Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.

Should Ableton fix the sync issues now?

yes, immediately...no scratch sync before midi sync..
149
60%
yes.. before L9
50
20%
neutral.. ableton best knows what is good for me
13
5%
No.. can wait.. i dont need to sync
30
12%
No.. i like to say no because it rhimes with moo
7
3%
 
Total votes: 249

davepermen
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by davepermen » Thu Oct 07, 2010 7:29 pm

it's not more important just because you spam the forum. understand that.

the way you describe sync, it's a bug, just like any other. one that hurts live performance. so it's a bug. understand that.

i actually replied to a statement of yours (this statement: "Just the question how much time the developers get to do fixes.. and ableton never fixed anything complete sofar..or?"). understand that.

but you won't. as you still don't get, how annoying it is to not use the correct nicknames, but instead create insulting fake-names. which is the reason i bitch on you so much: your tone is absolutely not acceptable (and this tone is the reason ableton does not listen to you in particular, so it fails for the thing you want to archive). understand that.
http://davepermen.net my tiny webpage, including link to bandcamp.

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 7:39 pm

davepermen wrote:it's not more important just because you spam the forum. understand that.

the way you describe sync, it's a bug, just like any other. one that hurts live performance. so it's a bug. understand that.

i actually replied to a statement of yours (this statement: "Just the question how much time the developers get to do fixes.. and ableton never fixed anything complete sofar..or?"). understand that.

but you won't. as you still don't get, how annoying it is to not use the correct nicknames, but instead create insulting fake-names. which is the reason i bitch on you so much: your tone is absolutely not acceptable (and this tone is the reason ableton does not listen to you in particular, so it fails for the thing you want to archive). understand that.

its your correct nick name for me..you dont know what a depp is in german ?
somebody that is not especially bright.

And i will ahive something because the situation is unacceptable.
After the serato skandal even more..
They are really able to sync to a dj record now before they are able to sync to another live instance via midi directly..
sorry..that is pretty unableton and cant stay this way.
Sofar i only use the fanboy forum to collect voices for a fix..
I can extend that very much. We have so many electronic and other musicans living in berlin now..
when the poll dont has a result i ve to move to bigger circles..
or really try to convince a competitor to do a concurence product.

That would be maybe the fastest way to get ableton doing something.. covincing steinberg to allow propper working clock slave sync for network applikation ;-)..with host samplerate adjustment..

wordclock sync via ethernet.. that has potential..
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davepermen
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by davepermen » Thu Oct 07, 2010 7:48 pm

its your correct nick name for me..you dont know what a depp is in german ?
somebody that is not especially bright.
weiss ich sehr wohl. i know that very well. and that's the ignorance and arrogance that you bring towards me, and ableton, and this is the reason why nobody reacts to your issues the way you want.
only someone that is not especially bright can not understand that: it's the tone, which creates the music (you know that one, right?).

if you want to get something done, be polite. if you can't, learn it. it's lesson one to getting things done. and as you know with your german blood, you want to get it done right. you explained that in here. so why don't you go any way to get it right, including behaving the way everyone wants you to behave. because, it would work. better than your attack-behaviour. that doesn't work. it didn't for over a year now. your bug reports got dismissed, and never fixed. as you say yourself.

how about learning to behave, to get your stuff done for you? it's very easy, and helps tremendously.

try it with me, don't call me wrong names anymore.

and this is not a fanboy forum (again, you imply stuff everywhere. 'serato skandal', 'fanboy forum', etc..). it is a forum from ableton themselves, for their customers, to share their information together. it's not a general public forum about anything, actually. it's a company chosen thing. for their product.
That would be maybe the fastest way to get ableton doing something.. covincing steinberg to allow propper working clock slave sync for network applikation ;-)..with host samplerate adjustment..
no the fastest way is to get yourself under control, be polite, and comunicate trough the correct comunication ports to ableton. the forum is not one, it is from customers to customers (with some people from ableton trying to support them).
http://davepermen.net my tiny webpage, including link to bandcamp.

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 7:57 pm

depperman..we had polite wishes for better sync for how many years now?

ableton dont reacts on beeing polite..they react on to much noise in the user base..

so please everybody suffering from wobbelsync please make some noise..

that will cause a fix of your issues..


