# Lemur, Composer Tools and Metagrid



## BenjaminParis (Sep 15, 2020)

Hi there,

I'm hesitating picking up Lemur+Orchestral Tools licenses (OT is on sale right now), but I'm using Metagrid already, and I'm happy with it regarding the way it can manage Cubase. I really got used to Metagrid and would like to go one working with it.

I would like to use Lemur and OT only for controlling my VSTs, using in particular the popup function-when you select your instrument track, it opens the appropriate controller tab.

Did anyone tried this? Can you launch Metagrid and Lemur at the same time? Can you switch easily from one to the other? How about the priority question? How can the system decide which software you want to use? Also: it certainly adds more Generic Remote Devices, how does Cubase stands all these different sources?

Hope someone can share his/her experience!

Thanks,

Benjamin


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## Shad0wLandsUK (Sep 15, 2020)

The best thing to do with Composer Tools (Pro) and Metagrid would be to own two tablets
I personally run them on two separate devices, as Lemur is a powerful application and I found it would not work very well on one iPad

I do have older iPads however, perhaps on an iPad Pro it would be fine
I find Composer Tools Pro to be invaluable however, and there is so much you can do with this

Once all your pages for articulations are setup, it really is very fun to work with 

Hope this helps,

Christopher


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## BenjaminParis (Sep 15, 2020)

Thanks a lot. Yes, maybe a second iPad... But I have the latest iPad, so I should check for an older and cheaper one, I have to check which models work with the apps...


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## Vonk (Sep 15, 2020)

Shad0wLandsUK said:


> Once all your pages for articulations are setup, it really is very fun to work with


Composer tools is great for the one thing it can do that metagrid doesn't - active feedback. Having each of the available articulations put up for control as you change tracks is a real asset. It also works on both android and ipad tablets, so it can be be a lot cheaper to have a dedicated tablet. However I do hate it's copy protection, which uses a midi channel and which I have found to be very unreliable. It will switch the app off for no reason, as it insists on a constant live link which seems to fail sometimes..
Metagrid is invaluable for visibility control, macro control and use of the PLE in cubase.
I use both and couldn't work without them.
To answer the question, metagrid uses its own metaserver, needing two dedicated midi channels, and composer tools its own agent using two channels, for copy protection and communication. It's perfectly OK to run both at the same time.


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## BenjaminParis (Sep 15, 2020)

Thanks a lot, Vonk!


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## mburellmusic (Sep 19, 2020)

I would highly recommend staying away from older iPads. Actually Midi Kinetics wrote a little blog post about this. The cheapest model modern iPad is massively more powerful than the older ones. https://www.midikinetics.com/which-tablet-should-i-get/


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## Dewdman42 (Sep 20, 2020)

He also suggests getting multiple smaller iPads. I guess maybe it’s ok if a few of them are slightly older


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