Multiple question for Ableton Live users.

[MikeMitchell]

I'm contemplating a change in direction and am considering live. Plan on trying the demo but wanted to get a little more info first.

How is the midi editing and composing? I'm coming from cubendo and I can't live without some of the their midi features i.e. selection midi regions and applying compression and expansion velocity. Midi is more important to me than anything. Does live include an arp?

I use numerous virtual instruments including superior drummer and bfd. Do these easily set up with multi outs for each drum and bussing options?

Does Live contain auto-delay compensation for plugin delay?

Hardware buss inserts? Is it difficult to integrate outboard comps and effects for mixing?

Do they use challenge\response or a dongle?

How are those Live interfaces from novation and akai?

thanks for your time,
-m

[steff3]

Well, MIDI editing is definitely not as feature rich as in classical DAWs, but if you can live with piano roll editor only it is not that bad. Destructive functions like compress velocities are not there - but you get real-time MIDI fx.
Some things (concerning MIDI editing are nicer with Live), some are less elegant and so on. It depends on your workflow, but standard DAWs offer more convenience IMHO.
One of the biggest slow downer is that there are no shortcuts and that the tool set is rather limited for MIDI editing. On the plus side is the real pattern approach to MIDI regions and not just pseudo pattern approch - with follow actions, etc.
I also love that when you can the grid to triplets or so the time line stays straight, making it much more easy to align MIDI events to straight or triplet positions.
best for this is - try the demo and see how you get along.

plugin delay compensation is there ... Do not know about outboard ...

their own challenge reponse which is trouble/hassle free most of the time ... it is really computer based and not some non-sense voodoo that takes other stuff like partitions into consideration ....

hope that helps.

[smccarthy945]

Ableton is a whole different ball game especially on the midi side. The advantage of Ableton is that it doesn't work like a classic DAW so the midi editing is much different. I have never hit a limitation with it and actually like it better than most DAWs.

You will go through about 4 months of pure frustration trying to learn it but once you do you will never look back. The workflow in Ableton is just incredible. I have been using it for 4 years now and anything I come up with in my head (IE. Idea) I can easily and quickly create in Ableton.

Its strongest point in my opinion is that you can transform an idea from your head to the software very easily. Its a very creative product.

[.T.]

Originally Posted by MikeMitchell

I'm contemplating a change in direction and am considering live. Plan on trying the demo but wanted to get a little more info first.

How is the midi editing and composing? I'm coming from cubendo and I can't live without some of the their midi features i.e. selection midi regions and applying compression and expansion velocity. Midi is more important to me than anything. Does live include an arp?

I use numerous virtual instruments including superior drummer and bfd. Do these easily set up with multi outs for each drum and bussing options?

Does Live contain auto-delay compensation for plugin delay?

Hardware buss inserts? Is it difficult to integrate outboard comps and effects for mixing?

Do they use challenge\response or a dongle?

How are those Live interfaces from novation and akai?

thanks for your time,
-m

I am a relatively new Live user (coming from Reason) so I'll do my best to answer these questions from the POV of someone who has just jumped in.

The midi-editing, as already noted, is not really that extensive. You've got a piano roll, and that's about it. There are very basic editing features - velocity, length, quantize, etc. If you have to use more in-depth midi tools then live probably isn't the best avenue for you. There is an Arpeggiator for the MIDI Effects section but I haven't really used it - it does look pretty good and you have a lot of control over the settings.

As far as multi-out instruments are concerned, it's really easy to set them up in live (I had massive headaches setting it up in reaper by comparison, in live it's a snap of just creating new audio tracks and setting the 'receive' from the plugin track, then the specific plugin audio channel you want).
HOWEVER, if you plan on freezing/flattening tracks to audio you're going to have a pain in the ass experience as this is supported poorly for multi-timberal instruments (you cannot freeze a track with a plugin that has other midi/audio channels sending to/from it - this is my big gripe and makes quick audio flattens a pain. It's also a clunky process to render the clips in clip view to audio).
Also, there is no support for multiple-input plugins, 5.1 audio tracks and the like. The max you can go is stereo on an audio track. This is a pain in the ass for me as far as sidechaining is concerned (Ableton has it's own compressor with sidechain, and that's it). There's no multiple outputs from a stereo track either. To do things in parallel you have to use the send channels.

