Published 2025-03-07.
Last modified 2025-03-25.
Time to read: 7 minutes.
av_studio collection.
This article reviews Imaginando LK and UBRIDGE, introduced in Android and iOS Remote Control Surface Apps. I normally only work with Microsoft Windows, so Apple Mac was not considered.
Imaginando LK and UBRIDGE are available for iOS and Android. I like the Android implementation better than the iPad implementation because it supports split-screen operation and because MODE management works better. Imaginando told me they have no plans to support split-screen on iOS.
On my iPad tablets, prices were $11.99 USD and $4.99 USD. All of your compatible Apple devices can use the app and all modules for no extra charge, provided they are associated with the same Apple account.
On my Android tablet, prices were $8.49 USD and $3.99 USD. All of your compatible Android devices can use these modules for no extra charge, provided they are associated with the same Google Play account.
There is no discount for purchasing all modules for all devices on both Android and iOS.
It is not possible to purchase more than one module at a time. This means that if you want all six modules, there will be six small financial transactions.
The Moving Parts
LK requires two programs to be installed on the Windows DAW that runs Ableton Live:
The UBRIDGE Windows service mediates the dialog between LK (running on a tablet) and Ableton Live (running on a DAW.)
More than one instance of LK can connect to a given instance of UBRIDGE. For example, I was able to connect LK running on an iPad to UBRIDGE running on the Windows DAW, then also connect LK running on an Android to the same UBRIDGE instance. The two control surfaces are, in effect, merged.
Unfortunately, LK does not support split-screen operation on iOS. However, Android automatically provides split-screen capability to all apps.
Virtual MIDI Port
The Windows version of LK also requires a port from a virtual MIDI driver. Imaginando recommends loopMIDI by Tobias Erichsen. I already had loopMIDI installed; it is an excellent program that “just works.”
UBRIDGE
UBRIDGE uses the Bonjour protocol to communicate between the desktop running Ableton Live and the tablet running LK.
Installation
The UBRIDGE installation instructions at Setup - LK Help are a bit disjointed, and that page is difficult to find. Oddly enough, the Wayback Machine’s archived version of these instructions from 2022 is much better.
LK should be installed on the tablet before installing UBRIDGE on the PC.
For iPad, when you see the following message, select Allow.
The following are the steps that I used on the DAW. The order is important!
Download, install and open loopMIDI.
Create a new virtual MIDI port by typing UBRIDGE Virtual into the New port-name field,
then click the + button.
Download and install UBRIDGE.
Click on the Allow access button when the Windows Security Alert appears.
Launch UBRIDGE. On my desktop, which has two 4K monitors and a 1080p monitor, UBRIDGE rendered fine on the 1080p monitor but was small on the 4K monitors. On my HiDpi 2-in-1 laptop, the window for the application was even smaller. These are the settings I used to right-size the app on the laptop; I was unable to resize the app on the desktop:
UBRIDGE will display two tabs, and the LK tab will be the default. The heading of the default tab is colored green. In the LK tab:
Configure the MIDI Input port to use the UBRIDGE Virtual xx port the MIDI Output port to use UBRIDGE Virtual yy.
Click on the + symbol for the Control Surface
and navigate to the Ableton Live exe file.
For me, the path was %PROGRAMDATA%\.
Launch Ableton Live, press CNTRL-, to open the Settings dialog, and click on Link, Tempo & MIDI. Define LK as a new control surface, with input and output both set to UBRIDGE Virtual.
The MIDI input and output settings also need to enable Track and Remote for UBRIDGE Virtual. Note that my setup includes a LaunchKey MK3, which presents as LKMK3 MIDI; this MIDI device has nothing to do with LK or UBRIDGE.
All of my tablets immediately connected UBRIDGE to LK over USB.
I was unable to connect UBRIDGE to LK over Wi-Fi to any of my tablets. That problem was due to a bug in EuCon, which I had previously installed, and had nothing to do with UBRIDGE or LK. However, if UBRIDGE and LK were coded more defensively, they would be able to shrug off the problem introduced by EuCon, and continue to operate properly. The problem, and the workaround, are described below.
LK Modes
LK can work in two modes: as a MIDI device, or as an Ableton Live control surface.
