seem like they are bad at the software end of things and it's only good for XP. I have no clue why they never kept this up to date as it would sell a lot of units if it did. I could use it by patching it in with analog but oh well, I just use the Pantheon which is probably half the sonic quality of the MX.  
To me there is something about hardware that "seems" better but it's sort of an organic voodoo thing. 
I keep a lot of hardware around just to make my studio "feel" better. How boring would it be to sit there with just a laptop and and a interface. 

AT there is no question when it comes to mics and pres.  I have a bunch of great mics (Neumann, BLUE, Manley...) and I have a UA LA 610 pre/compressor/eq.  There is nothing like the immediacy of it when mic-ing stuff.  
 
I am specifically curious on reverbs - where pretty much all of the internals of the box are digital - so software could be able to do the same work in the PC.  

I don't do live any more but I would never have considered taking a computer to a gig for my reverb... I simply wouldn't trust it. So I would have thought that this is where "boxes" are still preferable to ITB software.
 
That said, I have a Lexicon MPX-500 in my little rack and it doesn't even get turned on nowadays. I bought it back in 2002, when all my sound gear was hardware based. Then I had a bit of a break and when I came back I decided to try VST stuff, now that I had a PC suitable to run the software.
 
For studio stuff I would never go back to hardware.
 
I have a modular synth and a couple of older virtual analogue synths but when it comes to any effects, reverb or whatever, I use VST...

I guess it would come down to processing power. The question I would ask is does my Lexicon MX 200 have more available processing power than what any given plug in demands of my CPU? 
And therefore, if the answer was hardware has more processing power than most plug ins-- it would explain the quality of that effect. I've just never gotten the depth of field in the plug in reverb that I have gotten from any of the hardware. Even my old Alesis Multi verb sounds better to me. 

I went for years with no outboard hardware. When it came to keyboards and processors, if it wasn't software I didn't want it. I think I mostly loved how when you saved your project, everything was saved. Load it in months or years later and it would be exactly as you saved it. No having to remember which outboard gear was patched where nor which patches or settings you used.

Last year I started to rethink that and I bought a PCM91. I don't think anyone would vote it the best reverb processor ever created. But good or bad, I like the way it sounds and if I use on something, its that much less my CPU has to handle while mixing. Now on the flip side of that, I also own the Abby Road plate reverbs and I've probably used one as much as I've used the other. 

Then last month I really went full analog and built a Hairball Audio 1176. The PCM91 wasn't hard to justify adding to my rack because of its digital I/O which allows me to keep whatever I send to it digital the whole way. With the 1176, anything I use it on is going to go though a D/A/A/D conversion. Plus it has no automation nor any way to save settings. So when everyone and his brother makes an 1176 plugin why would anyone want to waste rack space on a hardware version?
 
The short answer is I wanted one. I like building electronic kits. And deep down I've always wondered if the software 1176 models really do accurately replicate what the hardware sounds like and how the hardware behaves. My suspicion is that when it comes to compressors, software can get close, but never exact and never 100% as good. That's my suspicion. I've not had the hardware box in my rack long enough to do any projects with it yet so time will have to tell on that one. But I figure if it turns out that I really can't tell the difference between the hardware and software, I can always just sell the Hairball box. 
 
Which brings up an excellent point. In most cases the value of any software you buy goes to $0 the moment you drive it off the lot. Your ability to resell a software plugin license depends on the particular license but regardless of that, the market for used software plugin licenses is about nil. On the other hand, I can easily sell my PCM91 for about what I paid for it if not a bit more. Since I built the Hairball kit myself, I could easily sell it for at least a bit more than I've got in it. That makes the risk in trying on hardware for size much lower. Buy it, use it, if you don't like it, sell it and buy something else. That option simply doesn't exist with software. At least not in the same way. Many vendors will give you a 30 day free trial on software. But I've never been fan of that. I usually have to live with something longer than that before I know for sure if it adds value for me.

Digital reverbs are, of course, mostly computer.  And the modern computer handles convolution reverb pretty easy, where convolution used to choke off a song until you froze the track.  Now REmatrix has 4 convolution engines in one instance, along with all the algorithmic effects it includes.  And even on a computer several years old I can use more than the one instance at a time.  However, just like the "computer" in your UA card, a hardware reverb/effects unit is optimized for calculating the sound, not running an OS and writing with Word and running email and a internet browser and finally SONAR running a reverb.  It just simply spits out the process for the sound.  And that helps, just as UA generally sounds better than many "in the box" effects.  The soft SSL buss comp in SONAR works great, so much so that I don't usually mess with other buss comps, but hardware DSP in general can sound better.  I know the DSP reverb in my TC Konnekt 48 sounded great, smoother than any computer-based algorithmic reverb I had.
 
Some of that was the conversion too, which added its own character to a reverb.  And some of it is just price, or was back a few years ago before conversion got so damn good.  If you are buying a $5000 Eventide unit it better have superior ADDA.  And for that price, it ought to share a cigarette after and maybe call to take you out to dinner. '-) 
 
I have no doubt if I bought one hardware effects unit I'd be buying more, whether to supplement the effects in #1 unit or to upgrade it.  So just buy the Eventide H8000 and get it over with, Maurice.  The reverb is calling calling calling you.  It has delays too.

I LIKE HARDWARE COMPRESSORS.
 
there, i said it.
 
i like how they color the sound in a way that most all the plugins i use don't seem to be able to do.
 
i also like real tube preamps.
i can push level into them in a way that does not end up sounding a bit grainy, 
like most plugs.
 
but if you are diligent with GAIN STAGING, you can use plugins for everything,
and nobody you or I know, would ever be able to tell the diff.
most nobody.
me especially.
LOL
 
 
it's almost an intangible thing, it's really more a feel thing.
analog paths just feel different, especially while you are actively tracking.