Its like when somebody ows you money..ad you are the one beeing polite.. you get payed last..

thats the reason the freaky sync performance is handled as state of the art by now because people have given up allready on asking for better sync.
mac book 2,16 ghz 4(3)gb ram, Os 10.62, fireface 400,

Tone Deft
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by Tone Deft » Thu Oct 07, 2010 8:09 pm

be cool 3phase, most people don't like the flame wars and ugliness.

you can't say this aggro attitude will work because there's no evidence that it ever has. nothing you're ranted about has been fixed. in fact it only led to you being ignored, right? you're working against yourself when that happens.

can you post a simple version of your setup that someone at Ableton could use to try to reproduce your problem?

something like

computer make and model - soundcard make and model - midi cable - some well known piece of gear that Ableton can get a hold of.

a really simple example. then maybe Ableton can try that and report back if it worked for them or not. from there you have a delta to work with and can sort out the difference to see where the bug might be.
In my life
Why do I smile
At people who I'd much rather kick in the eye?
-Moz

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 8:34 pm

Tone Deft wrote:be cool 3phase, most people don't like the flame wars and ugliness.

you can't say this aggro attitude will work because there's no evidence that it ever has. nothing you're ranted about has been fixed. in fact it only led to you being ignored, right? you're working against yourself when that happens.

can you post a simple version of your setup that someone at Ableton could use to try to reproduce your problem?

something like

computer make and model - soundcard make and model - midi cable - some well known piece of gear that Ableton can get a hold of.

a really simple example. then maybe Ableton can try that and report back if it worked for them or not. from there you have a delta to work with and can sort out the difference to see where the bug might be.

please tone deft.that the same retard question again

its no bug,, its underdeveloped programming thats all..
its not good on any machine because the had the wrong plan and no time to realy come up with something good..

i do studys on clock problems for 15 years now, belive me.. this algorythm cant give a propper rsult as explained earlier in this thread..

its a worse case algorythm that dont even expects the possibility of wordclocked systems...
the tempo recognition is done wrong
it emphazises to mcuh on tempo changes ..waht nobody needs to abondon production quality..
sorry..
its inferior by design.. its not a bug
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Dennis DeSantis
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by Dennis DeSantis » Thu Oct 07, 2010 8:40 pm

Hi folks,

Again, let's try to avoid turning the forum into a virtual mud-wrestling pit.

We're well, well aware at this point of the concerns over sync, and are working on it. Really.

At this point, the signal-to-noise ratio of information about the sync topic is heavily slanted towards noise. Further data has the potential to be useful in solving bugs. Further arguing, not so much.

Best,
Dennis DeSantis
[email protected]

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 8:45 pm

i think the problem is that ableton never even thought about that the users might have a well synced enviroment.. so they expected a wild djungle of heavil jitterig midi.. aand gave up on even trying to establish a propper sync.. with teh result that the best clocked and synced systems suffer from the same bad performance as beeing in a wild midi and clock jitter djungel..

if they would have had it on their agenda to really sync the systems, without abandoning grove, audio quality and latency compensation, they probably would have come up with even better soultions than the ones i roughly mentioned..they know the programm.

but when the challenge was just.. follow a midiclock ..be fast on tempo changes..Dont wobble more than +/- 2 bpm..

Than there is no way the developers can come up with anything better..

So the challenge needs to be a high standard, and not a sub standard !
Last edited by 3phase on Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 8:54 pm

Dennis DeSantis wrote:Hi folks,

Again, let's try to avoid turning the forum into a virtual mud-wrestling pit.

We're well, well aware at this point of the concerns over sync, and are working on it. Really.

At this point, the signal-to-noise ratio of information about the sync topic is heavily slanted towards noise. Further data has the potential to be useful in solving bugs. Further arguing, not so much.

Best,

Thats good news... wasnt sure about that.
But whike working on it I suggest to choose the highest possible standard as the goal or challange.. than the result will be good even when you only accomplish 50%

but as said earlier..

a performance like automated dj sync with the aid of the midi clock. would be nice
no old fashioned clockslaving, where the program that follows has to be behind..

And this production sync that is keeping the audioengine at max performance
as an option to the standard but optimized slave sync..

actually 100% of that would be nice and the wright feature set for the demands of our time..

there are many other features you can bring in later upgrades, the basics should have been good years ago allready..

in the past it wasnt so difficult to work around because the other musicans usually had a protools or emagic or nuendo to supply a timecode..

but as higher the market share of ableton gets, as more you run into the situation to sync to another ableton live.

and it feels extremly strange that this cant be done without abandoning any chance of a halfways contemporary sound quality on the slaves side..

and..
if you could advertize L9 with highly acurate sync options.. i am sure the szene will realize that as a sales argument.. maybe not the newbies..but all the older users will say..finaly


regarding bugs.. the main issues are not bugs.. better algorythms and sync tactics.missing features are the main reason the whole syncing is flawed..in all regards and szenarios are problems..

bugs?

the remote feedback bug mentioned early in the thread.. internal process timing and data package szise needs to be optimized..

the timecode offset bug..

this is a strange typical l8 bug again.. needs investigation.. maybe its gone allready ..but your changelogs dont indicate any work on the timecode sync..

being restarted in timcode sync, while being in session mode, results in chaos..

because the clips are not aware of the timeline and need to be retriggred, to get alligned to the timeline again..
while this is suitable for compromized studio work ( dont sounds good to your customers),
it is a no go on stage for timecode sync and session view..or with high caution and sop clip szene on a restart..the timecode cant drop!

