Am I the only one that feels like Push 2 is useless?

[yur2die4]

Call me strange, but part of the excitement for me with the Push 2 news was that it shows waveforms. Not so much that that is anything new, but that if Push 2 can show waveforms, that means Ableton has implemented a tool in their programming which allows displaying waveforms on external devices.

Here's hoping it pops up someday on the iPad! Imagine a waveform combined with touch-envelope control. Mmmmmmmmmm

[Machinesworking]

I would agree that if you have no idea how to leverage Live for your music making that Push would be useless in your hands. Changing DAWs isn't as easy as the software makers pushing for your cross-grade cash want you to believe, expect to put in hundreds of hours of use and study to to get your muscle memory to a point were you can freely create and not refer to manuals/forums in other words; find your 'flow'
Once you have a grasp of Live it is then that you might want to consider how best control the functionality it offers in order to shape the listening experience.
In short 3 months IME is nowhere near long enough to consider yourself proficient. It took me at about 3 years to get to that point of flow in Live having changed over from using cubase for years

I think you're missing most of OP's points.
He likes regular keyboards over an 8X8 grid, not arguable. He think most of what Push does is covered by Maschine, that's kind of arguable, but his point that getting a Launchpad in his case might have made more sense is pretty subjective, and has little to do with whether he switched from another DAW or not. Personally I agree with most of you that Push 2 will end up being useful in his setup, but I get why he might be wondering why he bought it considering he has alternatives that he's currently using. Again, nothing to do with switching from another DAW.

To offer an olive branch of sorts though, if you're switching instead of using both, there's absolutely no reason not to buy into the whole "user experience™" a company offers, and Ableton offer Push 2, with the promise it will be expanded upon.

[login]

So push isn't useful because you know to use other gear better? worst argument ever.

Check your logic bro.

Not at all. Push isn't as useful to people who have similar alternatives.
I think we can all agree that Push without a good controller keyboard or controller percussion style system like Maschine would seem like a godsend, but if you're comfortable on a piano style keybed, and have similar devices to Push already, it's going to seem redundant. In my case it's main purposes are Launchpad style Session View control and as a huge drum controller for Maschine percussion instrument patches in VSTs like Kontakt, Battery, SSD, Attack etc.

Beyond things like whether you can use patches in Push in other DAWs, real differences between it and other controllers etc. the rest is pretty subjective wouldn't you agree?

My point is that your argument is deeply flawed, since it doesn't value Push on its own but on your particular case where you are more confortable using other gear.

Same stuff if I said "maschine is useless since all that I can do with Push".

[Chingy]

You of course named things you like better, but let's talk drum machine aye?
Maschine by far IMO.

What do you find superior with Maschine for drum programming? I find Push better for this, by a large amount. The momentary toggle of individual pad editing for one. Velocity-based step sequencing will arrive I bet, but even without it, I still prefer Push.

[Tarekith]

Call me strange, but part of the excitement for me with the Push 2 news was that it shows waveforms. Not so much that that is anything new, but that if Push 2 can show waveforms, that means Ableton has implemented a tool in their programming which allows displaying waveforms on external devices.

Here's hoping it pops up someday on the iPad! Imagine a waveform combined with touch-envelope control. Mmmmmmmmmm

More info on that if you're curious:

http://blog.qt.io/blog/2015/12/15/ablet ... ic-making/

[starving student]

You switch to Bitwig or Fruity Loops and you're going to lose all your 'Racks' and all the assigned controllers etc. that Push offers. This is the big let down of Push integration. The main advantage is the advanced Simpler control, but you have to be interested in Simpler in the first place.....

Personally I'm a bit disappointed at how much Push 2 and 1 concentrate on song creation over performance. Live's biggest feature over other DAWs is being ignored in favor of it's 'mac like' UI experience. I look at Simpler and wonder why it took them this long to get pitch and time stretching? and why on a modern computer anyone would want to use it over Kontakt or UVI's Raven?

whats good Machines?
but by the same token the fact that maschine totally eschews any real song creation tools is equally if not more frustrating.
it's like you need ableton or dp just to write a maschine song

[starving student]

just sounds like push isn't for the op, nothing wrong with that......

maschine on the other hand ohhhh boy there's allot wrong with that

[Machinesworking]

My point is that your argument is deeply flawed, since it doesn't value Push on its own but on your particular case where you are more confortable using other gear.

Same stuff if I said "maschine is useless since all that I can do with Push".

