Starting music tech again & I'm new to Ableton

[Greg S]

Hi everyone,

I am eager to get back into music production on computers after a long break. I have been focussing on live performance but now I really want to use my music tech skills to create complete and high-quality audio productions using both MIDI and real audio recordings.

I still remember a lot of the production techniques I used in the past but I have totally forgotten how to operate a DAW so I need to learn again from the start. I have never used Ableton before but, as I am starting music tech again, I am ready to try it as many people have recommended Abelton to me.

My first question is: What is the quickest way to start learning and using Ableton? I have a basic laptop that I mainly use for work and I am on a fairly limited budget. This will change in the future but I just want to get started as soon as possible. Is the instruction manual available as a hard copy or an e-book or is it only PDF?

My second question is: When I am ready to invest more money, what is the best computer and hardware set-up for producing commercial music (mostly library music for use in videos) and pop music? Are laptops or desktops best? Also, what version of Ableton is best for making music that can be sold professionally?

Thank you very much for your time,

Greg.

[scg]

Here are some (possible) answers to at least some of your questions. PDF of the manual is here. There are also links to it in languages other than English at the bottom of most/all pages of the online manual. [Edit: Sorry, misread - I see you already know about the PDF and were asking about other formats. Obviously you could print the PDF, but I don't know about an e-book.]

Here is a detailed comparison of the different version of Ableton. One limitation you might run into with the Intro version is the track limit, which could be an obstacle to creating full/professional/etc. productions, depending. Beyond that, you can see all the differences in features and devices listed there. You could, for example, go for Standard, and if needed supplement with free or inexpensive third-party plugins.

For learning, Ableton provides a set of tutorials here. You can access the videos directly here. I'll also add that (in my opinion) the Ableton manual/documentation is excellent (although it does have errors/omissions/etc.), and it's relatively short, so I wouldn't rule out reading the documentation top to bottom as a quick way of learning the app. To accelerate the process, you could skip everything that doesn't seem immediately relevant (e.g. 'Working with Video' if you're not going to be doing that, or everything related to Push if you're not using that), and you could also skip the chapters on devices (instruments, audio effects, MIDI effects, and Max for Live devices), and then return to those if/as needed. If you only read what seems immediately relevant, you could probably get through the manual in a couple weeks at most, depending on how much time you have to spend on it.

[DunedinDragon]

My second question is: When I am ready to invest more money, what is the best computer and hardware set-up for producing commercial music (mostly library music for use in videos) and pop music? Are laptops or desktops best? Also, what version of Ableton is best for making music that can be sold professionally?

Thank you very much for your time,

Greg.

A large portion of what I do is develop projects to be used in different kinds of productions. I've never felt limited by using the Standard version of Ableton, but that's also because I depend on Native Instruments plugins for most of my projects rather than Ableton plugins.

I've always preferred using a desktop computer for all of my DAW work primarily because it's easier to incorporate a wider range of simultaneously used external gear such as MIDI keyboard controllers or other external devices than it is for a laptop. I still use a laptop for live use, but it's easier to add more memory and capacity to a desktop than a laptop which can become very important if you begin to get into more complex areas of production such as video integration.

I prefer Windows as my operating system because that's what I'm most familiar with as far as troubleshooting problems or using various system utilities to diagnose and correct system level problems.

[Greg S]

Hi, sorry for the late reply. Thank you so much for the great responses. I will note all of the details and try to assess whether or not my current computer can run Ableton. Thanks!