Clicks and pops when recording in ableton

[MarcusvS]

Hi!

So I've got a problem when recording in ableton. I use ableton 11, SSL2+ sound card, recording at 48k hz in ableton and using the same setting in windows, and an sm7b mic.

When I am recording, (perhaps also with electric guitar) but most noticeably when recording with a mic, I get these very noticeable weird clicks in my recordings which is super annoying. At first I thought it was only in playback but I have noticed that the clicks and pops are actually in the recordings themselves.

I have tried troubleshooting for a week trying many different things such as testing different xlr-cables, another sound card, different USB-port, condenser mic, different sample rates (128 and all the way up to 2048 samples), but I haven't found a solution to my problem.

It appears when recording in bigger projects but also in basic projects such as those with only 2 audio tracks, 1 for vocals and 1 for electric guitar. Sometimes I also get playback clicks and sound crackles in bigger projects (those artifacts sound completely different though), which is fine. More often than not I then just put the sample rate a bit higher and it disappears. However, I can sometimes get a few of those small artifacts in smaller projects as well, and I wonder if those are the ones that end up in the recording? I'm very sad because I always have to re-record a lot of stuff since the pops make a lot of my takes unusable.

I would highly appreciate If someone has any suggestion as to why this could be happening, any solution or perhaps have experienced something similar.

A sample of how it sounds: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

In this example, the clicks happened at the end of words but they usually pop up anywhere.

I'm on a desktop pc with windows 11, i7 12700k processor, rtx 3070, 32 gb ram, 2 tb ssd.

[jlgrimes]

Have you tried a different PC.

You shouldn't be getting pops at 2048.

It could be a bug or defective sound card.

[creativespiral]

I have been having the same issue... little digital pops/crackles in my recordings, or even just playing live with my instruments, monitoring through Live. I just listened to your example audio files -- the pops on my system are identical in nature.

Using a WING with wing asio driver, 48000... and even adjusting buffers up to 512 or 1024 or 2048, I'm getting these crackles / digital pops in my recordings... even just recording a single stereo audio track. It's a weird intermittent thing... doesn't always happen, but its regular enough that it has ruined several recent recordings, and I've had to re-track. I don't recall ever hearing it before... not sure if its related to the latest FW for live?... but I did update about a month ago.

I also tried replacing USB cable to WING, using different USB ports, and adding a ferrite to my USB cable, just to rule out any USB issue.

I'm really not sure what I should try next..

[iancrespo]

Hey there!

any update on a fix? I'm having the exact same issue as you, also on Windows 11, a new computer I've owned for a few months now and have not had this issue previously. I've tested the exact same mixer configuration on another PC running Windows 10 and there's no problems at all. This happened all of a sudden, too. Literally happened overnight.

So far I've made sure all cables and connections are secured, I've definitely narrowed it down to some sort of software issue.

[tralf]

Any luck? Does this only happen in Ableton? I get very similar sounds but also when I abruptly start/stop basically any audio - youtube, any mp3s, even windows pop-ups/sounds. I've tried everything - but I'm quite confident it's a GPU or GPU driver issue - I also have a 30 series RTX (3080)

[masxsim]

Had the similar issues, finally found the answer!
The problem hides in the priority of the processes. By default Windows sets the priority for running programs (including Ableton) to “Normal” or “Below normal” which means quite a low level of “attention” and amount of resources the system gives to the program - and that causes buffer overloads, late response to increased audio flow etc which leads to clicks during recording.

Here’s what you should do:
1. Run Ableton Live
2. Press Cntrl+Shift+Esc to open the Task Manager
3. Click the Details tab
4. Find Ableton processes (I found two)
5. Right-click the selected process
6. Select Set priority
7. Set a priority level to “Realtime”
8. Enjoy

I think there’s a way to set priority level for a particular process permanently, just Google it. Otherwise you’d have to go through these steps each time you start Ableton.

PS It also helps a great deal to close all UI of VSTs in the project. Things like Amplitube 5, Ample Bass or Izotope Ozone cause extra clicks and pops when their UIs are open.

[Rivanni]

No user thread need to be realtime. Nothing is processed until that threaf has been processed.

I find it funny people think that the Ableton Live thread is more important than the mouse, keyboard, sound or disk drive thread, and many other system events. Good luck with having a stable system.

[Yearofthegoat]

DO NOT set your Ableton thread to Realtime.

It's not where the problem lies, and you could lock up your system. You'd then have to hard reset, losing any work in progress.

My system works absolutely fine with no audio pops or glitches - without altering thread priorities.

[masxsim]

Well, if someone’s system is working fine without tweaks - then one shouldn’t be even reading this post))) It’s for those having issues as I did.
It’s not a magic wand though and you’d still get processor spikes if you set the latency too low but it certainly improves the performance noticeably.
I went on and did a few hours test for system stability using Ableton (in realtime priority) to host Amplitube 5 vst (which had previously cased the most clicks) and the system was as stable as usual. If my Windows ever crushes in realtime priority mode I’ll post a warning here right away, I promise.
In any situation just remember to save your work regularly!!!

And to make sure I’m not just seeing pink elephants here’s the CPU load in “normal” priority:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1J7jd75 ... p=drivesdk

And here’s is the CPU load when Ableton is set to “realtime”:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OhxhKV ... p=drivesdk

You can see CPU choking in low priority.

[Rivanni]

Well, if someone’s system is working fine without tweaks - then one shouldn’t be even reading this post))) It’s

I read these types of posts to help people who are having problems with Live and to give them information on what to do and what not to do, regardless of whether I myself am experiencing similar problems.

You can see CPU choking in low priority.

I can see you use an unsupported version of Windows.