Live or Suite?

[BranTurn362]

Hey, I am getting into music production and I have been using Ableton Live Lite to get a feel for the program before I spent money on it. I have decided that Ableton is what I want but I'm not sure if I need Suite or if Live is good enough. I have been working on electric music like house and I plan on going into more intense music like electro house or dubstep. I know that Suite is the same as Live just with a lot bigger of a sound and effect library with operater, simpler, sampler, etc. But is it worth the extra money? I don't exactly have money to throw away saying screw it I may as well just get suite if it has more. Plus I am definitely getting massive sometime relatively soon which as far as I know is a great way to get the more intense sounds for electric music. So I guess summarizing my question is Suite worth the extra money even if I have massive? Thanks for the help!

[The Northern Contingent]

I think you would be better to download the demo of Suite and see if it has everything you are looking for (the demo works for a month I think). I personally like the included instruments and sounds, but often turn to third party plugs as well. Hope that helps.

[login]

I think one of the best selling points right now is the included upgrade to live 9 suite and max for live with it.

Max 4 live provides a very nice number of midi devices that enhance the music production experience.

And then you get tons of material in samples and recorded instruments with the Suite, so you will have pretty much all you need.

The other way, Live standard, you will need to buy a pair of softsynths probably.

SO, I think right now it's a good time to buy suite and get a ton of content.

[yur2die4]

I cannot imagine a world where Operator does not exist. I thank those who have spent the time to create it!

Having and using instruments native to Live is really easy and fun.

And M4L will give you loads more options (like more reverbs!, and insaaaane automation devices!!)

Also, I think I've seen a lot of people (ab)Using Amp to get some nice growly, biting noises. That reminds me, my sister isn't vaccinated for rabies..

[oblique strategies]

I think one of the best selling points right now is the included upgrade to live 9 suite and max for live with it.

Ditto. Max For Live is going to be essential for my work.

[pencilrocket]

Suite is come with tons of unuseful things. Live purely shines.

[jestermgee]

GO Suite...

More stuff = better. I saw it in a movie.

[J0n35y]

I voted Suite without thinking about it because, well, I own it but on reflection I thought I'd give my tuppence worth in more detail.

Without the discount and future free upgrade to 9 I'm not so sure I would have gone with Suite. I think I would have saved the cash and gone with Komplete or something instead (I'm a Maschine owner so would have managed to get it at a discount). I'm saying that with hindsight and thinking back to where I was in October/November.

But, at current price I am very happy with my choice and loving my investment. Live 9 (beta at least) has been fantastic. It has been very robust, has some great features that I love (I find audio to midi to be a great function personally and regularly rave about it) and has, in my opinion, an excellent learning curve once you get your head around its session view.

I admitedly still rarely use much of Suite's instruments or library packs - I also own Synthmaster and Synth Squad and have been learning them as well as Massive with Maschine - but it's nice to know that stuff is there to explore and I certainly intend to get in about Suite's content in due course.

I haven't even gone near Max 4 Live yet!

Anyway, demo it heavily. That is by far the best advice to be had. You might be better of with Standard plus investing on another VST? Horses for courses, each to their own and all that.

[david.barker]

Although Im a,relative newcomer to Live.

I voted for the suite,as it offers me all that I need in one package. Rather than buying add on's ,(which work out much more expensive)
I bought mine as an upgrade ,which worked out more reasonable,but if you buy the suite as it,its still a good price in terms of what its got
And more so,when L9 suite comes about!!!

I use use Live rewired to Reason ,which gives me a awesome power tool box,ha,ha


All I need now is a shed load of cash, a decent place to live and a studio,I then could give up my current job and focus on making and production ambient sounds

http://soundcloud.com/ambientdave

[Timbeaux]

All I need now is a shed load of cash, a decent place to live and a studio,I then could give up my current job and focus on making and production

Isnt that the dream of most of us )))

[ljd2002]

Live for me. Great as suite looks, I can't help thinking that you're only going to get your money's worth if you use most (if not all) of what it offers.
And quite honestly, its taken me over 2 years to get to grips with Live...
Its not an all or nothing situation. You can find out what modules youre interested in - and buy those.

[Timbeaux]

First i bought a midi controller, to use it with reason. the controller got ableton live intro/lite within. so i tried ableton live lite/intro. I decided to buy the full version of live. that was enough for me. i only bought the suit version cause i got the upgrade for 187 euro (in this direction, iam not sure anymore) cause i will get live 9 suite for free then.

i have to say, that i didnt use the native plugins like analog, tension and so on not that much. but i wanted analog, and it would have cost at that moment 49 euro, like the other devices. but i dont wanted to buy one device after another, so i bought the suite.


i would say, u should buy live 8 without suite first. when u will buy it later. maybe its enough for u, and u have enough other plugins to use.

[kanuck]

the beauty of Live is that it's so modular. Ableton's instruments fit so well with the workflow, if you're just starting out I think it's worth the money to get Suite but be warned, the presets are pretty horrendous but it's very easy to program sounds from most of the instruments (Tension is a little tricky).

[H20nly]

You can find out what modules youre interested in - and buy those.

this only works if you don't buy more than 1 or 2 add ons. it doesn't take long before the price of the separate components becomes more that the price of the entire Suite upgrade. then you find yourself looking back going "i shoulda..."

my vote is for the boxed version of Suite. then you have everything that Ableton has to offer with Live 8... this way you never run into a situation where you can't do something because you need to throw more money at it. that's just me though.

regardless of all that... i think you should check out the demo first.

[footsy]

It depends, I couldn't live without Operator, simpler, and analog....


It depends on what you're looking for, if you use alot of VSTs (third party) Then you probably wont need it at all and therefore standard live would work great for you.