Would it be possible for you to provide a list of pros and cons between Logic and Cubase here? It would be really useful. In fact I think a separate thread should be devoted to DAW comparisons as far as realizing virtual orchestral works and the VSL are concerned.

My opinion,

Cubase expression maps is a very attractive feature when doing lots of keyswitching. I'm making the switch from logic to cubase and I like it. Without the need of Expression maps i'd probably stay on Logic wich probably got the best performance on mac. And there a lot of other cool features for midi programming in Cubase.

The 16 midi channel limitation of AU plugins is another negative factor against Logic but there's a workaround with VE Pro 5. 

I use Pro Tools on regular basis for finishing, mixing and exporting my projects. It is the more mixing, post-production, audio oriented DAW. For me, it as the best audio editor and mixer out there. I do some simple midi programming on non-orchestral gigs. But RTAS virtual instruments plugins are not as powerfull as VST and AU. You really need VE Pro to take care of VI if you wan't to do big midi programming in Pro Tools.And the midi editing features are really basic, nothing compares to Cubase and Logic.

So my choice: Cubase

- On the same CPU, Logic is supposed to be much more powerfull than Cubase, (that what said a friend of mine,  the keyboad player of my band,  that has moved from Cubase to Logic)

- you can play many many EXS (sampled instrument) with very little cpu use, apparently in Cubase if you use Sample Tank it ikills the cpu with a very few track

- It has the Environnement, that nobody has !

The Environnement is fabulous but it is not obvious to use by common people that do not have a "programmer's mind", you can do many things, with one note pressed you can have a whole orchestra playing different chords, arpeggios, delayed note........ it a true programming environnement 

The draw back of Logic/VSL is there is no "expression maps", I had to defined an environment that convert Bank/program changes to matrix/articulations changes

Logic is more a DAW than a partition player, incident defined in the score does not act, if you draw a cescendo it will no play the note crescendo....... They say they did not want to compete with other notation programs !!!

        This is  bad decision !!!! it will be so simple to built in what I do with the environnement 

Best

Cyril

My 2c in the interests of helping others ;)

I have used both extensively: Logic is definitely up to a point more CPU friendly but Cubase uses 32bit freeze files by default, and *call me crazy...* but I consistently feel that Cubase sounds better. I just find Logic to have a bit of a tinny sound compared to Cubase. Why I used Logic for many years was because Cubase barely worked on Mac, but I'm happy to say version 6 (latest updates) is worked as solid if not more solidly than Logic is, which is fantastic. Interface-wise, I much prefer Cubase.  You may get more performance out of Logic at first glance, but in fact what I have found in the real world is that especially with larger projects or anytime you really push a machine especially multi-core machines with multiple hosts (aka VEPro instances) - Cubase comes out on top. 

On the other side, the Groove Quantization set up in Logic is better - you can create templates that are stored with the project, whereas Cubase seems to bizarrely make them global across all projects. So you have grooves from other projects in there - why anybody would want that (If I am doing something wrong and you are reading this and know what it is, please let me know!). In fact this is my only gripe with Cubase vs Logic. Not a deal breaker.

I'm using Cubase in 64bit with OS 10.6.8 (not bothering with Lion) by the way, and have loaded RAM intensive projects with Vienna Software as well as many other instruments from various companies at once, sometimes inside Cubase, and sometimes inside Vienna Ensemble Pro. I have not used it much with Vienna Instruments Pro directly inside Cubase because I have instead used Vienna Ensemble Pro (4 and 5) as the host of course, and Vienna suite both in VE Pro and in Cubase. Reliability is great across the board - I rarely have crashes and recovery is great (and I believe I have always been able to track them to a certain third party plug in that I will not name here but which has not been very reliable) - I highly recommend keeping a save of your VE Pro metaframe and project files, as well as of course saving your host file, in this case Cubase, and keep a backup going a la time machine - your chances of recovery are very high. I haven't had any crashes I couldn't recover from thank God... not so in the past though: Cubase (circa version 4) was abominable and un-useable in any professional or creative sense for that matter (for me).

Cubase has one fantastic feature that Logic doesn't have - when you freeze tracks you have the option to "unload instrument from memory" - you can freeze the track and then go and delete the VEPro instance from memory - you can't do that in Logic. Multi channel functions from Cubase are FAR easier and more intuitive. Very easy to add or delete a stereo stem from Vienna Pro. I run mostly Stereo subs from VEPro instances, but it's always easy to siphon off a solo part or other instrument that you want to treat or mix differently (especially useful when freezing and you find you want to raise or lower a specific solo part - no need to unfreeze the whole instance).