With MODE set to LIVE, an iPad acts as a control surface as expected when using LK MIXER. As I moved between the various LK modules, I discovered that the MODE had to be set to LIVE or MIDI for each module. In addition, the MODE setting was not remembered the next time LK was launched.
The Android version did not have these problems; MODE was consistent between all the modules, and MODE persisted between launches.
For MIDI mode, DEVICE needed to be set to Michael’s iPad (2) before it worked. This is the name that appears for my iPad Air 13" (2024); it is not possible to rename it.
Nagging Problem
LK runs for a limited period of time before nagging the user that they should purchase a license. When this happens, LK often disconnects from UBRIDGE without warning, and the only way to reconnect is to terminate LK and restart it. If more than one instance of LK is connected, and one of them pauses to nag the user, connections to all LK instances are dropped.
While I appreciate the developer’s desire to nudge the user towards purchasing the product, this behavior causes the user to wonder if the product is broken. I did find the connection between LK and UBRIDGE to be fragile (more on this below), but the interruption caused by the nag makes the problem worse.
Problem and Workaround
UBRIDGE would not connect to any of my three tablets.
LK on the tablets showed the message Waiting for UBRIDGE.
I opened the UBRIDGE log and looked for problems.
The last message was “Installation completed. Please restart Ableton Live”, so I did that, and I launched LK on the tablet. LK did not find any connections to Ableton Live. After poking around, I found Setup - LK Help. It said that the first time UBRIDGE runs, it should present a Windows Security Alert, which would allow traffic destined for UBRIDGE to flow through the Windows Firewall.
In Windows Control Panel, I opened Control Panel\
and noticed an entry for UBRIDGE.
Good.
I verified that the Bonjour service was running by pressing and releasing the Windows key,
then typing services, then selecting Open.
I scrolled down the list of services until I could see the Bonjour service status was Running.
On my iPads, I verified the permissions for the LK app by going to Settings / Apps (way at the bottom), then selecting LK, and verifying that Local Network was enabled:
Disabling Windows Defender by turning off Real-time protection had no effect. I quickly re-enabled Real-time protection because I knew that leaving this off left my PC with no protection from malicious programs.
I was unable to make LK work on any tablet using Wi-Fi. Imaginando’s tech support was very responsive over email, and worked with me for a few days and into the weekend, but to no avail. After poking around, I noticed that Windows Event Viewer, Windows Logs / Applications had this event:
PM Bad service type in ._EuConProxyDevice._tcp.local.
Application protocol name must be underscore plus 1-15 characters.
See
https:/
I disabled the EuControl service (installed by EuCon) and rebooted.
LK and UBRIDGE worked.
The current version of EuCon will not allow some or all other programs to access Bonjour.
The current version of the Avid EuControl service has a bug when initializing. The Avid EuControl service may be incompatible with some or all other programs that use Bonjour.
Defensive Coding
If UBRIDGE and LK were coded more defensively, they would be able to shrug off the problem introduced by EuCon, and continue to operate properly despite the problem.
Programmers generally first implement a non-trivial application by focusing on the “happy path”. However, programs generally consist of a series of API calls, each of which might return the expected result, or generate an error. If an error causes the happy path to abort without attempting to rectify the problem, the program is fragile and fails.
Every API call must handle all possible results, including all possible errors. A program with robust error handling is usually more complex than one that just considers the happy path.
LK and UBRIDGE are not robust in how they manage Bonjour. If they were, they would be able to shrug off the problem introduced by EuCon, and continue to operate properly. I know this is possible because EuCon does this.
Stale Bonjour DNS Cache
I left UBRIDGE and Ableton Live 12 Studio running overnight on my Windows 10 DAW. The next morning, none of the tablets could connect to UBRIDGE. The Bonjour service was still shown as Running in the Windows Services app.
I think the problem was a stale DNS cache. After restarting the Bonjour service, the LK apps on the tablets could once again connect to UBRIDGE. Clearing the DNS cache might also work; I will try that the next time the problem manifests.
Exiting UBRIDGE on the DAW or LK on the tablet should provide an orderly shutdown of the Bonjour connection. You should not leave an unused connection between LK and UBRIDGE running for extended periods of time.
Other Reviews
- Sonic Bloom (Published 9 years ago.)
- Resident Advisor (Published 9 years ago.)
- An undated but obviously quite old Review: Neyrinck V-Control Pro by Everything Recording.
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