The Little List of Tips and Tricks

[Tone Deft]

http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?p=978412#p978412

There's no way to tell until you try it. They don't show in order like VST parameters in t he configuration view, so you just have to remember or write it down. It may be documented somewhere, but I'm not sure.

nativeKONTROL.com Released this document on their apc40 portion of their forum to go along with the release of their apc add-on templates.
The apc nativeKontrol forum:
http://beatwise.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=apc
and the actual document:
http://www.nativekontrol.com/uploads/Li ... apping.pdf

This document is a list of ALL the native Ableton control bank settings as set by Ableton. The nativeKontrol apc templates do not change the default usage and settings of the apc40, they only add additional features that should have been included to begin with.

I asked if I could share it here and Stray said no problem.
The document is 23 pages of Ableton control bank settings... here is a sample.

INSTRUMENTS:

ANALOG:
Bank 1: Oscillators
Encoder 1: OSC 1 Level
Encoder 2: OSC 1 Octave
Encoder 3: OSC 1 Semi
Encoder 4: OSC 1 Shape
Encoder 5: OSC 2 Level
Encoder 6: OSC 2 Octave
Encoder 7: OSC 2 Semi
Encoder 8: OSC 2 Shape

Bank 2: Filters
Encoder 1: F1/F2 Mix for OSC 1
Encoder 2: F1 Freq
Encoder 3: F1 Reso
Encoder 4: F1 Type
Encoder 5: F1/F2 Mix for OSC 2
Encoder 6: F2 Freq
Encoder 7: F2 Reso
Encoder 8: F2 Type

Bank 3: Filter Envelope
Encoder 1: F1 Attack
Encoder 2: F1 Decay
Encoder 3: F1 Sustain
Encoder 4: F1 Release
Encoder 5: F2 Attack
Encoder 6: F2 Decay
Encoder 7: F2 Sustain
Encoder 8: F2 Release

Bank 4: Filter Modulation
Encoder 1: F1 On/Off
Encoder 2: F1 Frequency < LFO1 ..... and on and on....


MIDI EFFECTS

ARPEGGIATOR:
Bank 1: Style
Encoder 1: Style
Encoder 2: Groove
Encoder 3: Offset
Encoder 4: Rate
Encoder 5: Retrigger Source
Encoder 6: Retrigger Number
Encoder 7: Repeat
Encoder 8: Gate

Bank 2: Pitch/Velocity
Encoder 1: Transpose
Encoder 2: Key
Encoder 3: Steps
Encoder 4: Distance
Encoder 5: Velocity Decay
Encoder 6: Target
Encoder 7: Velocity On/Off
Encoder 8: Velocity Retrigger

Best-of Bank
Encoder 1: Sync Rate
Encoder 2: Free Rate
Encoder 3: .... and on, and on.............


AUDIO EFFECTS:

AUTO FILTER
Encoder 1: Frequency
Encoder 2: Q
Encoder 3: Attack
Encoder 4: Release
Encoder 5: Envelope Amount
Encoder 6: LFO Amount
Encoder 7: Rate
Encoder 8: Phase

AUTO PAN
Encoder 1: Amount
Encoder 2: Rate (Hz)
Encoder 3: Phase
Encoder 4: Shape
Encoder 5: Shape Select
Encoder 6: Rate (Beat-time)
Encoder 7: Offset
Encoder 8: Width

BEAT REPEAT
Bank 1: Repeat Rate
Encoder 1: Interval
Encoder 2: Offset
Encoder 3: Grid
Encoder 4: Variation
Encoder 5: Filter Frequency
Encoder 6: Filter Resonance
Encoder 7: Volume
Encoder 8: Decay

Bank 2: Gate/Pitch
Encoder 1: Chance
Encoder 2: Gate
Encoder 3: Pitch
Encoder 4: Pitch Decay
Encoder 5: Filter Frequency
Encoder 6: Filter Resonance
Encoder 7: Volume
Encoder 8: Decay

Best-of Bank
Encoder 1: Interval
Encoder 2: Offset
Encoder 3: Gate
Encoder 4: Chance
Encoder 5: Grid
Encoder 6: Variation .....and on, and on......

[Zygi]

The best post ever!

thx Tone

[atom heart]

Wicked video showing artifacts in Live's warping scheme

I made a video demonstrating the different warp settings and the fact that repitch doesn't always cancel. It's a little boring and maybe a bit confusing but I can explain what's going on step by step if anyone cares.

http://ultrashare.net/hosting/fl/a88b195057/

Thread here:
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 004#353004

could u plz upload the file again?

