Is my iMac too old for Ableton Live 10?

[Christian_R]

Hello!

I want to upgrade to Ableton Live 10, but I'm not sure if my Mac will handle it. I have an iMac from 2013 (Mojave, 27-inch, 3,2 GHz Intel Core i5, 24 GB memory).

Does anyone know if Live 10 is a lot "heavier" on the computer? I don't have many issues with my Live 9 on this Mac (unless I have MANY tracks in a project), but I would love to hear if anyone has experience with Live 10 and an older computer

[jlgrimes]

Hello!

I want to upgrade to Ableton Live 10, but I'm not sure if my Mac will handle it. I have an iMac from 2013 (Mojave, 27-inch, 3,2 GHz Intel Core i5, 24 GB memory).

Does anyone know if Live 10 is a lot "heavier" on the computer? I don't have many issues with my Live 9 on this Mac (unless I have MANY tracks in a project), but I would love to hear if anyone has experience with Live 10 and an older computer

Im guessing you should be ok.

I didnt know of any CPU use changes going from 9 to 10.

[jestermgee]

Download the demo, load up one of your decent projects and test. Can probably find the answer easily enough that way.

[xyz023]

I still use an iMac from 2011. You'll should be good.

[Pasha]

iMac 21.5" Late 2013 here with 8GB RAM on 10.14. Booting from external USB 3.0 enclosure and SSD, otherwise the internal 5400 RPM is very slow.
Live 10 Suite - no problems. The Ableton Live 10 Performance Test shows I can make 64+ tracks of the Lesson Project with no problems. At 128 I got 100% CPU and distortions - dropouts. For me, 32 tracks are more than I do actually. Usually around 18 (Drum Rack counts as 1 here). Hope this helps

- Cheers
- Pasha

[doghouse]

I have an iMac a year older than yours, with slower CPU and less RAM...no issues.

[Christian_R]

I have an iMac a year older than yours, with slower CPU and less RAM...no issues.

Thank you guys for the answers!

I still use Mojave. Does anyone know if it's okay to upgrade to Catalina too?

[Tuur]

I'd guess most are running Catalina by now.

No probs over here...

[TLW]

I still use Mojave. Does anyone know if it's okay to upgrade to Catalina too?

Check you’ve no non-Apple vital software that’s 32 bit first (the Mac’s system report tool can tell you which applications are and aren’t 32 bit), do the same with plugins.

Other than that I think you should be OK. Catalina doesn’t seem to need more resources than Mojave and if anything runs smoother and with a slight improvement in the graphics, particularly on non-Retina screens.