Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Share what you’d like to see added to Ableton Live.
bubblebobble
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Jan 25, 2014 11:57 pm

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by bubblebobble » Sun Jul 12, 2015 1:17 am

This would be extremely beneficial and remains one of my biggest pet peeves regarding Live. There is no reason Live can't "figure this out". But even if the coders wanted to be lazy, then just allow us to select a "Preferred Audio Device". Here, I'll write the code for ya ;)

if (PreferredDevice.Status == DeviceStatus.On)
{
CurrentAudioDevice = PreferredDevice;
}
else
{
CurrentAudioDevice = FindAvailableAudioDevice();
}

Sorry. Code is never that simple. But really.. add a drop down to Preferences > Audio > Audio Devices title "Preferred Device" showing all available devices. Once preferred device is chosen, always favor that one. Seems simple enough to me. Or, you could get fancy and write an algorithm that determines the best/preferred device from usage stats combined with some diagnostic checks to see if the sound card is a lousy "on board" one, or a nice external/discrete one.

To those that say this is no big deal and we shouldn't complain, two things:

1. This may not take too long to do each time, but the main purpose of code is to perform menial tasks for us. To automate procedures that are redundant.
2. I just timed myself switching my audio device and it took 14.82 seconds. I wasn't rushing like a madman, but I wasn't being deliberately slow either. I used the hotkey (command + ,) to bring up the preferences. But after clicking on the audio tab and selecting both the input and output device, more time had passed than one would think. Lets round this down to 10 seconds. If I turn off my audio interface every time I finish using Live; or lets say I transport my computer to somewhere else (studio/friends house/coffee house/etc), then that's 10 seconds every time I use Live. Lets say I use Live about 5 times a week (in fact this is precisely my current scenario). Thats 50 seconds a week. Not too bad. But lets multiply that out for the year:

50 seconds x 52 weeks = 2,600 seconds per year (or 43 minutes).

If I use Live for 10 years, thats 7 hours selecting an Audio Device. Not too bad I suppose, but the thought of wasting almost a full work day of my life selecting from drop downs is kind of depressing. But here is where the real benefit comes in with software:

Lets say there are 1000 Live users just like me. Thats 7,000 hours combined. That's 291 days!! I'd wager a decent coder could TDD this feature with solid code in 2 days (max). That's a net gain of 289 days!!!
This is the amazing thing about code. And when designing and writing software I have to remind myself of this type of perspective. Because there are times you spend days doing, what seems like such a mundane, useless task that can't save a person more than a few seconds. So what right!? How lazy can those users be!? But if your user base is 50,000 large. And most of whom use this app everyday.. well that can change things considerably.

Anyways. Who knows, maybe my figures are all F'd up. And there aren't many of us turning off or moving our work machines. But for me, I've been dealing with this pretty much everyday for the last 3 years :(

I would really really really really love to see this feature!

nexus01
Posts: 15
Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 8:22 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by nexus01 » Mon Jul 13, 2015 12:27 am

Its not easier that if you worked with X audio card for a couple or hours, close Live while the Audio card is on and connected? I think its what all of us do...

Yet, if you turn on and connect your soundcard BEFORE open Live again, your settings will be remembered, its not that complicated :?

I do it every day and never had a problem with that.

Anyway, No Audio when the last card used is not detected, its still not logical.

twilly86
Posts: 3
Joined: Fri Jan 29, 2016 9:46 pm

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by twilly86 » Fri Jan 29, 2016 9:46 pm

There is still no way to do this right? Is there a max plugin or some mac script that would enable this? There has GOT to be a better way.

csselement
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2009 8:47 pm

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by csselement » Sun Jan 22, 2017 4:17 am

Millions of cumulative man hours are being wasted. 4 years later and still no consideration for a default interface.

Stromkraft
Posts: 7033
Joined: Wed Jun 25, 2014 11:34 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by Stromkraft » Sun Jan 22, 2017 10:26 am

csselement wrote:Millions of cumulative man hours are being wasted. 4 years later and still no consideration for a default interface.
I think it's worse than this as Live sets the outputs to the last interface used, so when you share the set to users without that interface they need to reroute all outputs. This is of course another situation, if related.
Make some music!

dilettant
Posts: 5
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2016 8:32 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by dilettant » Fri Mar 17, 2017 11:05 am

Same problem for me! I just voted for the suggestion: https://ableton.centercode.com/project/ ... 322f309ebb

When sorting all suggestions, this one is on pages 6 of 98, so maybe there is hope :) Everybody who likes to have this feature should vote for it!