Since when is it deeply flawed to compare Push to other devices that can much of the same things?
That, there, is a deeply flawed stance, any device that comes out can be compared to any similar device, period.

Your instance that in my case it's about being comfortable is presumptuous, you're assuming a lot there.
No offense but you either have a hard time with the concept of subjective opinion or you think I'm the OP here and took offense to the term 'useless' in the thread topic.
I have literally no problem with someone arguing that Push can do all Maschine can. There are benefits and downsides to both, and in a lot of ways they aren't even close to similar.
Push integrates with Live better, doesn't come in VST and AU for one, and isn't as useful in other DAWs. Push also has 4X as many drum style pads... etc.
I do agree with the OP though that if you prefer the preset browsing in Maschine and a regular keyboard, Push might seem like a waste of time. I'm happy enough with Push 1 for what I do with it, that may change when PXT General comes to Push 2.

[Machinesworking]

just sounds like push isn't for the op, nothing wrong with that......

maschine on the other hand ohhhh boy there's allot wrong with that

I dunno man, the learning curve is typical of NI, get in make a loop, and it's another month before you really feel comfortable enough with it to write a song, but after that?
I'm liking it more and more honestly, it's as intuitive as I think NI are capable of!

Oh, and again, it does matter whether we're talking about Maschine Studio or the smaller ones. My guess is on the smaller ones there's a lot of computer screen mousing going on, whereas it's pretty rare with Studio.

[Lovelights]

Its also very useful as a chess board Live and Push together are perfect. Why compared it to other controllers, push is made for Live only, machine isent. About the options in both controllers its a bit like pears and apples, both nice and enjoyable but quite different fruits. Use Push as a deluxe chess board if you think its useless

[Machinesworking]

Its also very useful as a chess board Live and Push together are perfect. Why compared it to other controllers, push is made for Live only, machine isent. About the options in both controllers its a bit like pears and apples, both nice and enjoyable but quite different fruits. Use Push as a deluxe chess board if you think its useless

I don't know why I have to keep mentioning this but I never compared Maschine directly to push in a shootout fashion, I compared the equipment I have now, (MKII keyboard and Maschine Studio) to what Push can do, and to only a noobs surprise, there's plenty of overlap. Whether Push is made for Live, it's as useful of an observation as saying that Live isn't made by Apple so Logic is obviously a better fit on macs.

I think all the hyperbole is probably due to the thread title being so brutal though.

[Jbvdb]

It just seems that the OPs only issue is learning a new workflow not a fault of push or ableton live!

[starving student]

just sounds like push isn't for the op, nothing wrong with that......

maschine on the other hand ohhhh boy there's allot wrong with that

I dunno man, the learning curve is typical of NI, get in make a loop, and it's another month before you really feel comfortable enough with it to write a song, but after that?
I'm liking it more and more honestly, it's as intuitive as I think NI are capable of!

Oh, and again, it does matter whether we're talking about Maschine Studio or the smaller ones. My guess is on the smaller ones there's a lot of computer screen mousing going on, whereas it's pretty rare with Studio.

imo they are all pretty capable controllers only the mikro is really lacking but it's the software that gets to me, I guess the most polite way to put it is that to write a complete song in maschine you need to use live but to write a complete song in Live you don't need to use anything else, and that is not including the arrangement view but the session alone.
maschines cool and all I just think something that cost that much and claims to be a sequencer should be able to act as more than a sketchpad that coughs of loops that you wanna take somewhere else and turn into a song.

[musikmachine]

just sounds like push isn't for the op, nothing wrong with that......

maschine on the other hand ohhhh boy there's allot wrong with that

I dunno man, the learning curve is typical of NI, get in make a loop, and it's another month before you really feel comfortable enough with it to write a song, but after that?
I'm liking it more and more honestly, it's as intuitive as I think NI are capable of!

Oh, and again, it does matter whether we're talking about Maschine Studio or the smaller ones. My guess is on the smaller ones there's a lot of computer screen mousing going on, whereas it's pretty rare with Studio.

Mk2 user here and when i use Maschine i hardly touch a mouse, if i were using a mouse a lot i wouldn't even own it cause i have it around for that reason; to get away from the mouse/kb/monitor.

[starving student]

not the most fair comparison though even when comparing them only by features they both should have cause it's like if ableton live could only efficiently make loops then you wouldn't have to touch a mouse to use it either. Maschine is the only product of it's kind where expert users routinely recommend creating a song in one large pattern......... if what you actually want to do is create a song...... ffs that is ridiculous