Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

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docbot
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Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by docbot » Sun Jul 19, 2020 3:40 pm

When connecting my iPad via usb to my Macbook Pro and just outputting Sound via the Macbook Pro's speakers, how come there's so much latency when sending notes from a Sequencer on the iPad to my Macbook Pro?

I thought Ableton Link was made to do exactly this latency free or synced up? Since the iPad is directly connected with a lighting usb cable shouldn't there be any latency at all in theory? Notes are not just of by a few ms but more than whole 1/8 notes.

Somebody explain this to me please, where does the latency occure in such a setup?

yur2die4
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by yur2die4 » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:43 am

Link is designed for individual audio sources to be in sync. It had been promoted as a way for people to ‘jam together’. So if two people had laptops with Live, they’d be in sync without having to deal with other means of synchronization (which was often messy and unreliable).

If your iPad and your computer were both going out to a mixer simultaneously, they’d in theory be pretty much in time.

But if you put the iPad to a computer’s audio input, that Adds latency to the equation, so you’ll get different results.

Link wasn’t entirely designed for people to have something in sync be recorded By a device that would be in sync also. If you recorded two devices that were synced via Link from their outputs directly, then you’d ideally be in sync.

For actual midi recording, you might be best off going with the old non-Link methods, using appropriate track delay settings, and hoping for the best.

TLW
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by TLW » Mon Jul 20, 2020 5:00 am

The way I connect my iPad Pro (9.7” version) to my Mac is to connect the iPad using a lightning cable then enable the iPad as an audio device in Audio/MIDI Setup. If I want to record the audio output from the iPad I also create a composite interface with my RME UFX. Live then sees all the inputs from both devices. I generally monitor through Live rather than direct through my RME. I use TouchAble Pro as a touch control surface and it responds very quickly.

For MIDI sequencing and playing synths I enable the iPad in MIDI Setup and also in Live’s preferences. I set Live to send the iPad MIDI clock.

iPads generally seem to run at 256 samples latency if running synths. Some will let you go lower but I generally leave things as they are.

For MIDI I find there’s no noticeable latency at all, certainly no more than my hardware sequencers and synths have.

Link isn’t strictly necessary, but in my experience doesn’t impose unacceptable latency.

One thing that can help keep things synced is to let Live’s transport run for a couple of bars before trying to record. MIDI clock can sometimes need a little time to steady itself and settle down (if for no other reason than the hardware receiving clock hears the first “click” but doesn’t know when the next is coming until it arrives), which is one reason for not trying to record something using external MIDI in the first bar or two of arrangement view.

What I do find a bit erratic sometimes is my Korg Volca Modular. Korg use a clock that functions a little differently to MIDI “standard” clock and the first few notes can be off unless it’s received clock before starting the sequencer.
Live 10 Suite, 2020 27" iMac, 3.6 GHz i9, MacOS Catalina, RME UFX, assorted synths, guitars and stuff.

docbot
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by docbot » Mon Jul 20, 2020 8:36 pm

yur2die4 wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:43 am
Link is designed for individual audio sources to be in sync. It had been promoted as a way for people to ‘jam together’. So if two people had laptops with Live, they’d be in sync without having to deal with other means of synchronization (which was often messy and unreliable).

If your iPad and your computer were both going out to a mixer simultaneously, they’d in theory be pretty much in time.

But if you put the iPad to a computer’s audio input, that Adds latency to the equation, so you’ll get different results.

Link wasn’t entirely designed for people to have something in sync be recorded By a device that would be in sync also. If you recorded two devices that were synced via Link from their outputs directly, then you’d ideally be in sync.

For actual midi recording, you might be best off going with the old non-Link methods, using appropriate track delay settings, and hoping for the best.
Thanks, I've tried Midi Clock but it's just as laggy, even drifting horribly, whenever I adjust the latency - once I hit play, everything is off again :(
So annoying, it's 2020 how is this not possible yet :x

yur2die4
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by yur2die4 » Mon Jul 20, 2020 11:13 pm

If I’m not mistaken, Apple is gradually working at allowing iOS apps to run in macs. So maybe 2021 will be your year.

docbot
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by docbot » Thu Jul 23, 2020 12:04 pm

Still wondering though how Link works or is supposed to work exactly.

Let's say I have Ableton running and connected to an Interface and

I link it up with an iPad running fugue machine triggering a synth in AUM.

are they only in sync if I connect the iPads analog out to the analog in of the same interface? Is Link taking interface latency into account or are they just syncing at app level ignoring Interface latency?

login
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by login » Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:00 pm

docbot wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 12:04 pm
Still wondering though how Link works or is supposed to work exactly.

Let's say I have Ableton running and connected to an Interface and

I link it up with an iPad running fugue machine triggering a synth in AUM.

are they only in sync if I connect the iPads analog out to the analog in of the same interface? Is Link taking interface latency into account or are they just syncing at app level ignoring Interface latency?
Link syncs through the network, not the MIDI or audio cables. Link syncs the clock of each app, think of it as a master clock external to the apps, it doesn't deal with latency from and into audio interfaces.

docbot
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by docbot » Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:21 pm

login wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:00 pm
docbot wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 12:04 pm
Still wondering though how Link works or is supposed to work exactly.

