You can do something similar with LiveProfessor and any VST plugin. LiveProfessor has a free version, so you can still use DAW plugins, but at a much lower cost than the Waves stuff.
Yes and LiveProffesor also supports ASIO drivers so any digital mixer that caters to the Windows folks can do this. I don't mean to unblow your mind but you can do digital inserts on a 15 year old Tascam TDIF.
It is actually much simpler to split a bitstream than it the hardware for analog inserts. You just have to wrap yourself around the digital path.
One thing that I see folks struggle with conceptually as they move to digital is how to gain stage. While there is no such thing as an amplifier within the digital domain we still have to express gain. An ideal insert in the digital domain will only increase the gain of processed signals IE bands on an EQ. Base gain will rob you of dynamic range.
Everyone focuses on sampling rate but bit depth is also very important. The sampling rate dictates the maximum frequency that can be reproduced by a coder operating at a given sampling rate. Nyquist and Shannon at Bell Labs published the equations 65+ years ago that are still relevant today to express this "transfer function", this is an important term.
WRT to the loudness of a the signal that is expressed by the word length. A 16 bit word has 96db of headroom, a 24 bit 144db. One other point, a larger bit depth also means smaller units of loudness are more accurately quantified, producing a more analog like sinusoidal waveform.
My point being that every digital insert that adds gain robs you of precious dynamic range. Just like you gain stage an analog signal change you have to do the same thing in the digital domain. It's also harder to recognize the artifacts of low bit depth in the analog output. Every audio engineer learns early on what an amp driven into limiting sounds like. Recognizing digital "squashing" is much harder.
I hope this makes some sense, I wish someone had taken me aside and explained this so I hope it is useful.
It's still more fun to buy old processors and refurb them but the cost of the plugins can't be beat!