Live should have auto-compensation plugin delay but I've noticed problems with parallel compression using sends (it's ever so slightly out of sync to give me that nice phaser effect). I have to do more research in this department but I haven't had any other problems with plugin delay compensation.

As far as hardware support goes Live is meant to be pretty awesome with sending things to outboard gear (specific options to send tracks to external inputs). I have never tested this myself though, so I can't really comment.

Live uses a challenge/response code and registration was a breeze. It was so easy I've forgotten what was involved.

The live interfaces are ****ing awesome (here is where I stop being objective and gush for a little bit). I own a novation launchpad and it changes the way you approach writing music. I have quite literally 'jammed' tracks for hours on end and I'm really excited to try and do some live gigs in the coming year with it. The ability to select clips by pressing a button sounds fairly rudimentary in nature, but when you can actually play a track like an instrument it is seriously cool. Add in concepts like dummy clips (where you can route an audio track to different effects, all while the track is playing in realtime), and crazy fx-laden changeups are a button-press away. The difference between the two units really just boils down to the fact that the AKAI APC40 has knobs and sliders and is more of an 'all in one' solution, while the Novation doesn't (you still have simple options for changing levels/pans/sends on the fly from the novation, even arming tracks for record, though its all done with the buttons)

Plus, it has pretty lights.

Overall, Live has its ups and downs. It's not the perfect DAW and misses out on some things which would make me build a shrine to Ableton. I've found that 8.1 tends to enjoy crashing with NI plugs and it's a known issue. However, unlike say Reaper, where a crash either [a) ****s my whole project, or b) loses a good few hours of work while I have to copy everything into a new, fresh project], Live will generally recover everything I lost after a crash - whether I saved it or not.

As far as creativity and straight song-writing are concerned, you will find it injects a whole new wave of creativity into your writing (once you get over the initial 'wtf am I doing?' stage). That being said, don't assume the apple doesn't have any worms!

Edit: It's already been mentioned but the workflow is phenomenal. Everything has a keyboard shortcut. You can fly through creating/quantizing/rearranging clips with very little effort.

[MikeMitchell]

Thanks for the excellent replies. Dongle free is a huge issue for me right now, extra extremities hanging out of a laptop is a less than ideal situation. Really interested to see how I vibe with the work flow. I wind up over tweaking while writing with nuendo and pt. I've gotta say their vocalization on product direction and concern with stability in the recent 'watershed' thread really caught my attention.
thanks
-m

[MikeMitchell]

Originally Posted by MikeMitchell

Thanks for the excellent replies. Dongle free is a huge issue for me right now, extra extremities hanging out of a laptop is a less than ideal situation. Really interested to see how I vibe with the work flow. I wind up over tweaking while writing with nuendo and pt. I've gotta say their vocalization on product direction and concern with stability in the recent 'watershed' thread really caught my attention.
thanks
-m

Ok so... now I guess I understand the necessity for the public announcement. Sooo many bugs. I can't even keep it running. Oh well, a nice thought. Maybe in the future.
-m

[n8tron]

Originally Posted by MikeMitchell

I'm contemplating a change in direction and am considering live. Plan on trying the demo but wanted to get a little more info first.

How is the midi editing and composing? I'm coming from cubendo and I can't live without some of the their midi features i.e. selection midi regions and applying compression and expansion velocity. Midi is more important to me than anything. Does live include an arp?

It will be a big change of direction. After using a lite version of live here and there for years I've finally *got* it. It finally made sense to me. I'd suggest spending a lot of time with the demo. This might seem weird but don't just learn how to use Live, but learn how Live is used. For midi editing its meh, but for composing and bringing together ideas it is just fantastic. While I could now see myself using only Live I wouldn't want to. The way its designed handicaps some ways of working.

You might start out enjoying the new way of working, but then you'll hit a wall. As smccarthy945 said, you might get really frustrated at first, but then after that wall it eventually it will click. Now I just keep using it more and more.

[Dysanfel]

There are bugs, but your not able to keep it running? Thats not right.

I just finished an entire track without a single problem. First time since 8 was released.

[turkdirty]

Originally Posted by smccarthy945

Ableton is a whole different ball game especially on the midi side. The advantage of Ableton is that it doesn't work like a classic DAW so the midi editing is much different. I have never hit a limitation with it and actually like it better than most DAWs.