Theese are the only bugs i came along.

but togteher with the longer list of missing features and wrong conceptions they really seal the fate of no sync on stage in any regard..

best way of working with ableton..just start it.. and let the other dj sync to it..

with other softwares like fruity the precise beat matching and start in operation is much tighter..
you dont need more than one try as with ableton.

no bug here..but even the free syncing would benefit from optmisations..
if it would work as good as fruity loops i probably wouldnt bother about midi clock sync at all..
Last edited by 3phase on Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:28 pm

ah..the fix of the timecode with session view issue would bring back a clip timeline aswell..

what is nice and shows that the problems are really interconected..

as in logic it would be great if that clip timeline could show local time.. the internal time of the clip..

or global time.. thats the one supplied thru the extrenal timecode..or the arrange timeline..

..because..this is the misiing refference the clip needs to hold on its read out..




There seems to be one problem with ableton live and its flexible audio..

it dont looks like that the program actually uses the sampleclock as time refference..
I might be wrong here because thats just indicated be certain glitches i experianced over the years...
But in case that is the case...and

i see why you maybe dont want to get a dependency of internal process timings to an external interface..

but..

we have to consider that even cheapest interfaces are pretty good by now ..

and..

there is a reason that the pro audio and broadcast word allways is refferencing to the wordclock..

the advatage is ..as soon you apply the same clock to the devices they are on the same time base..

something you cant achive when any machine in a system is creating its own time refference..

so maybe even with elastic audio it might be an idea to refference certain process-timings to the sampleclock itself..

at least interpretation of incoming clocks can be well done in refferece to the sample clock..

this would allow optimum performance as soon you wordclock master and slave,.

that the reason they do it this way in the broadcast world..

and its not unlikly to expect your users to have a didgital connection between theier interfaces to have them synced..

at least in such an optimal enviroment live should be able to perform with minimal resyncing. probably rather a start allignment and that it just runs.

i dont really think that can be achived with out refferencing to the sample clock..

but what do i know.. i am just a stupid soundengineer. you are the mighty phyton coders
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tchan
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by tchan » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:58 am

Dennis DeSantis wrote: At this point, the signal-to-noise ratio of information about the sync topic is heavily slanted towards noise. Further data has the potential to be useful in solving bugs.
Hi Dennis,

Thought I would share our experiences and relay some hard numbers about sync performance. We're still in the test phase for a series of collaborative performances. Below are some notes from a weekend workshop conducted with 3 laptops synced with an ad hoc wifi connection using network core midi. We're planning to expand the test next week with another player/laptop using ableton live. Hopefully, there's more signal than noise in this post ;-)

10-02 SYNC TEST

Setup:

laptop 1 (master): macbook, 2.16ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, iPad (griid control app), monome 128, apogee duet interface

laptop 2 (slave 1): macbook pro-15, 2.4ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, jazzmutant lemur (mu patch), motu 828 mk2 interface

laptop 3 (slave 2): macbook pro-13, 2.26ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, serato scratch live 21122 (bridge mode DISABLED), rane ttm57sl mixer, iPad (touchAble control app)


Sync Results (test tempo = 70bpm)

laptop 2 (slave 1):
- tempo fluctuates every half bar at varying values up to +/- 0.1 bpm

laptop 3 (slave 2):
- erratic tempo fluctuation every half bar, usually +/- 0.3-0.4bpm
- can sway to +/- 1bpm but corrects itself by next bar
- after a few minutes (didn't note the bar count), the fluctuations got closer to the 0.15bpm range

Test Notes:
- so far, we're happy with our first group test with wireless sync
- the tempo fluctuations haven't really affected straight ahead clip playback, everything sounded pretty good
- next step will be to test with effects manipulation and monome clip mashing
- didn't have time to test different tempos nor the sync performance during tempo changes
- will be doing a smaller scale test in next couple of days with just 2 laptops to test these issues

Complaint:
- when bridge mode is enabled with serato, we can't use external sync to sync the live session with the rest of the laptops
- we want to be able to use the bridge in a group performance situation: manipulate live clips with max for live patches (synced to external live session) while scratching audio files with serato (no sync)
- previous support thread: http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=150901

Future Plans:
- purchase an airport express base station and setup a wireless network on stage using 802.11a
- hoping the use of the 5ghz spectrum will [a] reduce wireless interference from other devices stabilize sync between laptops and [c] reduce control latency with the iPads
- this handy tip was given to us by a tech who helped setup the recent plastikman tour ;-)

-----

Advance apologies for any subliminal threadjacking...however, I think everything here relates to sync in some way :)

outershpongolia
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by outershpongolia » Fri Oct 08, 2010 4:02 am

davepermen wrote:he's a bitter, angry old grumpy man who want to fight till death about these issues instead of accepting that he might be part of the source problem.