The use of MIDI channels, "lanes" which is really virtual midi channels on a single channel and folders make Cubase really great for organising especially with large projects. You can take a VE Pro instance, 10 MIDI channels and it's output and put them all in a folder, and use that as your "brass" or "woodwinds" section. When you aren't working on that section, you just fold them away. Sure, you can do this in Logic, but it's not the same, not as easy or straight forward IMO. I also think the built in EQ sounds better in Cubase than Logic, but I almost always use Vienna EQ anyway. But for simple things or if I'm in a hurry I know I can reach for the built in EQ and not fear it will sound bad. Logics EQ is ok, don't get me wrong, but if I had to use either Logic's EQ or Cubases EQ across an entire mix, I know which I would go for.

Cubase lets you bounce to 32bit audio files and freeze files are automatically 32bit. (this is nothing to do with the app running in 32bit or 64bit memory space).

Logic has very clever bounce features - you can bounce in several formats all at once in a single pass, with Cubase you have to manually do them one by one if you want to make mp3's etc. But, this is certainly a very minor issue and not a deal breaker. The ease of use, reliability, and great functionality with VE Pro, plus the sound  (for me) make Cubase the DAW of choice these days.

Well that's my non-linear review of Cubase ;) Hope it helps you get a feel for it. The things that are most important to me and probably to most others as well are:

- Sound, Reliability, Compatibility, Workflow.

For Vienna Users, IMO, Cubase wins hands down right now.

BTW I haven't used Nuendo, but from what I hear Cubase and Nuendo are cut from the same cloth, so it's basically the same thing.

@mpower88 said:

The use of MIDI channels, "lanes" which is really virtual midi channels on a single channel and folders make Cubase really great for organising especially with large projects. You can take a VE Pro instance, 10 MIDI channels and it's output and put them all in a folder, and use that as your "brass" or "woodwinds" section. When you aren't working on that section, you just fold them away. Sure, you can do this in Logic, but it's not the same, not as easy or straight forward IMO. 

Logic has the option to make folders of midi tracks, you select the tracks and select Make a folder, this is simple

@majing said:

logic／cubase／protools？？

My personal opinion (!) after 27 years of MIDI sequencing and over 20 years of working with digital audio workstations:

If you're rather into MIDI than audio, it's a decision between Cubase/Nuendo and Logic. ProTools is trying to catch up, but very obviously still behind those two.

If you want to do serious audio work, you have to chose from Cubase/Nuendo or ProTools. Logic is too clunky (and sometimes just useless) for everything that goes beyond the most basic audio tasks.

... but you will find very emotional advocates for many other serious DAWs, too (Digital Performer, Sonar, Reaper, Live, Studio One ...)

One feature in Cubase that stands out is the score editor.  I think its a little under-appreciated because it has a very steep learning curve, and it is designed more for extracting the score from MIDI tracks rather than as a method of input.  I'm assuming Sibelius and Finale are much better suited for inputting music through a score for people who prefer that instead.

But, for many of us who usually live on the DAW/mixer side of things, it can be very time-saving and beautifully convenient to have a mostly complete score editor fully integrated with a complete DAW/mixer =)

Maybe someone else knows about Logic - does Logic have any similar scoring tools?  Has anyone else found Cubase score editor useful?

Cyril, you have to read what people write before responding ;)

I wrote:

"Sure, you can do this in  Logic, but it's not the same, not as easy or straight forward IMO."

@mpower88 said:

Cyril, you have to read what people write before responding 😉

I wrote:

"Sure, you can do this in  Logic, but it's not the same, not as easy or straight forward IMO."

I did read it, this is why I answer that it is VERY SIMPLE, select the track and select pack,

It's not the same.

You have to "Pack" and "Unpack" folders. What a pain. In Cubase everything you have done is always there, you just open the branch out just like a folder on your hard drive. Open a section, edit something, close it away again or leave it open. So simple. Sometimes you unpack things, and all hell breaks loose, everything is everywhere. Folders in Cubase are fantastic and how it should be IMO. Logic is just bizarre and completely counter intuitive, to me at least. As Dietz said, it's just a matter of personal opinion. We all share our experiences so others can make their own mind up.