Let's say I have Ableton running and connected to an Interface and

I link it up with an iPad running fugue machine triggering a synth in AUM.

are they only in sync if I connect the iPads analog out to the analog in of the same interface? Is Link taking interface latency into account or are they just syncing at app level ignoring Interface latency?
Link syncs through the network, not the MIDI or audio cables. Link syncs the clock of each app, think of it as a master clock external to the apps, it doesn't deal with latency from and into audio interfaces.
thanks for making that clear, it would be great if Link could also do automatic latency clock offsetting let's say Ableton is connected to an interface with 50ms global latency (+50ms plugin latency) and the iPad is connected to another interface with a different reported latency, then the slaves could automatically be delayed to match the slowest device with the biggest latency to have perfect sync. Would be great when using hardware mixer and such, but I know this is possibly rather complicated.

yur2die4
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by yur2die4 » Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:22 pm

The audio interface would have its output sent to a mixer.

And the iPad would have its output sent to the same mixer.

Or alternatively, let’s say you have two laptops with audio interfaces, plus the iPad.

One iPad is the one with Ableton Live. That laptop interface’s audio output will go to the input of a second laptop. The second laptop might just be for recording the session overall. The iPad also would send its audio to that second laptop.

Link just syncs things. But the moment you start trying to take a synced device and send it into another synced device, you’ll experience a delay chain where the timing starts becoming ambiguous.

You should still be able to record activity. You’ll just have to fix it after.

Actually, many audio interfaces do have a fader for mixing between the processed output and the immediate, unprocessed input. Often referred to as ‘zero latency monitoring’. You could record the iPad (mute the channel within Live but record it) while mixing between the output of Live and the raw ‘immediate’ audio from the iPad by using the zero latency monitoring setup. You’ll just have to fix the timing of the recorded material afterwards.

TLW
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by TLW » Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:27 pm

docbot wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:21 pm
let's say Ableton is connected to an interface with 50ms global latency (+50ms plugin latency) and the iPad is connected to another interface with a different reported latency,
It’s easier to connect the iPad to the Mac with a lightning cable and use Audio Setup to activate it as an audio device then create a composite interface out of the iPad and the “real” audio interface. Live will then let you select that as a Core Audio interface with the both the main interface inputs and iPad audio outs (down the lightning cable, not the iPad’s audio jack) available as inputs to Live. If you set up the iPad in MIDI Setup as well it seems to receive clock more reliably.

I suggest using a lightning cable (a) because of the composite interface possibility and (b) because relying on wi-fi or Bluetooth for accurate timing is a risky thing. It also means you’re not adding interface audio input latency to the response to MIDI time of the iPad application. I find that sort of setup generally works pretty well.
Live 10 Suite, 2020 27" iMac, 3.6 GHz i9, MacOS Catalina, RME UFX, assorted synths, guitars and stuff.

docbot
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by docbot » Fri Jul 24, 2020 12:21 pm

TLW wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:27 pm
docbot wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:21 pm
let's say Ableton is connected to an interface with 50ms global latency (+50ms plugin latency) and the iPad is connected to another interface with a different reported latency,
It’s easier to connect the iPad to the Mac with a lightning cable and use Audio Setup to activate it as an audio device then create a composite interface out of the iPad and the “real” audio interface. Live will then let you select that as a Core Audio interface with the both the main interface inputs and iPad audio outs (down the lightning cable, not the iPad’s audio jack) available as inputs to Live. If you set up the iPad in MIDI Setup as well it seems to receive clock more reliably.

I suggest using a lightning cable (a) because of the composite interface possibility and (b) because relying on wi-fi or Bluetooth for accurate timing is a risky thing. It also means you’re not adding interface audio input latency to the response to MIDI time of the iPad application. I find that sort of setup generally works pretty well.
This is what I have been doing, but Midi from the iPad is out of synth by an 1/8 note and can't be stablized. the offset always seems to very.

TLW
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Re: Someone please explain Ableton Link iPad Latency to me

Post by TLW » Fri Jul 24, 2020 5:59 pm

I find MIDI to and from the iPad locks pretty accurately to Live’s clock. The only “problem” synth being a Korg Volca because Korg Volcas use clock in an odd way - two “clicks” per pulse - which means they don’t actually start running their sequencer until they’ve received the second clock pulse so the very beginning of the first run through generally drops a note or two unless the sequencer is started manually after the synth’s been receiving clock for a few bars.

A bit of MIDI timing drift is pretty much inevitable using a computer as master clock, though the shift is usually no more than a tenth of a beat or thereabouts...

I’ve been pondering your problem and the only suggestions I have left are to ditch Link and just use MIDI clock, assuming you haven’t already tried that of course. It might also be worth trying making the iPad the MIDI clock master so it controls Live’s playback and see if that helps.
Live 10 Suite, 2020 27" iMac, 3.6 GHz i9, MacOS Catalina, RME UFX, assorted synths, guitars and stuff.

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