My other DAW makes better use of Push

[dna598]

Nope, but then again I use hardware FX or a specific plugin controller for that

Ah I see.
Well, as you're here, you might as well try and get some experience of the specific problem.

[Mark Williams]

It isnt a problem, only a mental attitude that is making it one.

Maybe try the Sensel Morph, you can map that how you like.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQb61Ov ... bw&index=4

[dna598]

You're simply trolling now, Mark

[Mark Williams]

Ah I see that attitude is shining through.

I give you a possible solution to something you find an issue, but you just spout off about trolling. Seems to be YOU that's trying bait others. Enjoy your insular world.

[dna598]

come on, you haven't taken in a word I've said. The solution to this is not aquiring more gear.
It's just Ableton making it better. That's my "mental attitude" on this.

sorry I upset you.

[Mark Williams]

Instead of trying to force Ableton to fit into your workflow, use it as it is, and adjust, educate yourself, learn and move on. Surely you do not buy stuff, to make it work the way you want, you should buy and use it how its intended and made. Square peg round hole.

[Bruce Richardson]

I have personally experienced the same frustration with the Push 2 that the OP expresses, and I'd be just as happy to see a more extensive selection of behavioral choices and defaults. I would expect a product this mature (and with this much potential) to have an extensive software-side implementation, and significantly more ability to "push" every setting from the software to the surface, and vice versa. Key/Scale programming would be one obvious place that would have super high performance value. I think that's a reasonable expectation for a custom branded controller.

[dna598]

Instead of trying to force Ableton to fit into your workflow, use it as it is, and adjust, educate yourself, learn and move on. Surely you do not buy stuff, to make it work the way you want, you should buy and use it how its intended and made. Square peg round hole.

I have my Ableton workflow which I have described to you already. Possibly more than once. The whole playing midi and adjusting FX thing. A standard workflow. Forgive me if I was expecting the same workflow to be achievable standalone on the Push hardware (since v1). Unfortunately that wasn't what happened. This uncomfortable limitation has been resolved now though. In another DAW. Hence this thread.

I just want to see it improved. I know it can be.

[Angstrom]

I can see that push works for some people. But for anyone who doesn't want to conform to "the Ableton way" it's an expensive non starter.

[Bruce Richardson]

It is working for me about 60/40. I am really surprised that it cannot be "automated" by the software. I guess I was expecting some functionality that seems implied by the (very nice) display, but in fact does not appear to be there.

It would be exponentially more useful if, say, you could sequence different key/scale setups from the software to "note mode," so that if you're programming something that's intended to be played live, the pad surface could be constantly updating to be in the right key and mode. That would turn it into an insanely useful performance device.

Or, say, you're in Session Mode, and when you trigger a particular scene, a track in that scene might contain "Push programming" sequencing that bumps the Push into Note Mode. Or whatever mode.

In short, just ways that you're not always using the PUSH to 100% drive the performance. That sometimes the performance drives/sets up the PUSH, so that you can concentrate less on knobs and settings.

I don't see any reason this couldn't/shouldn't be the case. A mod replied to another thread I started, saying basically, "don't expect to hear from Ableton." But why not? This is a really underdeveloped device that has a lot of potential, and some exchange clearly needs to be taking place. For a device that has been out this long, it should have far more functionality from what I can see. I guess 60% is an OK amount of satisfaction, but that makes me want it to be 40% cheaper, hahaha.

You pays your money, you takes your chances, sure. But I would think that Ableton would want this thing to be mindblowing, and it's really only slightly more capable than a pad/button/knob surface alone. The screen parameter duplication is nice, seeing what the knobs are doing and getting some editing/waveform displays. I'm not discounting the value of that. I am just surprised that some performance aspects which seem kind of obvious to me have either not been considered, or are not possible to implement with the hardware's architecture. Hopefully the former and not the latter :p

I'm actually cool with "the Ableton way" so far as the basic feature set is implemented. It reminds me of my EARLY EARLY days with sequencers on the Apple IIe. Some of those early sequencers were very much like the "scene" implementation in Session View. I have not worked that way in years, and it's a nice change from strictly linear production/composition. Turns out that I didn't realize I missed that way of working, and I have been enjoying it.