Suon: You are right the cubase score editor is great and has always been a strong feature, and is underappreciated / over looked. I haven't used Sebelius - haven't had much need to print much score material but the few times I have I've used Cubase and found nothing lacking. But has anyone used Cubase and Sebelius I wonder and is there anything that Sebelius has that Cubase doesn't? 

@mpower88 said:

It's not the same.

You have to "Pack" and "Unpack" folders. What a pain. In Cubase everything you have done is always there, you just open the branch out just like a folder on your hard drive. Open a section, edit something, close it away again or leave it open. So simple. Sometimes you unpack things, and all hell breaks loose, everything is everywhere. Folders in Cubase are fantastic and how it should be IMO. Logic is just bizarre and completely counter intuitive, to me at least. As Dietz said, it's just a matter of personal opinion. We all share our experiences so others can make their own mind up.

You cannot make it more simple than in Logic

It is not this kind of feature that will put a + for Cubase,

Do you have a multi take folder in Cubase where you can use the 1st and the second mesure of take one, the mesure 3 and 4 of take 2 ........

Then environnement in Logic is at least 2 x + for Logic, 

Can you redraw an audio signal with a pencil in cubase ?

A good point in Logic that was not in the version of Cubase I saw a few time ago, is that Logic is complettly multi task, you can play, edit, create, load at the same time. You can open the same windows many time with different display parameter

 The big plus for Logic is that you have very good effects all included, even multi channels effects 5.1 to 7.1, banks with thousands of inst all included

Why is there is Cubase and Nuendo ??

@Cyril said:

[...] Why is there is Cubase and Nuendo ??

I'm not sure that I understand your last sentence, but could it be that you haven't worked a lot with other DAWs than Logic ...?

I have seen working Cubase a few year ago but I never saw Nuendo 

I spoke a lot about Cubase with my friend that has moved to Logic. 

What is the difference between Cubase and Nuendo ? is it a super Cubase ?

I think the answer for the OP is a mixture of things. Workflow is everything, as far as I'm concerned, and if you like the way of working with Logic, then that's obviously the program for you. I just know that to do what I do in Nuendo would take me many more hours in Logic. If you have no need of the tools I have come to  rely on, then it wouldn't matter.

As far as working with VEP I think it's painfully obvious from reading this forum which program has the most problems. [;)]

DG

I haven't used it but from what I have heard they are really quite similar, but Nuendo is more geared towards surround and video applications.

@mpower88 said:

I haven't used it but from what I have heard they are really quite similar, but Nuendo is more geared towards surround and video applications.

There are many more options that most musicians won't need, but there are some automation things and other workflow enhancements that IMO are better than Cubase. However, the reason that I use it is that when I moved over from Cubase VST, there were things that I really needed in Nuendo, that weren't in Cubase. Now they are, but as upgrade prices are the same, there is really no point in changing.

DG

@cojoncio said:

In the other hand I have to admit it's very complicated sometimes, but the features under the hood (the environment stuff) is a must if you wanna do crazy things.

I've heard this said before, but I don't know any specifics. If you have time, I'd be interested to know what you can do in the Environment that you can't do in other programs.

DG

@DG said:

I've heard this said before, but I don't know any specifics. If you have time, I'd be interested to know what you can do in the Environment that you can't do in other programs.

DG

First of all I'm not a Logic champion. If you read between lines in my other post, you could see that I wouldn't choose Logic today if I were a begginer, but I'm too old to make a transition now[;)]

I don't know what other DAWs can do but nowadays they're pretty similar, so choosing one of another is just a matter of taste or (in my case) what I was recommended by friends.

Back to previous versions of Logic, it was the only program to offer something like the environment, where you can tweak almost everything:

From making your own librarian for external MIDI devices to making complete grooves with the press of a key, or create complex lines from a single melody, or also re-harmonize  a progression. The possibilities are endless. I've seen crazy environmets from electroacoustic composers that could do the most bizarre but still amazing things. I haven't seen any electroacoustic composer using anything else but Logic. The environment is not only capable of transforming MIDI but audio as well.

Don't get me wrong. Probably you can do all this stuff with Nuendo or Cubase or Sonar or whatever, but the question is, are you gonna use all that stuff? Getting deep into the environment is a very time consuming process which can led you to a divorce [;)]