Ableton Forum

Hi!

I just had a second of crazyness when I began thinking about walzing in here and ask YOU to tell me why i should choose ableton live over other products. However I quickly woke up and remembered how much i hate those types

Anyway, i am a FL Studio user, and currently owns these things:

-Refx Nexus
-Refx Vanguard
-FLStudio XXL (sytrus etc included)
-DiscoDSP Discovery pro
-Voxengo Elephant
-Voxengo Marquis Compressor

And probably a few more here and there i don't know.

Anyway, my problem is that i have been feeling lately like i need something new. Or at least something faster! Actually it just occurred to me that i don't like using pattern based sequencing for everything, and hence I'd like to test something else.

The major things i wanted was:
1) uninterrupted creative flow when it happens
2) a good midi note editor
3) a nice way of handling mastering or effect chains
4) it would be cool with a few instruments and some good effects.

My choices fell on Sonar 6 producer edition and Ableton Live!

splitted about the two things:

1) absolutely fullfilled in ableton live, however i feel sonar is quite messy.

2) LIVE seems to fullfill this pretty well. Sonar's seems to be very very powerfull, but then again it looks like its more for things i don't need.

3) I don't enjoy the way sonar does it. I enjoy the way live does it

4) Both might seem to be on that one. But I have to say i am very happy about lives quality.


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My conclusion SO FAR is that sonar is created for recording and so on. Eg for making a rock track, and where it might be suitable for that it is not what i want to make. What i want to do is to smack a whole lot of instruments in and get on with the stuff as fast as possible!
So i feel like while LIVE might be used for recording and running that way around (i also felt comfortable recording in live eh), it is much more suitable for electronic music than Sonar is. (not saying it is not suitable for rock and recording multible instruments either, i won't even touch that subject as its none of my interest)

another thing is the way live can handle ideas. I need a place where i can go and smack in what i feel like, and just save it for later uses..

Allright, I got no clue why I decided to write this here (hey maybe my moment of crazyness where not gone), but it might be because i like to check out all edges of a product before purchasing. And when it comes to programming and compilers, the forums are very important places!


My best regards, Daniel Middelhede (maybe upcoming Live user )


edit: forgot to mention that i am on a 64bit vista, but even though the ableton faq say that "it may work to an extent", i would like to say i have had no problems at all so far. And performance wise nothing either (and it seems to take use of the quad core cpu). My buffer latency is set to 5 ms, but i can easily set it to 2 and stuff no problems while playing songs.

sonar and live are two different animals. Cakewalk's project 5 is more similar to Live in that it has a (kind of) session view but lacks quite a lot of what Live can offer, IMHO.

Never liked Sonar's cluttered interface, but one benefit it has it that the 6.2 version is certified to work in vista. Having said that, I was brought up on Cubase, so familiarity with a competitive product sometimes clouds one's judgements on alternatives.

Live is great for putting together quick compositions using session view, auditioning clips on the fly, editing clip envelopes and flexible routings. It is OK with the more traditional linear recording in arrangement mode but not as strong as Sonar or trad linear daws in this area. Live's MIDI is OK but it's MIDI editing is not as strong as some other DAWS, ditto it's audio editing capabilities. But it excels as a compositional tool, in terms of sheer flexibility and productivity it just burns off a linear DAW like Sonar, I had 11 tracks done (complex, greater than 20 tracks) and mixed in 6 months with Live, I might have done 3 or 4 in Cubase in that time.

Mastering - this mostly depends on the plugins you're using, Live is not blessed with great mastering tools in the box but you can use some good 3rd party plugs that are not so costly or even free to good effect. Sonar would get the nod in this area with it's vintage channel and other fx.

Thanks for the reply

Sonar surely is a bit cluttered, and just following the tutorials brought me in a mess. It is much faster to set up Live i suppose.

About midi editing: Though trance and such genres often can hold complex melodies don't require a huge amount of tools. I feel an urge to get the melody down on board. Maybe i'll start by playing it on keyboard and then re-creating it using my mouse (or sometimes i just fire off pads/strings and then build a melody on that of course). So midi editing, i basically require snapping to beats/grids and thats it hehe

About audio editing i think of purchasing Adobe Audition for a try, though a german artist said i'd be better of with Steinberg Wavelab or something i can't recall (SAW?)

About mastering, I actually bought voxengo elephant because the same german full-time artist suggested me (he is a hobby programmer too, thats where i know him from ). Also the marquis compressor was bought on a recommendation.