[Tone Deft]

Wicked video showing artifacts in Live's warping scheme

I made a video demonstrating the different warp settings and the fact that repitch doesn't always cancel. It's a little boring and maybe a bit confusing but I can explain what's going on step by step if anyone cares.

http://ultrashare.net/hosting/fl/a88b195057/

Thread here:
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 004#353004

could u plz upload the file again?

it was never mine to upload to begin with, you need to find the author.

[Tone Deft]

a good succinct answer as to what orange midi ports mean in Live, from the Support forum:

Hello,

Orange means that Live can´t access the MIDI driver or that the MIDI driver can´t access the interface
because it´s not connected/powered down etc.
It often helps to either reboot or reconnect the MIDI interface. In other cases it only helps
to reboot Live.

Best,
Christian

[friend_kami]

a good succinct answer as to what orange midi ports mean in Live, from the Support forum:

Hello,

Orange means that Live can´t access the MIDI driver or that the MIDI driver can´t access the interface
because it´s not connected/powered down etc.
It often helps to either reboot or reconnect the MIDI interface. In other cases it only helps
to reboot Live.

Best,
Christian

also goes to orange if the midi driver is used elsewhere, so live cant connect to it.

[hoffman2k]

A bit overdue, but I updated the list. Earlier this year I removed dead links, today I added some links I was collecting. There are about 15 new links, one of which links to a list of over 50 music production videos from various artists using various software. Thanks to @mr_union for that list.

[depnaker]

Woow, its great,Excellent and fun stuff

I look forward to hearing more.

[Icaro Ferre]

This is such a great topic.
Thanks for all the tuts (:

[fakemoney]

Cool thing I've started doing to keep my head straight in live performance:

I use a basic 4-channel setup with 1 and 2 running to a single bus channel and 3 and 4 running to another. (For dummy clips.) Crossfader switches between the 2 busses. But there are effects I use on channels whose state I will forget because my MIDI controller doesn't have much visual feedback, and sometimes the buttons get stuck, or I can't see a knob in the dark, or whatever. So for effects whose state I want to see without opening the rack at the bottom, I'll create a dummy return (muted) and map the same MIDI CC to my effect parameter and the send. So the little send knob will always tell me where my settings are and it doesn't take up much space on the screen.

That is all.

[mok]

a good succinct answer as to what orange midi ports mean in Live, from the Support forum:

Hello,

Orange means that Live can´t access the MIDI driver or that the MIDI driver can´t access the interface
because it´s not connected/powered down etc.
It often helps to either reboot or reconnect the MIDI interface. In other cases it only helps
to reboot Live.

Best,
Christian

also goes to orange if the midi driver is used elsewhere, so live cant connect to it.

On the Mac it really helps starting the Audio/Midi Settings, and check for new Midi devices again... so you don´t have to reboot live and don´t have to switch/replug your Midi devices.

[Tone Deft]

a post on how Win XP identifies USB devices, why things like that APC show up as USB AUDIO DEVICE and what you can do about it.
http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php? ... 9#p1031649

This issue is not really an issue. It happens whenever you are using more than one class compliant audio or midi device. A class compliant device means that it does not require any drivers to be loaded, instead the operating system has them already and it loads a generic driver.

The problem under WinXP is that it does not give these devices identifiable names, instead it calls them USB Audio device 1, device2, device 3 etc etc. Not particularly helpful when you have a bunch of class compliant devices in your setup. More annoying is that the name assigned to each device can change depending on what order they are plugged in/switched off and which USB port they occupy (this also links in to the 10 MIDI device entry limit issue in XP - see RME site:http://www.rme-audio.de/en_support_tech ... q_10entryd)

Microsoft have addressed this issue in Windows 7. Class compliant drivers now appear in the system by their actual name instead of the generic one, which makes identifying each of your USB MIDI devices alot simpler.

IDENTIFYING YOUR DEVICES: Unfortunately I am stuck using WinXP until I get proper audio drivers from Focusrite for Win7, so this may help other XP users with multiple devices to begin with.

First, go to your MIDI prefs and disable ALL control surfaces in the top section. For ALL remaining USB Audio devices in the list enable Track & Remote input.

In a blank MIDI track in session view and select the "MIDI From" dropdown box and select "USB Device 1". Press buttons on all your devices until the MIDI track shows that it is receiving input. Note the device that worked and remember which USB device it is linked to.

Repeat this for USB Device 2, 3 etc etc. You will now know which USB devices are which physical devices.

Go back to MIDI prefs, enable any control surfaces you require and point them to the USB Audio device numbers you found in the previous step.

