Possible new Ableton user - Digging the workflow

[DeyBwah]

Hi everyone,

I just started the Ableton Suite 8 30-day demo this past weekend. I've set up my Axiom Pro and located all my VSTs.

First things I've noticed.

Ableton has a HyperControl personality! Woohoo! I recently moved from Pro Tools to REAPER and was sad to lose HyperControl along the process. Any other Axiom Pro users here? How useful is HyperControl in Ableton?

I've only run the application a few times, but I've noticed that it chugs quite a bit on performance.. for example, when I click and drag a construction set(or any component for that matter) over to the main arrangement window, I have to wait a few seconds for it to "catchup" and visually display the hovering element before I release my click to drop it in. I'm on a brand new i7 930 PC running W7 64-bit.

Also, when I was initially setting up my VSTs, I had to reboot my PC close to half a dozen times as it kept freezing. I do appreciate that Live detects a problem VST when rebooting it and asks if I want to skip loading it. But one thing that I noticed, when Live would freeze, it wouldn't completely terminate. I would try to open it again, and it wouldn't load. No error message, nothing. That's why I had to reboot the PC. I'm guessing it was locking up my sound card or something.

Is Live known for being buggy and performance heavy for PC users? Or is this just the initial set up blues I'm experiencing?

I have watched numerous videos that show of Ableton's workflow but I'm still having trouble duplicating what I watch. For example, on the demo videos, I can clearly see the instructor is able to seamlessly record while playback is engaged the whole time. When I tried to attempt this, I could not find out how to get my play back to loop to the proper length, and I feel like I'm missing something important that isn't mentioned in the videos I saw. Does anyone have a link to some videos that are meant to break things down step-by-step for newcomers?

Conlusion:

I'm pretty excited to learn Ableton and I love the workflow(from what I've seen). I'm ordered Maschine and it should arrive soon. Hopefully the two compliment each other as I'm starting to get into more electronica/hip hop production.

Thanks everyone,
Dey

[#1thelark]

Welcome!
Check out if multiprocessorsupport is activated in your Live preferences!

Cheers!

[DeyBwah]

Welcome!
Check out if multiprocessorsupport is activated in your Live preferences!

Cheers!

Is it activated by default? I'll check this when I get home tonight. Thanks!

[Tweaking Knobs]

Live is great , is fun...


though...

the big flaws it has for me are :

No automtion curves.
No lfo's
No recording automation in session view
No advanced midi editing in piano roll ( choping , strum , flam , and many more.. )
No snaping of automation points to beat.

[delicioso]

You can record automation in session view, sort of.

Nope. You can only record controller movements of MIDI CCs in session view with third party plugins that have their own midi learn system. You CANNOT record parameter automation of anything in Live's session view (in other words, you can't use Live's midi mapping system to map a knob and record the movement in real-time).

The annoying thing about this too is that once you record MIDI cc data into a clip, moving that parameter conflicts with the cc envelope and it jumps around, rather than behaving like an Ableton control that has a clip envelope, where you can still move the control and the envelope is relative to the position of the control while tweaking.

There's also the IAC/Yoke workaround though that also causes various issues & complications.

[Tweaking Knobs]

see what you mean, i think. I tried it with Operator and you can draw it in but not record it.