How to reduce latency in Ableton Live

[rikhyray]

I used NI card, I think it was called Audio 1, 3-4 years back and it worked OK @ 128 and lighter projects at 64 with really low latency , around 3ms, I remember I was surprised, even shocked that such inexpensive card delivered decent sound and such low latency. Rather impressive as compared to other cards those days, or even by todays standards. It was years back with computer probably 20% CPU power of yours and I would expect NI cards /drivers to get better with time. You should be able to get low latency with your laptop.
For heavens sake forget that MPV intellectually challenged "master" and his nonsense

[abstract_q]

the video is not available...but:

I had problems with latency and MacBookPro with Lion + Edirol FA101.
with a buffer of 256 samples I get an acceptable latency around 18 ms (input + output).
I followed the instructions for test the latency of the audio device and is virtually non-existent (1 ms). I used the tuorial of Live8.

The problem exists when I record a channel with the external monitor switch ON or AUTO.

I have noticed that if I do the test proposed by Ableton putting the monitor switch on the armed track OFF latency is minimal and negligible.
If i set it AUTO or IN the waveform of audio is moved forward about 18 ms!

It seems that Live will not compensate the overall latency (input + output)if the i use monitor: IN or AUTO.


The only solution I've found to make sure that the recorded tracks with monitor ON or AUTO are not delayed is put that value (18 ms) in the Driver Error Compensation to obtain a general latency 0.

Now if i record a signal in two separate tracks the first with monitor OFF and the other with monitor AUTO or ON i see the waveforms in sync.

It seems absurd, but seems I've solved it in this way.

[rickdorr]

()

[tintala]

I get terrible latency with Live at 128 and 44.1 / So I just record in Reason, 0 latency. I have never had good recording experience with Live. I have a Focusrite dsp 24 pro. Pc, 8gb, 3.2 gz i5 core.

[H20nly]

@ tintala - sounds like a shitty driver. is there an updated driver or firmware update available?

another potential candidate is your firewire card, at least if you're running Windows... not sure about Macs. TI chipsets are recommended. i can tell you that switching my firewire card out worked for me.

a quick google finds this

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-much- ... 4-dsp.html

[102455]

Is this video a better solution to latency in Ableton?

No - as someone has said in the comments under that video, it's a workaround not a solution.

If he'd got himself a decent sound card and set it up well, he wouldn't have had that delay in the first place!

[ivaranz]

Before the soundcheck yesterday I did a deep restart of my Mac, then restarted again in order to load all program functions. At the soundcheck there was no latency and everything worked fine. I then left my mac turned on and went to eat. When we arrived at the venue it was full of people and as we were going to to play in 20 minutes I could not check if and how everything worked. When we started I had a noticeable latency so long that playing in time was impossible so I simply had to unplug my Mac (new, pro retina with Live 9). As I said, this setup does not normally produce any latency I cannot live with. Apart from this I have no idea what went wrong: I noticed that WIFI was on before we started and I simply turned it off. My question: what should I do to avoid this latency problem to return at our next concert?

Kindly
Tellef

[Khazul]

What sort of things are people trying to do that is causing apparently huge latency? Playing synths from midi controller? Use Live as a hardware fx box with long plugin chains.

What reported latency are you seeing in Live preference audio tab? Have you tried measuring the real round trip latency for audio and midi? Are you using a load of high latency plugins in the fx chains? That can make life hell when trying to record/play synth plugins.

Just curious. I don't think its especially a live problem, though I have wondered if there are time when live seems to add an extra buffer between plugins.

Also I have come across some plugins that just seem to be weird and inconsistent (over reloads) with their latency handling in live - some voxego plugins and T-racks come to mind. I'm sure there are probably others. Some quality plugins have various operating modes that affect their latency, for eg check for high quality type modes. If yo are worried about latency, then choose a minimal latency limiter if you use one and don't drive it as hard.

I do know that I have achieved reported latency of a little over 1ms and a real round trip latency of a little over 2ms, but that was using an RME UFX at 192K sample rate to try to make my MBP comparable with a hardware synth or hardware fx box. Normally however I use 128 sample at 44.1k and find it fine so long as there are no high latency plugin in the audio chain.

BTW - I have never switched off any hardware on my MBP (like wifi etc). On PC yes almost always, but never felt the need in the MBP, not even in boot-camped windows.

[ivaranz]

As I wrote there was no latency on soundcheck or rehersals. Tlf