[jlgrimes]

I was playing around with Reaper last weekend. It has improved its Midi GUI over the years but IMO, it still has a pretty cumbersome workflow. Having to create Track Templates or custom toolbars to turn on midi overdub loop recording I find pretty tedious. It's Input Quantize system also needs to be either tracked with Templates, custom toolbars, or key commands. Also you can only Quantize midi notes by going inside the piano Roll which I find a little strange (That said you probably can create a script to work around this).

That said, Reaper's Input Quantize system (Quantize system as a whole) is alot more sophisticated than Ableton and shows an area where Ableton is lagging. It's piano roll though is weird. Don't expect normal functions like Ctrl+D to "work". Oh yeah it works but not how expected and I wonder who would want to use its default implentation. To get it to work like every other DAW (such as Ableton), you need a user created script. Scripts are a good thing though as it does makes Reaper extremely flexible, but I think they would focus on getting a "decent" default midi workflow. Their Audio default workflow is pretty good. Most DAWs don't have great default midi workflow's, but Reaper takes the cake here.

Also with barely no included integrated instruments, it can be hard getting used to Reaper. Drum Racks/Simpler vs. Reasamplematic is like the Empire State Building vs a Camping Tent. With the lack of integrated Instruments makes it hard for me to see how Push would work better in Reaper. Does it give you waveform view of Reasamplematic?, ReaComp, ReaEQ? Does the Drum Step Editor still work with the grid changes? I'd be interested how loop recording works.


That said though from an audio only workflow (Recording/Mixing), Reaper is one of the best DAWs (I'd put it up against any DAW), but it's midi is its weaker point (although it is much better than it was like 10 years ago, the developers still have the create your own custom workflow with midi that I think don't always work well especially if the foundation is somewhat lacking).



I understand Ableton has limitations (in some cases glaring ones), but I'm a little skeptical of Reaper making better use of Push than Ableton. I'm guessing those few features that Reaper does better in your opinion trumps all of the other implementation that Ableton has done right with its own implementation. I guess I need to try this out for myself.

[dna598]

I have spent like, a year getting Reaper the way I want. It's like the opposite of Live in terms of set up. LOTS of things to change. so many menus. I wouldn't expect anyone else to bother doing that, I find it fun though.

I have emulated the Live midi editor (and everything else) as much as i could. I enjoy some of the flexibilty that Reaper offers on top of the emulation i have implemented. Such as selecting non contiguous items (cough, ableton).

Yeah, the native sampler is an abomination, though there is rudimentary drum rack type stuff with an add on.

Reaper with push contains a lot of the sequencing and scale stuff, though nothing in terms of waveform views, so yeah it's not as good Live in that regard. However I never used it to look at waveforms.

I am not using Push for session view stuff or converting instruments. . All i ever wanted to do with Push was tweak a delay feedback on a send, play chords, and record it all. A Music production basic. It's not possible in Live, but is in Reaper. So that's how it makes better use of it (for me - YMMV).

[NingDynasty]

I find it very strange, and somewhat telling of the Ableton community, that when a complaint is raised in regard to the device lacking some functionality, that other devices or even this device in another daw posses, the attitude seems to be one of go with the Ableton way.

As someone who is new to Live and Push 2, there are glaring things that Launchpad and Machine provide that really should exist from a software/firmware side on the Push 2. While I do appreciate the open source style programmability of the remote control surface scripts and even the display integration details that Ableton has posted, I did make the (misguided) assumption that Push 2 would work better with the virtual instruments and effects that are available to add to Live. I still don't have the faintest clue how to get my NI Komplete presets to change or be visible on push and it's not like NI or the NKS format are from a small 3rd party developer.

I'm still inside my return period and to be honest I think I got more use out of my launchpad pro than I have push 2. Chord mode alone is a fantastic feature. Not to mention the level of support and development from Novation for their products vs what appears to be stagnation in terms of development on the Push 2 (see the posts above about long standing issues not being addressed).

I want to like the Push 2, because from a hardware perspective it's impressive. I want to keep the Push 2, as the customizability for use outside of Ableton is limitless. However, I'm seriously considering returning the Push 2, as I expected to be able to put down the mouse and keyboard when using Ableton to let the creativity flow more freely, and thus far I've been thoroughly disappointed in this regard.