So how do you find Live for arranging? You talked about linear recordings but how about midi/synth edited things? The only thing i would record is vocals hehe

thefool wrote:The major things i wanted was:
1) uninterrupted creative flow when it happens
2) a good midi note editor
3) a nice way of handling mastering or effect chains
4) it would be cool with a few instruments and some good effects.

not so sure about #3 and mastering but it does great with effects and 1,2,& 4...

thefool wrote:...My conclusion SO FAR is that sonar is created for recording and so on. Eg for making a rock track, and where it might be suitable for that it is not what i want to make. What i want to do is to smack a whole lot of instruments in and get on with the stuff as fast as possible!
So i feel like while LIVE might be used for recording and running that way around (i also felt comfortable recording in live eh), it is much more suitable for electronic music than Sonar is. (not saying it is not suitable for rock and recording multible instruments either, i won't even touch that subject as its none of my interest)
another thing is the way live can handle ideas. I need a place where i can go and smack in what i feel like, and just save it for later uses..

i use live for all kinds of music. lately i've been doing a lot of guitar layering, which live makes a breeze. i've got my line 6 hooked up to my tascam fw 1884 so all i gotta do is plug up a guitar and hit record. that works great for quick recording of new ideas. vsts and aus work like a charm (as long as they're UBs). midi is awesome. plus i just got into using the session view finally (it took 2 years before i paid any attention to it). arrangement view worked fine until i started thinking about live situations. now i do EVERYTHING in there. i'm a huge fan of what live ALLOWS me to do. now go buy iT!

Well, one thing i seem to like is the ability to create the tracks and bits in session view, focusing a bit "modular" on everything and then wandering off to arrangement view placing the stuff on a more linear time.

About mastering - well yeah, i suppose you could finetune the stuff somewhere else. Though it probably wouldn't be a problem to smack up mastering chains with eq's, compressors and limiters.

What do you use for mastering then?

now go buy iT!

Its close

NOTHING! man, i'm still a n00b with compressors (i'm getting better with eqs though). i'm still working on training my ears. i'm also getting better at doing mixdowns. that goes a long way. but mastering is something thats gonna take years to understand properly.

Mastering is a huge aspect of the whole thing
I have been studying compression for a longer time. And mastering in general.

For a beginners book I can recommend "The dance music manual", it will teach you a thing or two about compression, effect chains and so on.

Oh yes, one thing: Are ableton planning to introduce a 64bit mix engine?
http://www.cakewalk.com/Products/SONAR/Sound.asp

(though i suppose the synths has to output 64bit to get a full usability)

anyway, i think Leedsquietman has a good point in mentioning they are two different things. But I think LIVE is more what i am looking for, but i think i will think a little bit more at first, but right now Live has the favour. Again i will only buy one of the tools (and the thing i haven't registered at the cakewalk forums might be seen as a + to LIVE's side again). i am really not needing recording for anything else than vocals, and definently not multitrack.

well, if it helps, if I could choose one DAW, I would probably go for Live myself now, even though I grew up using Cubase (which is similar to Sonar in it's functionality, although I prefer Cubase's less cluttered interface).

Live has compressors built in, they are OK for starting or you can get decent freeware or low cost ones, such as the Kjaerhus Audio classic range etc which are freeware plugs but sound good for nothing.

leedsquietman wrote:well, if it helps, if I could choose one DAW, I would probably go for Live myself now, even though I grew up using Cubase (which is similar to Sonar in it's functionality, although I prefer Cubase's less cluttered interface).

Live has compressors built in, they are OK for starting or you can get decent freeware or low cost ones, such as the Kjaerhus Audio classic range etc which are freeware plugs but sound good for nothing.

Thanks for your help
I have chosen Live, after reading a bit around, testing the demo for a week++, and your points. I will purchase it this afternoon.

About compressors or such i have also been looking at Kjaerhus Gold series,l but i have a lot more to look around after but thats a business for later

ok just placed an order on live

Regarding the mastering side of things, there's a school of thought that says you shouldn't need lots of fancy plug ins:

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=72222

Nice link!
Thanks, i'll give it a read this afternoon when i get home

andydes wrote:Regarding the mastering side of things, there's a school of thought that says you shouldn't need lots of fancy plug ins:

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=72222

The teachers at that school are kinda weird though.

Tarekith wrote:

andydes wrote:Regarding the mastering side of things, there's a school of thought that says you shouldn't need lots of fancy plug ins:

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=72222

The teachers at that school are kinda weird though.

Yeah i agree..



I like the guide. Had some time to read it now, and I think you just hit a soft spot with me. I always tried to make the thing sound good AFTER mixing it, rather than wandering off to the "assembly" state and fixing it there hehe