Banditos
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Dec 18, 2017 12:49 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by Banditos » Mon Dec 18, 2017 1:13 am

+1
Please!

leandro
Posts: 83
Joined: Mon Sep 26, 2005 11:31 pm

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by leandro » Sat Apr 14, 2018 8:50 pm

+1
iMac i7 - Macbook Pro i7 - Motu 8pre FW + 828 MKii - SSD HD

jonathanbaldwin
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Apr 24, 2018 5:06 pm

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by jonathanbaldwin » Tue Apr 24, 2018 5:07 pm

This is something I looked on the internet hoping there was a fix for but no there isn't. Even Garageband can do this but Ableton nope. Incredible software guys but this is something you MUST fix!

Stromkraft
Posts: 7033
Joined: Wed Jun 25, 2014 11:34 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by Stromkraft » Tue Apr 24, 2018 7:39 pm

jonathanbaldwin wrote:This is something I looked on the internet hoping there was a fix for but no there isn't. Even Garageband can do this but Ableton nope. Incredible software guys but this is something you MUST fix!
While I agree this'd be nice I fail to see the must. Are you changing audio interfaces all day long? Why?
Make some music!

h2jazz
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Jan 04, 2018 11:55 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by h2jazz » Sun Apr 29, 2018 7:38 pm

Because I take my macbook to work in a classroom with a zoom interface, than in a rehearsal room with a Saffire interface and then at home with a RME Interface... very annoying.

And even worse, Live does not remember my RME UFX+ Input/Output Configuration, all fields are empty and the inputs are greyed out. Restarting Live, reconnecting thunderbolt, restarting UFX+, nothing... after a dozen of attempts it works...

Stromkraft
Posts: 7033
Joined: Wed Jun 25, 2014 11:34 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by Stromkraft » Mon Apr 30, 2018 5:12 am

h2jazz wrote:Because I take my macbook to work in a classroom with a zoom interface, than in a rehearsal room with a Saffire interface and then at home with a RME Interface... very annoying.

And even worse, Live does not remember my RME UFX+ Input/Output Configuration, all fields are empty and the inputs are greyed out. Restarting Live, reconnecting thunderbolt, restarting UFX+, nothing... after a dozen of attempts it works...
Yeah, The other side of this issue is when Live does remember the outputs/inputs, like for instance when I've been in the studio with an MX-1, using multiple outputs, and then I move to the home studio with a Babyface and the output goes to channels that don't exist and I have to manually re-route. Don't you find this as well? So just remembering isn't sufficient I believe. We need some kind of mapping paired with that.

I'm not sure how much of this is OS audio level related, but I'm pretty sure Live works quite low level and does rely on the CoreAudio API in macOS for instance.
Make some music!

locojohn
Posts: 487
Joined: Mon Feb 19, 2007 8:42 am
Location: riga, latvia

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by locojohn » Mon Apr 30, 2018 9:05 am

Stromkraft wrote:I'm not sure how much of this is OS audio level related, but I'm pretty sure Live works quite low level and does rely on the CoreAudio API in macOS for instance.
I believe each audio device has a unique device identifier that can be used by Live to store I/O channel information along with it, so when it's used next time, the configuration is restored. I can't believe this can't be done.

Andrejs
/*
  • the basic tone of life remains the same,
    and in it there are some happy melodies
    and some sad melodies
    - sekito kisen
*/

Stromkraft
Posts: 7033
Joined: Wed Jun 25, 2014 11:34 am

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by Stromkraft » Tue May 01, 2018 9:43 am

locojohn wrote:
I believe each audio device has a unique device identifier that can be used by Live to store I/O channel information along with it, so when it's used next time, the configuration is restored. I can't believe this can't be done.
No? Then can you please tell me how to rename the channels of my audio interface in the Audio/MIDI app in macOS?
Make some music!

locojohn
Posts: 487
Joined: Mon Feb 19, 2007 8:42 am
Location: riga, latvia

Re: Remember the Bloody Audio Interface!

Post by locojohn » Tue May 01, 2018 10:47 am

Stromkraft wrote:
locojohn wrote:
I believe each audio device has a unique device identifier that can be used by Live to store I/O channel information along with it, so when it's used next time, the configuration is restored. I can't believe this can't be done.
No? Then can you please tell me how to rename the channels of my audio interface in the Audio/MIDI app in macOS?
Where is this coming from? I don't think Audio MIDI setup offers this feature, but I don't think it's not doable – Apple just doesn't support it in theiir Audio MIDI Setup program. As I said, macOS CoreAudio programming API provides a way to identify an audio device by unique identifier.

You can even run the following command in the terminal to get generic information in XML format about all audio devices on your system:

Code: Select all

system_profiler SPAudioDataType -xml
Andrejs
/*
  • the basic tone of life remains the same,
    and in it there are some happy melodies
    and some sad melodies
    - sekito kisen
*/

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