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-- I gave Ableton Live 4 a second chance...now I am HOOKED!

I gave Ableton Live 4 a second chance...now I am HOOKED!

I got this proggy abou 2 years ago from my friend, who couldn't figure it out and deemed it as "sucky". I gave it a shot but didn't have time or patience to figure out the "hard" interface; I put it away in my "barely use" drawer. Well, I found it today after coming back from work and looking for some cash in my drawer...I looked deeply at it and decided to give it a shot. I took the tutorial and figured out the rest. I have been messing with it for 2 hours and I pretty much have everything covered. It is so much fun...there is no sequencing here per se to build the song...you do everything live. Just build your parts with audio or MIDI, add effects, which by the way, the factory ones are awesome, and then click RECORD and start clicking away your parts to enable them. It automatically syncronizes the parts, so when you click, it doesn't start the part instantly...it waits until its turn. You have different scenes and you build your main "buiding blocks" by combining the smaller parts that you sequence or record. I think I read someone here saying that after working in Live, he couldn't possibly go back to Cubase. Well, i say that too...the interface is so intuitive...I am not touching Cubase for a while. Live has EVERYTHING you need...supports VSTs, records your voice and stuff right there, it even normalizes your tracks when exporting. I LOVE it. This is the ultimate inspirational tool...it keeps you moving. Try the demo and you will see...you will not go back to the other sequencers unless you REALLY need to, hehe.

A little beat I made...using AToD SuperSaw for the weird squealy sound, my voice for the rough sound and a kick from retiro's kick pack. Oh, and a hip-hop sample from the program, hehe.

http://s50.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=...IL0ET0S0QKMVVPY

I gave the demo a shot a few hours ago (before I saw this thread).

Automation seemed to be much nicer than in cubase... mostly because you don't have to open and collapse the automation tracks... this is similar to how Sonar is, if I remember correctly.

The program seemed to be very loop based and the deeper I got into it, the more limited I felt. When I use cubase, I truely feel I can do anything I want... ANYTHING.

To each his own, though

Yeah, it does feel like loop based; mostly because of the building process. It does not have the continuity that Cubase has. I kind of miss that now that you mention it. Also, I noticed how I have to do more stuff before arranging the song. In Cubase, I just play and record...bingo. In Live, there is a lot to do and is a bit confusing. Oh well, it got my creative juices flowing for a while, hehe. I will keep using it, but I am not going to ditch Cubase like I though I would, hehe.

like the sound of this loop based stuff ... might give it a whirl ... can u export a work to MIDI file spec ?

I checked and it says Export MIDI part...so maybe it just renders it individually and doesn not actually save it as MIDI. The loop thing is not actually loops...it is MIDI and audio...but because you make everything in building blocks, those parts actually loop, unless you make a part long enough all the way to the end of the song. But that is why it is easy to work with...just build short parts taht will be used throught the song and just actuvate them when you need them again. It is like Fruity Loops in that aspect...you build your sections and then combine them. That would be great for a live gig...the song would never repeat itselft because you can trigger different parts at the same time. It is awesome. I cannot wait for 5, so I can upgrade.

well till now i couldnt notice any positive differences with fruity in any of this posts, so ill just stick with fruity until anyone of you guys finally give a good reason to switch over

plz try to beat fruity!

Fruity is too closed in my opinion. Ableton is so easy to use...everything you need is right there. The thing that would make me switch form FL to Live is that automation is so easy...play the song and do your thing and it is recorded. In FL and any other sequencers, you have to build the song after making the parts for it. In Live, you do not do anything after building the parts...you just press Record and start clicking the parts while the song is playing and all those parts put themselves in the sequencer quantized and everything. So everything you do is faster. There is no arrangement per se...you just press record and start clicking the parts when it is their turn to play. I mean, it cannot get any easier. The program does the hard stuff for you, so you have more time to concenctrate and get inspired.

Plus, I didn't make this thread to push people or convince them to switch over...I just wanted to share a positive experience. 2 years ago, I didn't click with the program and now I do...I wanted to share that.

Coming from the dj booth i realy cant wait for five because many tracks i have ripped from my vinyl and cds i have ripped in mp3 and i cannot mix using ableton i am hoping that once five comes out ill be mixing and remixing and im getting into the live production aspect of djing aswell.

Hi all!
Do you use Ableton Live with VSTIs when producing? I also tried the demo to evaluate if it is any good for me. I liked the way of recording and arrangin very much and the implementation for hardware controllers also seems to be good (I have a BCR-2000 and a selfmade Mackie Control)I would really like to have this prog if it wouldn't bring my CPU to the knees when using VTIs. I compared it to many different aplications usind the same intstruments and effects and it has a way too high CPU-load. Did you realize that? I have a Athlon XP2800+ with 1.5GIG, so maybe my DAW is a little weak but nevertheless I get better performance with other apps. Another big drawback is, that you can't use your VSTIs when you rewire into another application for mixdown.
What are your experiences regarding these issues? I think I'm going to wait till version 5 before I decide about buying it.

cheers

hereander

Yeah, I noticed the CPU load with VSTs a lttle higher than in Cubase but I nver reached a limit where I had to bounce. 5 is going to be much better.

Here I used 2 z3ta+ demos, 2 Vanguard and I think that is it. CPU was around 8%.

Click here!

Hi RiCo!
You mentioned bouncing... so you didn't dot it yet.
Thats another point with live. Is there an easy way to do it?
I heard that there will be a one-click option in version 5. But with the current version you can't even render to seperate tracks. Thats what I would like to use rewire for. Anyway I still have alot of other stuff to do apart from deciding which studio-app to purchase next (like writing exams ) So it won't be a problem to wait for version 5 (I think it won't be out before end of august)

btw: I can't download you example track. I will try again later. What are the specs of the machine you did it with?

best regards

hereander

Hey, I turned-off my computer to update the BIOS and never turned it back on. I will turn it on tonight when I return to my room. It is an Asus P8P800 MoBo Pentium 4 2.6GHz HT 800 FSB overclocked to 3.13GHz, 512Mb of DDR333 memory, and M-Audio Delta 1010. Only plugins that kill my CPU are Waves and Korg Legacy. I had 2Gb of DDR400 memory but I used it to build another PC and sell it, hehe. You can export individual parts I think...I haven't done it since I have never needed to bounce.

HEy Rico... I got the same mobo as you and have been thinking of flashing the bios due to some instability problems. How did the update go?

Also, I've heard rumours that some VSTs can cause Ableton to be unstable. Like Vanguard for instance?! Have you had any issues with that?

Nooo, man, Live handles VSTs smooth as butter. I thought it was going to be troublesome but it is not. It summons them instantly and browses through the patches smoothly. I was surprised. This application is more stable than Cubase in my opinion. Everything happens instantly with no latency and the export, even though it takes longer because I choose the Normalize option, is fluid and clean. My PC is up and running now with the new BIOS...it changed from the blue ASUS screen to a black one. It gave new options on the BIOS, too. It is smoother now. But don't flash it manually, install the ASUS INF update that came with your motherboard CD and then do it online. It'll flash the BIOS while the PC is connected to the internet and it is fluid and happens behind the scenes.

The other sample was done with fatigued ears...you cann tell how all over the place harmonics are...mixdown is crap and is too loud. I made this clean example now using Bren-F's Trance Percussion set, one instance of the freebie synth Triangle I with Live's Filter Delay, and for the bass I used Live's Operator, which is an FM only synth. I love the bass...it is so tight on that synth. The presets are crap but you can build sounds pretty easy. I like this sample...sounds very clean IMHO.

Click here!

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