Ableton Shortcomings??

[chango blanco]

Am I missing something here?

My Reaktor pad (coming out of Green Matrix @ 58800 sample rate) sounds WAY warmer and vibrant when played STRAIGHT thru Live5.2, rather than when I recorded it to audio with Live. I recorded it MIDI Track-to-Audio Track, I resampled it, I even rendered the pad @ 32bit/ 96000!

I'm thinking this is why I read about so many guys using Live as sketch-pad/ loop tweaker/ basic idea getter, but end up using Nuendo/ Cubase/ (oh God) Pro Tools to ACTUALLY record and finalize the track.

Any thoughts?

[ewistrand]

Yeah. You're still resampling in odd chunks in regards to Reaktor from the sounds of it. Use even multiples; if you're rendering at 96k, run Reaktor at 48, 96 or 192k.

ew

[chango blanco]

cool, thanx for the tip.

So I matched Live & Reaktor up to 82800...Reaktor didn't have a 92 or 196 option.

Still losing this "analog" warmth thts laying underneath the higher freqs. on playback.

Could it be a setting in audio interface? (FW410)

[minimal]

sorry what analogue warmth has to be expected from a digital instrument?

[chango blanco]

hence the "quotation marks"

thanx for your reply

[3dot...]

...You turned warp off on the clips you recorded right ?
That could cause some degradation....

[chango blanco]

I usually just set it to Re-Pitch in these cases.
...I'm thinking it shouldn't really matter since the recorded clip is the same BPM as the project BPM, right?

[Angstrom]

correct.
same BPM beats or repitch will be fine.

anyway - the cause of your issue must be elsewhere - because recording audio via resample is something I do all the time. I don't find that the sound is affected. I am guessing there is a monitoring issue that is making the incoming signal be monitored twice, on playback you only hear it once.

If there was a general problem with Live making the sound 'muffled' you could reasample some audio 5 times and it would sound like it was in the room next door. Which is not the case.
tray resampling a beat 5 times from chan1 to chan2, chan2 to chan3, etc. , then compare the original and the 5th generation. They will be exactly the same - they will completely cancel each other out(with a phase inversion). Try doing it 20 times, it will do the same. There is no muffle filter on the encoding.


As regards comparisons with other DAWs, the reason people make statements like yours is because they have read statements like yours.

Many phase cancellation tests have been tried with audio between the main DAWS and they all came out the same - ie the audio cancelled out. Meaning they are the same.
It is an endless and tedious debate. Imagine someone reading your post, next time they have any problem with sound they will think "I remember some guy said that the sound was bad so I will change to Logic".

[chango blanco]

Phase cancellation, channels one and two Vs. channels three and four.. . i dont know. All I know is that SOMETHING is lost when I'm recording in Live. This is a very subtle SOMETHING...lets call it "warmth." SOMETHING the lay person will most likely miss. SOMETHING the normal ear, who cant distinguish between a 24 bit sample and a 16 bit sample, will miss.

When I was speaking about "reading about other guys using (other DAWs)," I was referring to reading in magazines, not reading on forums.

I'm still curious ....why would somebody, like Sasha for example who obviously uses Ableton A LOT, NOT use it for recording/mastering? I'm wondering if it's because of something like this issue I'm having???

Thoughts?

[Poster]

When I was speaking about "reading about other guys using (other DAWs)," I was referring to reading in magazines, not reading on forums

that's a real problem these days; too much talk talk blah blah..

if there was nothing to read, there would not be such speculation about Live's audio quality...

who cares what Sacha uses?
he's human, still..

[chango blanco]

When I was speaking about "reading about other guys using (other DAWs)," I was referring to reading in magazines, not reading on forums

that's a real problem these days; too much talk talk blah blah..

So what's 4700 forum posts gonna get me?

if there was nothing to read, there would not be such speculation about Live's audio quality...

So ignorance truly IS bliss.

I had no speculation on Live's audio quality, even after reading these articles...UNTIL I heard it with my own ears. And I'll be honest, I don't know what is causing this problem, it may NOT be Ableton, but there IS a loss of quality from just PLAYING a vst in Live, and RECORDING the same vst in Live.

who cares what Sacha uses?
he's human, still..

Fine, use Kaskade, Daft Punk, Armin Van Buuren...ad infinitum.
Sasha is merely an example of an artist who uses Ableton that readily comes to mind. Don't get caught up in the semantics.

Again, why would so many producers use OTHER DAWs to record/ master/ finalize?

[evernaut]

Live has some shortcomings....accurate metering is one niggle for me...but that's about it. Sound quality is just not an issue though...if you think you hear a difference, then the only solution that will work is to use something else.

I guarantee you there will be no actual difference but if it makes you happier....

As other posters have pointed out, it's a very tiresome debate fuelled by unfounded rumours. I use Live primarily to record analogue signals from mics recording real acoustic instruments... & I've done countless A/B-ing thru very high-end gear in wonderfully treated rooms as well as my own humble set-up. Live ( without warping!!!) will always only be as good as whatever you're putting through it - and that means outboard gear and the dynamics of your own performance.

Read some previous threads for the full skinny.

[Poster]

When I was speaking about "reading about other guys using (other DAWs)," I was referring to reading in magazines, not reading on forums

that's a real problem these days; too much talk talk blah blah..

So what's 4700 forum posts gonna get me?

dunno.. do some reading..

who cares what Sacha uses?
he's human, still..

Fine, use Kaskade, Daft Punk, Armin Van Buuren...ad infinitum.
Sasha is merely an example of an artist who uses Ableton that readily comes to mind. Don't get caught up in the semantics.

Again, why would so many producers use OTHER DAWs to record/ master/ finalize?

dunno.. you tell me..
so not interested in knowing who uses what, when and where..
what difference does it make?
If Sacha tells me he does his recording in Pro Tools I will still not use it, or start questioning Live's audio quality..

anyway..
the reason why I said what I said is that you mention, twice, about reading what the BigBoys use and by that insinuating Live is not up to par..
It's mostly blah blah talk that is written about what the Sacha's use and that eventually start threads like this...
Don't believe the hype..

If you think Live does not sound that warm, it's is not warm..
People might use other programs because of different feature sets,
not necessarily because of sound quality issues..

[Johnisfaster]

but there IS a loss of quality from just PLAYING a vst in Live, and RECORDING the same vst in Live.

no there isn't typically. there is something you're doing in your process that is causing this problem OR you're simply percieving a problem that isn't there. there may be a sample rate issue going on here but thats not a live problem thats a set up problem. there may also be a monitoring issue here as you may be monitoring the sound while you play it which makes it sound really beefy (hearing it doubled up) and then playing it back is not beefed up cause it's not monitored.

go to logic and make a midi pattern of your favorite vst. then drop that same midi pattern in live. (make sure the sample rates and bit rates are the same) now check them side by side.

[chango blanco]

Wurd, thanx for the input.

Yea, it's really weird. So far the only thing I've noticed is my FW410 has a max bit of 24. I would think tho that a 32 bit sample would then only play at 24 if that was the max for interface. I'm not sure I would be tell the difference between a 24 & 32 bit sample anyways...but I do notice a diff between what's being played and what's being recorded.

Could the audio buffer setting have any influence on the recorded audio? I wonder if I have it set too low.