HELP!!!! Need fixed before the 28th of September!!

[smol]

Hi fellow Ableton users

I am currently working on a set that allows me to change how my own tracks sound, they are set out on a time line in Ableton.
Each track has 2-3 midi tracks in it. This allows me to change the track on the fly.

My set is 1 hour and i have problems with the CPU usage.
I have been getting mixed messages reading over the forums that it is Live 8 itself that uses so much CPU.

With my set open Ableton idles at 26-27% CPU usage, the when i start the set it jumps to 159-170% CPU usage which then causes the "popping" sound for about 5 seconds then it Ableton will go back down to about 60% CPU usage while playing the set, this only causes the occasional "popping" sound.
Ableton then jumps to 150-170% CPU usage if i were to change the position on the timeline or change the master tempo.

Is this all to much for Ableton to handle?

I want to be able to do all this, without none of that^^^ happening. Please if there is a solution out there, i trust that you guys will have the knowledge to help me fix it

I currently own
Ableton Live 8.1.5
32 plug in buffer size.... >> is this correct!!<<
Buffer size: 512
In/Out sample rate: 44100
Cpu Usage Simulator: 50%

1st edition macbook pro 17"
Specs are
Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro3,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz


My Hardrive is
Enclosure Internal
Capacity 160 GB
Buffer Size 8 MB
Hard Drive Type HDD (Hard Disk Drive)
Spindle Speed 5400 RPM
Interface SATA I

Once again PLEASE help me out, i need this sorted desperately before the 28th of september!!

I trust there is someone out there who can help me out

[Fanu]

Do you have any CPU-hungry plugins?
E.g., some synths (such as Ace or Diva by U-He) can be very demanding.

Have you done much bouncing?

[timothyallan]

Yes, it's too much for Live to handle.

BTW thanks for your Hardware UUID, I'm going to write a GUI in Visual Basic and backtrace you.

[smol]

Do you have any CPU-hungry plugins?
E.g., some synths (such as Ace or Diva by U-He) can be very demanding.

Have you done much bouncing?

I have multiple instances of Massive going. Would it help if i were to turn off those plug ins when they are not in use.

What is Bouncing? Please dont judge, I'm pretty new to this.

Thanks for the quick replies btw

Second Q then, is there anyway i can do what im wanting to do without using so much CPU.

Cheers

[fishmonkey]

increasing your audio buffer size will also lower CPU usage a bit, although it will increase latency too...

bypassing plugs when they are not being used will also lower CPU usage.

bouncing means saving the output from your MIDI-controlled devices as audio. playing back the recorded audio uses a lot less CPU than generating the audio on the fly. this will only help you if don't want to actually play the instruments live though.

also, make sure you aren't running any other apps in the background, and turn off your network too, unless you need it for wireless controllers.

if you want to eke the last bit of performance out of an old system like that, it is a good idea to have a stripped down system with minimal extra crap installed on it, even all those dinky little helper apps and Dashboard widgets use RAM and CPU, and it all adds up.

[smol]

increasing your audio buffer size will also lower CPU usage a bit, although it will increase latency too...

bypassing plugs when they are not being used will also lower CPU usage.

bouncing means saving the output from your MIDI-controlled devices as audio. playing back the recorded audio uses a lot less CPU than generating the audio on the fly. this will only help you if don't want to actually play the instruments live though.

also, make sure you aren't running any other apps in the background, and turn off your network too, unless you need it for wireless controllers.

if you want to eke the last bit of performance out of an old system like that, it is a good idea to have a stripped down system with minimal extra crap installed on it, even all those dinky little helper apps and Dashboard widgets use RAM and CPU, and it all adds up.

Hey thanks for your help, I had bounced all the audio that I did not need to play live.

Also I have completely stripped the OS of all unnecessary installed programs.

Unfortunately I need to have a wireless controller set up with the laptop.

Once again I thank you for your help but is there anything else that could fix it?

Cheers

[fishmonkey]

yep, a faster computer...

[smol]

Haha I could of guessed that, what I should be asking then is how much faster?

[fishmonkey]

oh, and is your hard drive coping? getting any disk overloads?

[fishmonkey]

Haha I could of guessed that, what I should be asking then is how much faster?

get a proper quad-core i7 machine.

if you are shopping for a second hand MacBook Pro, be aware that none of the pre-2011 models were quad-core, and many of cheaper 2011 and later models are also still only dual-core i5s or i7s.

[smol]

Haha I could of guessed that, what I should be asking then is how much faster?

get a proper quad-core i7 machine.

if you are shopping for a second hand MacBook Pro, be aware that none of the pre-2011 models were quad-core, and many of cheaper 2011 and later models are also still only dual-core i5s or i7s.

Haha alright then thanks for that i guess that's something to chuck on the wish list.

I also have checked how the hard drive is doing and it all seems to be fine. I thought many upgrading the hard drive would help?

[andydes]

Turn down the polyphony (number of notes playing at once) to only what you need on each instance of massive (or anything else).

Turn down quality of vsts (if it has the option) if lower settings are good enough.

Turn of unused inputs and outputs in audio set up.

If playing sounds live in any cases means just turning a filter cut off,consider bouncing part to audio at high setting and adding an auto filter effect for live twiddling. Can do something similar with effects by turning off massive's effects.

[cotdagoo]

Why on earth are you using an ancient version of Live (8.1.x) while the current version sits on 8.3.4 ?

There have been a lot of improvements over the past years, including optimizing the whole thing to reduce CPU usage.

I'd say start by grabbing the latest version. Also gives you direct access to the Amp effect.

^^ +1

[smol]

Why on earth are you using an ancient version of Live (8.1.x) while the current version sits on 8.3.4 ?

There have been a lot of improvements over the past years, including optimizing the whole thing to reduce CPU usage.

I'd say start by grabbing the latest version. Also gives you direct access to the Amp effect.

Oh Great! I wasn't aware haha.

Your probably thinking I'm pretty useless by now but have you got some sort of a download link For version 8.3.4. Or how would I go about downloading this? Because it doesn't seem very straight forward to me haha

[smol]

So your saying, i won't be able to use my live sets that I have saved so far using ableton 8.1.x?
Or are you saying that if I were to save something in the latest version 8.3.4 it isn't going to be usable in the old 8.1.x? Why would I need to use the old version if I've got the new one anyway?