Sometimes I feel like people would rather the problems never get solved, so that they still have something to keep bitching about.

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Fri Oct 08, 2010 6:29 am

tchan wrote: laptop 1 (master): macbook, 2.16ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, iPad (griid control app), monome 128, apogee duet interface

laptop 2 (slave 1): macbook pro-15, 2.4ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, jazzmutant lemur (mu patch), motu 828 mk2 interface

laptop 3 (slave 2): macbook pro-13, 2.26ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, serato scratch live 21122 (bridge mode DISABLED), rane ttm57sl mixer, iPad (touchAble control app)

Advance apologies for any subliminal threadjacking...however, I think everything here relates to sync in some way :)
thread jacking? thats spot on info..

You have very good results there, never got close to such a performance.
Any ideas why its running on your setup so much better? any special network settigs ? is it the wireless?
or the slower speed?

You dont have your interfaces wordclock synced i guess? the duet has no wordclock i/O or?

The results i got:
with tempo 123 bpm

mac book 2,16 ghz on FF400 and and new unibood probook 15inch on Appogee duet, no WC sync

indepedend which one acted as master the fluctuation was in the +/- 1 bpm range ( +/- 0.8 bpm)

we synced via a 10 meter high quality network cable..

actually the idea was to avoid wireless for the test to dont screw the result because it was mainly done to compare network versus midi sync.. we decided for midi sync because it wasnt really worse.. maybe a little but we had some network drops for whatever reason and because the tempo satbility was not this much better we decided for doing music instead doing syncperiments. However might try it again in wireless

while some might cosider less than +/- 1 bpm a good value in relation to the +/-2 in other setups it was enough to interfear badly with the recording session because repitch mode became unusable and the groove suffered..

however you have factor 8 better results on the 15 inch pro and still >factor2 better ones on the 13 inch..
that wont switch latency compensation on or would allow sample transparent operation on playback,
but ..
the drunk sailor factor on the groove might be reduced to an amount where the recording dont suffers anymore.
At least the +/- 0.1 bpm looks promissing.. for my taste thats teh max it should do..maybe not 2 times the bar thou...

It is of cause my main concern in the studio to have the best possible recordings and not the drunken sailor version i need to warp again with loosing everything the expensiv preamps have done to the sound.
( waht just leads to a feature wish .. a warp mode based on slicing that alows transparent regrooving)

however,
since the crashes i had last year i very much would prefer to have an akai mpc 3000 as stage clockmaster again for various reasons..the look of cause ;-) but especially for its imideate start performance and the ability to seemless reload live session in the show without any interruption..

thats the way i worked in the past and i would like to do it again..
As much i hope that Live never will get as unstable again as we had this last year..
I wont risk it on bigger shows to have it as master clock device.. at least when i get the chance by a fixed midi operation..

one thing i dont understand.. on my system midi syncing and network/cable syncing dont makes a big difference...
the network seems to be slightly better..but wouldnt bet on that...

but i measured the midi clock stability of the core audio itself by by just used it to route an extrenal clock to another interface and within my rough measuring resolution of +/- 1 sample the fed thru result was more or less indentical to the source clock ( i measure on audio file base generated from the midi stream )..
so now relevant jitter introduced by the core midi itself..

How can your system be so much better than my? only logical explanation seems to be that you even have less jitter on your clock..
what leads to the susspicion that abletons algorythm reacts very sensetiv on very little clock fluctuations..
= is bad in dejittering ..what actually should be its job.

what again might point to the idea that its maybe better to do the syncinging based on the sample clock and quantized to the sample clock,, therefore you have somehow a constant clock jitter of +/- 1 sample..what should result in more acurate tempo readings and smaller impact of micro jitter on the tempo reading. ??

However..maybe its even better to have a finer resolution as ableton choosed.. but in any case the program needs to dejitter incomming clocks.. it should be able to achive a good performance on real jitterd clocks like in the windows world and not start to missread the tempo on allready fine clocks allready.
Last edited by 3phase on Fri Oct 08, 2010 8:52 am, edited 2 times in total.
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shimmy
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by shimmy » Fri Oct 08, 2010 7:08 am

.
Last edited by shimmy on Sat Nov 20, 2010 12:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

3phase
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Re: Fix the sync issues now !! yes or no ?

Post by 3phase » Fri Oct 08, 2010 7:20 am

tchan wrote:[
laptop 2 (slave 1): macbook pro-15, 2.4ghz core 2 duo, osx 10.6.4, live 8.2, max for live 5.1.5, jazzmutant lemur (mu patch), motu 828 mk2 interface


one more question..

which probook are you reffering to here? the new uni body or the al book of the previous generation?
mac book 2,16 ghz 4(3)gb ram, Os 10.62, fireface 400,

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