Running Ableton Live on a Netbook?

[ollyb303]

[iavine]

I've put live8 on an Acer AspireOne netbook. Main reason was to have a small portable writing setup. Not sure of the processor speed but its the usual Intel Atom device and 1gb of ram.

First thing, you have to have an external asio audio interface. Able to run NI Kontakt. To get anything worthwhile you need to freeze tracks. I usually keep it to 8 tracks and have no issues.

Trying to run with asio4all was pretty unpleasant.

As an aside the other reason for going with the netbook was the availability of low cost touch screen kits

IanV

[casiblake]

Dual-core netbooks are becoming more common. Viewsonic made a "mini-laptop" called a Viewbook 12 which had an expresscard slot. I owned one for a while, and it worked flawlessly with an Echo Indigo IOx, and the dual core Celeron processor was quite enough for a synth or two, and quite a few audio tracks.

AMD's new Brazos platform is showing promise. Small, dual-core "netbooks" are going to show up more this year, I reckon, and if you really want Ableton Live in a PC that small, I'd wait for them.

Wish there were more with expresscard slots, though. (Lenovo set a good example, shame they didn't stick to it!)

[Lo-Key Fu]

As an aside the other reason for going with the netbook was the availability of low cost touch screen kits

Oddly enough, this is another of the reasons I was looking into this option myself. I imagine the smaller screen would be a little awkward in some ways, but coupled with level of both price and portability, it's difficult to see how this could be a bad choice. Well, assuming I can run an appropriate number of tracks that is. Thanks for the valuable input too - much appreciated!

AMD's new Brazos platform is showing promise. Small, dual-core "netbooks" are going to show up more this year, I reckon, and if you really want Ableton Live in a PC that small, I'd wait for them.

Wish there were more with expresscard slots, though. (Lenovo set a good example, shame they didn't stick to it!)

I hear you on both counts here (I use a PCMCIA Echo Indigo with my current live rig) and appreciate the heads up on the dual core tip. Out of curiosity, do you recall a ballpark number of audio tracks you were able to run on the Viewbook?

[casiblake]

I hear you on both counts here (I use a PCMCIA Echo Indigo with my current live rig) and appreciate the heads up on the dual core tip. Out of curiosity, do you recall a ballpark number of audio tracks you were able to run on the Viewbook?

Sorry Lo-Key, I didn't really play back or record audio tracks with it that much. I almost always work with synths and such in real time.

You'll probably be able to get at least 12 tracks of audio going, but that's a guess. It's less of a CPU problem, and more down to hard disk and ASIO performance...

If you are seriously considering one of the Viewbooks, the 13" model is hardly much larger, has a proper Core 2 CPU in it, and might be a better choice.

[Lo-Key Fu]

All good, I appreciate the info regardless as it's difficult to get an idea of what's available - and how hard I might be able to push it - without getting hands on.

I'll throw the idea of a Viewbook into the mixer and take a look at the it in terms of size. Thanks again for the replies!

[bupper]

Just to keep you up to date. Have tested my msi wind U90 extensively for the last few days. I have guitar live + vocals live + both with all fx needed including reverb + 6 tracks of clips with minor fx on them too & the cpu maxes at 29%.

I'm on windows xp & have upped the ram to 2Go but the main thing was to follow this guide - http://www.native-instruments.com/knowl ... processing. The thing for me that made the biggest difference was this - USB settings > USB selective suspend setting > Setting = Disabled.

I'm now VERY happy with this quite old very low specification netbook so I believe that the newer ones with the newer (faster) cpu will be able to manage much more comfortably.

[noou]

hi all,

i'm planning to buy a netbook based on the new N550 dual core Atom processor. Does anybody have experience with it in real-time audio performance (in Live or other).
Thanks!