**IMPORTANT** Due to the way XP handles MIDI devices, the registry will contain references to each device that is plugged into a USB port and allocate one MIDI entry for it. BUT, if you move this same device to another USB port, IT WILL THEN ALLOCATE ANOTHER MIDI ENTRY TO THE SAME DEVICE. As far as the OS is concerned, you have just connected a new device.

It is therefore recommended that for users with multiple class-compliant USB Audio/MIDI devices that you always plug them into the same USB port each and every time to avoid running out of MIDI entries in the registry (see link to RME website above).

I hope this helps some of you out there, as it has caused me massive problems before (e.g. get on stage in front of a crowd and find that the MIDI device limit has been reached and it won't detect my devices in Live anymore!).

I recommend XP users keep a copy of the information from RME regarding fixing this issue in your gig bag just in case. When you need it you're likely to not remember how to fix it quickly.

[Tone Deft]

a list of the Pluggo devices in Live 8.1 (initial release, check the date on the post.)

http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php? ... 2#p1030062

[fakemoney]

One more!

Maybe it's an obvious trick, but I've seen a lot of people grousing about the sync issues so this might be a useful one. I've been stumbling around this particular beast for a while with a set of inelegant fixes, and I could never quite be sure whether things were out of line or whether I'm just a shit producer.

Finally figured out a smooth workaround for the horrible, horrible Rewire delay. I use Reason for almost all my drums and synths, and have historically used Live for basic audio recording and all MIDI sequencing. Well, a 15-20ms delay on vocals isn't a huge deal, but now that I'm using a lot more of Live's audio, bouncing shit back and forth between programs and mixing and matching drum hits and kits between various Drum Racks and my Reason samplers, the lag has been making my game SLOPPY. Track delays don't do it, and I can't just set up a template with all the delays set where I want them, because when I start a project and I'm recording live audio and MIDI, I want it to be quick snappy, with a small buffer...but as the project gets bigger and there are more devices and more automation, and I don't really care about latency, and it starts to get sluggish, I'll bump up the buffer quite a lot to make playback smooth. I don't want to go manually fiddling with delays on all my audio tracks every time I fuck with the buffer, do I?

So i made two sets of busses. I usually use a pretty standard 4-bus template that funnels down into the master channel. So I've grouped my FOUR busses and duplicated them...now I've got EIGHT. The L-Bus group (bus for all Live tracks) and R-Bus group (bus for all Reason tracks.) After figuring out what latencies were happening with different buffer settings (experimenting with identical clicks playing through Drum Rack and a Reason sampler at the same time) I made a simple delay rack for the Live Bus group, with a knob that goes from 3ms-30ms, and a little reminder info text box with a few guidelines about appropriate delay settings based on various buffer sizes. So when I've got my buffer at 256, the delay is at 4-5ms, and when it's 1000+ms for my bloated, cpu-heavy monster projects, I just turn the L-Bus knob up to 20-something until it lines up. Pretty simple trick for keeping everything in sync without a lot of headaches.

The only other thing I want to do is create a separate click track so that a)I don't have to listen to Live's BEEP booop boop boop boop and so it will still be in sync when the whole project is lagging 20-30ms behind the master click. (as far as the first concern, I know you can change the default click sounds in the folders somewhere, but....meh. It's out of sync anyway, right?)

Haven't had any of those brilliant "you jackass, why didn't you see [insert X obvious flaw here]" moments with this setup yet, so I'm assuming it's solid. Hope it helps some of the hapless Reasonites of the Live world.

*Note: There are still some issues with time-based effects on sends, and parallel processing through sends. This can be kind of a pain in the ass, but for situation where I Just Gotta Do It, I'll put an instance of the Compensation Delay rack on the individual Live track itself, set up the send I'm going to use to receive POST fx, and route the track to a separate dry bus with no delay. It's a little ugly like this, so if I can, I'll do whatever delays/parallel processing I want on each track, as long as it's nothing too cpu-intensive. Of course, this means you can't share effects between Reason instruments and Live instruments. Which sucks. But once it's set up, there are still only a few of the Compensation Delay racks floating around, and if you map them all to the same MIDI cc it's pretty easy to keep it tight.

Now, if I could only find a way to count on Live+Reason in a live setting. Crashes too much. Is this just Abes' way of trying to get me to buy Operator?

[Trent]

As far as running a master click, I'd do this. Create a midi channel, drop in a percussive rack, loop it for 4 to 8 beats and you can completely customize your click! This seems to work great for me and I am usually running about 10 to 20 pre-recorded clips and 5 virtual instruments, this just depends on the song. But needless to say...I use it and rely on all the time in arrangement & in session view! Works great in Live situations to. Everyone just needs to stay on the click!

Once I pick out my click I usually throw on EQ8 just on the click in the rack to make it stand out in the mix of things!