You will go through about 4 months of pure frustration trying to learn it but once you do you will never look back. The workflow in Ableton is just incredible. I have been using it for 4 years now and anything I come up with in my head (IE. Idea) I can easily and quickly create in Ableton.

Its strongest point in my opinion is that you can transform an idea from your head to the software very easily. Its a very creative product.

would say exactly the same thing. so quick and faff free. and the major drawbacks in 7 have gone in 8

[MikeMitchell]

Originally Posted by Dysanfel

There are bugs, but your not able to keep it running? Thats not right.

I just finished an entire track without a single problem. First time since 8 was released.

Maybe its because I am just running trial? Loading plugs from NI, ohmforce, waves is incredibly slow and often crashes the program. The disable\enable audio processing button in the upper right is THE instant crash button. Learned to not mess with that anymore. Lots of little things are causing it to hang.
-m

[n8tron]

I gotta say I've never experienced bugs in Ableton since version 5. I had 5 full, but haven't upgraded until recently to 8. (I wasn't using using it much for awhile and the lite versions kept me going through 6-7).

I feel like Live can slow down a bit more than other programs as you load it up with plugins. but crashes are pretty much non-existent on my end.

I don't own omforce or waves but I have a kontakt, and komplete 6 arriving tomorrow. I'll try my NI products out and see how they fair in Live.

(also, looks like the .1 update isn't available for the lite version yet. that might solve some of these problems you're having)

[Harry Hughes]

I only got into the whole audio engineering thing about 7 months ago.
I was given a copy of Ableton Live Suite 8.0 by my sister.
For a while, it was extremely frustrating to use.
But once you unlock the key to the door, everything just hits you and you get it. It's like it's designed to really benefit those who read the manual more so than other DAWs. I absolutely LOVE Ableton now.
I tried using Reaper for a while, but even though it was initially more intuitive, in the longer term Ableton just let me work faster with less hassle.
Everything is right in front of you, but you just need to learn how to see it all first

[Harry Hughes]

Just a bump here.
I recorded a guitarist 2 nights ago using Ableton, and also wrote out drum tracks on it.
It just astounds me again how easy Ableton is to use.

[Eloheim]

Hey really great review btw! Thought I might be able to help with a couple things though.

Originally Posted by .T.

Also, there is no support for multiple-input plugins, 5.1 audio tracks and the like. The max you can go is stereo on an audio track. This is a pain in the ass for me as far as sidechaining is concerned (Ableton has it's own compressor with sidechain, and that's it).

With VST plugin's at least (AU too?), you can do sidechaining. It's annoying beause you have to duplicate the whole trigger track and then set the duplicate track's (with your EQ on it, for example) Audio Out to the plugin's track inputs #3/4. It works with Stillwell's Rocket for example, but some other 3rd party plugs I tried gave me trouble.

Originally Posted by .T.

There's no multiple outputs from a stereo track either. To do things in parallel you have to use the send channels.

That's true, although if you go to the track you want to send to you can set THAT track's input to the first track's output and have it sent like that.

Originally Posted by .T.

Live should have auto-compensation plugin delay but I've noticed problems with parallel compression using sends (it's ever so slightly out of sync to give me that nice phaser effect). I have to do more research in this department but I haven't had any other problems with plugin delay compensation.

The audo-delay compensation is turned off if you're routing FROM a send back to a regular track again (because it could cause an infinite loop or something ). So I'm not sure if that might help any of the problems your having.


Hope some of these things might help you out a little. Check out the Ableton forums too for some good posts on this stuff (there's a "Tips n Tricks" sticky, etc.)

[.T.]

Thanks Eloheim, that's good advice.

I've been searching around for tips on the ableton forums but I think with sidechaining I may have been searching for the wrong keywords. I'll get to testing it ASAP - I'm pretty excited that it can be done (and hopefully it goes fine with at least one of the compressors in the stable).

The parallel stuff is really a non issue as one can easily do it on the audio effects rack - you'd think with all the dummy effects I was doing this would have sunk in earlier...!

I think I might go lurk a bit more on the ableton forums. I think there's still so much to learn in this program - there is a fantastic amount of flexibility.