Does proxy editing wav / mp3 work in Ableton?

[Miss Dilemma]

Hi!

I had some issues with Ableton crashing when I tried to load my 2 channel 2h .wav dj mix. (old computer) So I converted it into mp3 in iTunes and all imported and edited the mp3 files. When done I replaced the source file with the original .wav again. Voila! edits worked perfectly and computer could manage. Later I learned this is a common technique in movie editing called proxy editing.

So my question; will this method work without ruining any sound quality (compared with editing on wav in the first place)?
Since sound editing/mixing is minimal I only wonder about the technical aspect when importing a a file in low and then change it to high resolution like this.

/E

[miyaru]

MP3 is lesser qualiy then wav..... There is no way way around it........ Do you hear it? dependson many factors, does the audience hear it: I doub it.......

[Miss Dilemma]

It's not mp3 anymore, when the edit process is finished.

[Tarekith]

Doesn't matter, once you convert it to mp3 the first time you are throwing away 80-90% of the audio information in the wav file and you can get it back. Reconverting to wav just changes the file type, it doesn't restore the missing information.

[chrk]

Live doesn't read audio directly from the mp3s anyway. They'll be inflated to the decoding cache first.

[Miss Dilemma]

Doesn't matter, once you convert it to mp3 the first time you are throwing away 80-90% of the audio information in the wav file and you can get it back. Reconverting to wav just changes the file type, it doesn't restore the missing information.

I don't convert it and convert it back. I replace the whole source file.

[chrk]

I don't convert it and convert it back. I replace the whole source file.

I don't know how Live's internal referencing of the decoding cache works. You may want to ask support@ableton and reference this thread.

It may be that despite replacing the sources, Live still references your edits to the decoded files in the cache, as long as they're still there. But depending on your file/folder preferences for the min. free space/max. cache size for the decoding cache they will eventually be lost, when either limit is reached. Older files will then be overwritten. They'll be gone, too, when you empty the cache.

[jestermgee]

How big is the original wav file?

[Angstrom]

you can proxy edit, but I wouldn't do it the way you are doing. And it's not actually necessary in your case.

Firstly: There's zero point in converting to Mp3 because as others have said: Live doesn't actually load MP3s it just converts them to wave files and uses those files in the cache. Mp3s are not "faster" or "lighter on CPU" or anything. They are actually just wave files by the time they are in Live

One issue Live does have is opening files which are over a certain file size (2GB) It's a legacy issue which should not persist but it does. I suspect that's the issue you ran into. It's very common

The simple solution is to split your source wave file into chunks which are less than 2GB.
then you wont need to proxy edit. Live is well capable of editing waves !