Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 5:00 pm

I really like to find out if there might be a hardware related problem regarding the soundquality of Live or not...only other explanation is that i am hearing things nobody else is getting..either i haluzinate or just have better ears???

However.. I work with an apple powerbook Ti 1 giga and Hammerfall dsp multiface audiohardware .
On my system Live sounds on an unwarped soundfile with unity gain not as good as when i play the file back with an sampleeditor or the quicktime player.

I ve to admit that th difference in sound is small..
but it should be the same not only close...

Have anybody else have experianced similar phenomens?
And if...what setup are you using?

Or are there people with the same setup that clearly state that there is no difference? After carefull A/B listening of cause...

spiderprod · Post by **spiderprod** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 11:32 pm

the difference can be huge for a very sharp hearing ,but you have to look at it a different way ,it's like electric guitars,they all sound the same for some peoples ,& some others think a strato sound better .

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 12:04 am

spiderprod wrote:the difference can be huge for a very sharp hearing ,but you have to look at it a different way ,it's like electric guitars,they all sound the same for some peoples ,& some others think a strato sound better .

No... I am Studio soundengineer...Its not a question of taste.. Its a question if the sound gets altered or not. We are in the digital domain..With the same converters and the same bit width and samplerate i shouldnt be able to hear a difference...
My question here is if i am the only one that hears a difference.
And if there are others, if we have something in common with our setups.
????

bassntreble · Post by **bassntreble** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 5:06 pm

It would be interesting to find out if the quality is a function of live's internal routings, or just live's sound engine.

I think rewire could be used as a means to test this. Once live is rewired into another app (track for track as opposed to rewiring the master output) live's own routings effectively become bypassed. I notice a difference when I rewire reason in to protools but I have yet to do this with live as i don't have the horsepower to do it effectively.

DJRetard · Post by **DJRetard** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 6:29 pm

3phase wrote: I ve to admit that th difference in sound is small..
but it should be the same not only close...

.

Keep in mind that the smallest difference in volume can fool the mind in to thinking that one sound file sounds better than the other/ Keep that in mind when checking audio in your editor against Live. Your also aware that warped audio generally degrades the quality so if your checking warped vs unwarped you will hear a difference.

I know that Quicktime player is uncoloured compared to Windows media player. Anything I send through windows media player sounds like crap. Maybe i have a wrong setting?

I can assure you theres nothing wrong with Lives audio engine. Believe me when I say if I thought it wasnt everyone on this forum would know about it

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 6:41 pm

bassntreble wrote:It would be interesting to find out if the quality is a function of live's internal routings, or just live's sound engine.

I think rewire could be used as a means to test this. Once live is rewired into another app (track for track as opposed to rewiring the master output) live's own routings effectively become bypassed. I notice a difference when I rewire reason in to protools but I have yet to do this with live as i don't have the horsepower to do it effectively.

I often rewire live in logic with each track with an own rewire channel and it helps.
But when you do this you cant record clips in live anymore and i found it a great feature of live to be able to do so quick and spontanious recordings.

Funny thing is that Logic with live as rewire slave can do more plug ins than live alone... But other things like the graphic gets slower when using a rewire combination.

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 6:54 pm

DJRetard wrote:Keep in mind that the smallest difference in volume can fool the mind in to thinking that one sound file sounds better than the other/ Keep that in mind when checking audio in your editor against Live. Your also aware that warped audio generally degrades the quality so if your checking warped vs unwarped you will hear a difference.

I know that Quicktime player is uncoloured compared to Windows media player. Anything I send through windows media player sounds like crap. Maybe i have a wrong setting?

I can assure you theres nothing wrong with Lives audio engine. Believe me when I say if I thought it wasnt everyone on this forum would know about it

Sorry.. i am long enough in the pro audio industrie to know that certain things stay uncovered for quite along time...
I still remember the times when lots of people tryed to tell that 16 bit 44,1 is the best possible in audio reproduktion... Most people hear and beliefe what they want to beliefe...
And i surely dont want to beliefe that Live has a problem..it just effects my work and therefore i want improovement.

