Problems sync Live to Hardware

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Mon Aug 07, 2006 11:02 pm

hi!

i just downloaded the demo of live 5 some time ago to test it a little bit because i plan to use it for my live performace.

now everything works fine except for the problem, that live always slightly loses sync when i turn any knob or fader in live (no matter if i do this via my esi neon or with the mouse in live itself, and no matter if a vsti fader or e.g. a live volume fader!)

so that means (i've testet that), the whole thing can run for 30 minutes without loosing sync but when i turn some knob it CAN happen (but must not) that the beat within live is shifted some milliseconds. if i continue turning knobs its getting worse and worse.

can somebody tell me why this is happening? because this would be a reason not to use live.. i mean sync is essential somehow...

here is my setup:

live installed on a winXP athlon64 3000+ (also tested on a vaio notebook, same problem)
esi neon usb audio/midi controller used as midi interface and controller (to turn knobs)
korg electribe r mk2
quasimidi polymorph
jomox airbase

the korg is the master for midi, connected to the polymorph and thru to the airbase, then goes to the neon midi in.. live therefor is slave, which as i read here should work better than using it as master (?)

thanks for your help

greetings

gomez

justin · Post by **justin** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 9:26 am

have u tried reducing the audio buffer size in prefs?
according to ableton's FAQ smaller buffer size = better timing.

IMO live midi sync / timing is generally quite poor compared to Logic

and this thread does highlight some serious issues:
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28649

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 2:57 pm

thanks for your tips, just tried the buffer thing and it works a little bit better, but still gets confused.. now i tested quiet long with it and can say that only the 8 potis of the esi neon cause a heavy desync.. so could this mean it can be a fault by the hardware too?

i will contact the esi support for this i guess..

theque · Post by **theque** » Sat Aug 12, 2006 5:13 am

same problems here, really frustrating.

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Sat Aug 12, 2006 10:25 am

@theque so u got a neon too? do you also have problems with e.g. cubase?

theque · Post by **theque** » Sun Aug 13, 2006 4:36 am

no neon, an alesis photon here, but same problem if i use fw 410. seems live works ok as a master to send the clock but i need to use as a slave, it syncs but it wanders around by one or two bpm and it happens more if i push the cpu up a bit more, hoping this has been improved for live 6 as it seems a pretty huge issue.

i have been trying to sync two laptops using a korg er1 mk11 as master and splitting the signal to the two laptops.. i will try with logic and see if i get same problem

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 3:22 pm

hm ok so if we have that issue with three different controllers this pretty much sounds like a problem of ableton live...

can't somebody of the ableton crew say something to this thread? will this be fixed in version 6, is it even known @ ableton??

i think live is THE best tool for liveperformance.. but if a hardwarecontroller doesnt work it's nothing worth anymore

and i won't buy it then...

b0unce · Post by **b0unce** » Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:13 pm

hey gomez,
I read that the polymorph never loses sync if its in slave...

its worth trying ableton as master...

by the way, how do you like your polymorph ?

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Sat Aug 19, 2006 11:00 am

i tried hard making my neon to send out the midi clock, but it doenst work, i dont know why... i can play my external gear via the keyboard and everything but a midiclock isn't send out..

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 8:51 pm

theque wrote:no neon, an alesis photon here, but same problem if i use fw 410. seems live works ok as a master to send the clock but i need to use as a slave, it syncs but it wanders around by one or two bpm and it happens more if i push the cpu up a bit more, hoping this has been improved for live 6 as it seems a pretty huge issue.

i have been trying to sync two laptops using a korg er1 mk11 as master and splitting the signal to the two laptops.. i will try with logic and see if i get same problem

i called the esi support for this problem and the guy told me, this could be caused if such a controller as the neon (or probably others) use the standart windows midi drivers (which the neon does) because these drivers are not so performant as they should be. he advised me to buy a usb midi interface with own drivers and use this for the midi clock.. i will try this and hope the problem is solved then!

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Thu Aug 24, 2006 9:27 pm

for everybody who has the same problem with "cheap" controllers using the windows midi drivers.. i tried using an extra midi box via usb now and everything works great! so wasn't lives fault

theque · Post by **theque** » Mon Aug 28, 2006 7:58 am

good to hear gomez, what type of midi box did you get?

gomez80 · Post by **gomez80** » Mon Aug 28, 2006 8:23 pm

i got the EDIROL UM-2EX and it works pretty good, tested it on the weekend with the whole equipment and the timing was absolutely exact!

Honey · Post by **Honey** » Mon Aug 28, 2006 11:42 pm

so Gomez you're syncing with MIDI & Theque you tried FW810?

have you guys noticed any difference in sync performance between MIDI/FW ?

For my music I sync with another laptop (MIDI sync coming from a mac running an M-Audio interface into my PC laptop running Tascam US 428) & have never had timing problems beyond the latency on my lappy which I know is caused by the Celeron chip & minimal ram.

However I'm about to start work with a group (Who happen to be one of the bands headlining Bestival this year) that plays their backing tracks off live synced with the rest of their setup. They currently sync with Firewire

any experience / thoughts /tweaks on FW/MIDI sync reliabilityy welcome

H