Its however difficult to spot the degeneration with a single track..but possible when you work with the levels a bit..
As you say..louder is seen as better...
With my test i always end up in a way where i prefer Ableton to be on the lower level..something stresses my listening when getting Live louder ...#
While making an other audioplayer louder makes me prefering that...

The test goes like this:
just try it yourself... with a good monitor on a real listening level ( 85-90 db).
play a short cut from a goodsounding mix with depth and detail in live and in parralel in an good sample editor or just the quicktime player and listen A/B.. you can loop the unwarped audiofile with the follow actions.
Its important that the recording is not too long. A loop is better because you can listen to the same events over and over again..

first you might think it sounds the same...but concentrate on the details..the reverb tail on a percussiv hit for example...the colour of the attack in the bass region... make live a bit louder..it should sound better than...because our brain finds louder things usually sounding better...turn the level back to unity gain ..make the sample editor louder and have live a bit lower in volume...after doing that a few times i get a clear preference wich of the two audio players i want to be the louder one...The one with the finer highs, more depth and the better lowend..or call it the sweeter sounding one..
On my machine the quicktime player wins..listening in mono to a single speaker driven by a good little amp.

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 9:50 pm

Spiderprod-

"triple xeon pentium 6 9.2 ghz 4096gigb ram 7000gb hd 1200fsb ,ableton live9stpro ,apple G9 tarzan"

I bet the Xeon Pentium 6 is better than the Apple G9.

Magnetotron · Post by **Magnetotron** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 10:25 pm

Do you have high quality turned on in either the sample's settings or in preferences -> defaults -> high quality?

Can you hear a difference between the two?

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 12:05 am

Magnetotron wrote:Do you have high quality turned on in either the sample's settings or in preferences -> defaults -> high quality?

Can you hear a difference between the two?

high quality is on by default.. i havent switched it of for years.. i heared a difference in the past..but cant remember if this applies to all files..
The manual says that highquality mode is applied to samplrateconversion.
An unwarped file with matching samplrate maybe dont benefits fron high quality..but i never checked that sofar..
I will soon have a pc...

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 12:06 am

Magnetotron wrote:Do you have high quality turned on in either the sample's settings or in preferences -> defaults -> high quality?

Can you hear a difference between the two?

high quality is on by default.. i havent switched it of for years.. i heared a difference in the past..but cant remember if this applies to all files..
The manual says that highquality mode is applied to samplrateconversion.
An unwarped file with matching samplrate maybe dont benefits fron high quality..but i never checked that sofar..
I will soon have a pc... and check myself if this sounds different.

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 1:32 am

Per the manual, High Quality only matters if you are doing pitch shifting or other types of frequency changes. For beat matching, it has no effect and only takes more CPU.

3phase · Post by **3phase** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 4:56 pm

nebulae wrote:Per the manual, High Quality only matters if you are doing pitch shifting or other types of frequency changes. For beat matching, it has no effect and only takes more CPU.

I dont think it fx unwarped files but the warping (beatmatching ) is some kind of pitch shifting...the pitch is not changing..therfore its altered when you change the tempo..

On warped files i would use HQ allways..at least aslong there is enough cpu resources left.

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 5:01 pm

To each his own...

I go by the manual, and unless I'm not doing any pitch changes in the clip properties, I don't use HQ at all.

Beat matching is not really a pitch thing - depending on the mode of warp you use, it's basically taking slices of audio and squeezing them to fit into a new timing, and I don't think HQ applies to that. But if you got the CPU to spare, go for it

blakjesus · Post by **blakjesus** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 11:16 pm

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Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?

Did you ever experianced Live not sounding as good as other DAW´s?

Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?

Re: Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?

Re: Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?

Re: Is Live´s soundquality platform/hardware dependend?