Problem : Live 6 Sync Hardware

[p8guitar]

we have experienced live's midi clock slowing down when recording midi notes with a keyboard and sending midi clock to the electribe simultanously (using the same port for this, evolution mk249C2 keyboard). this was very noticeable with live's built-in metronome, it was quite difficult to play in time to this.
turning the metronome off seemed to solve the problem (?!), but I don't understand how that could be related.

G5 Dual 2.5GHZ should be fast enough for the task...

I don't have the electribe here in the studio now for testing this, but I will try to investigate that next week.

[Chouch21]

Sorry, got a lot of work these times...
I'll do tests this week...

[[Galo]]

me too, my electribe start a little time afetr live and all my patern are wrong

If this problem does not have a solution I will not buy live and will remain under cubase

I have the exact same problem with the electribes, dont know why, they worked in previous versions and now they just tempt to skip thereselves half a note to the right, i think it's the MIDI delay compensation but it's not doing anything...

[Chouch21]

OK Here is my report of the different tests I made.

Config : Live aways as master
Pc
Live 6.0.1
2 different Midi interface (Edirol Um-2 and Edirol Fa_101)
Hard= Clavia Nord Rack 2x and Korg Microkorg

Good :
-Hard, notes played by keys (Evolution mk249) thru live
-Hard on arpeggiator(synced with Live), notes played via Keys thru live
-Hard LFO synced with Live, notes plays via Keys thru live
-Program Changes well transmitted (at right time)(without considering notes)
-Controll changes well transmitted

Not good :
-Hard on arpeggiator(synced with Live), notes played by Live (behavior different between bars, sometime synced, sometimes not)(test made without prgm change or controllers)
- Hard, notes played by Live. Sometimes wrong when I tune the delay compensation to fit with the hard arpeggio (even it's not perfect)(seems to have 2 distinct behavior when transmitting the sync and the notes than only the notes)
-Program change+notes (the fist note of the first bar is rarely played due to the sending of the prg change)

Conclusion :
The sync is good
The notes are good
The Sync+the notes=not good
Prgm change+notes=not good
Prgm chge+sync+note=not good

My Advice :
Never send 2 messages at the same time. I assume that is not simple but maybe it's a matter of ms...

[p8guitar]

me too, my electribe start a little time afetr live and all my patern are wrong

If this problem does not have a solution I will not buy live and will remain under cubase

I have the exact same problem with the electribes, dont know why, they worked in previous versions and now they just tempt to skip thereselves half a note to the right, i think it's the MIDI delay compensation but it's not doing anything...

When I hit play in the session view, the electribe starts with a very short bassdrum beat, then 2 bars (=quantisation) silence, then the pattern starts. so the electribe pattern is 2 bars late.

[mgerrard101]

Good Morning,

After much time trying to get this to work I decided to post something here and hope that one of you will be able to help me out. I do have this as a post on its owns but after reading this one I figured this might be a better place for it. If you have any tips please let me know. At this point I am willing to try anything to get this to work.

Equipment: Pioneer DJM 800
M-Audio Audiophile External Soundcard
X-Session Midi Player
Ableton Live 6.0.1
Serato Scratch LIve
G5 Imac (running Ableton)
Powerbook (running Serato)

So my aim is to be able to sync with what is coming out of the mixer playing with Serato. This is how I have everything set up now. The back of the mixer has a midi out. So I have a cable running from that into midi in on the X-Session. I then have a midi out going from the X-Session into Midi in on the external soundcard. Both the X-Session and External Soundcard are plugged into the computer through a USB hub. I then have RCA's going from the sound card to the mixer on a free channel.

Now I go into Ableton Live and open up preferences. Under Audio I choose the soundcard as both input and output. Under Midi Sync I turn on both Track and Remote for Input 1 - which is the USB connection. Then with input two which is the midi in connection from the mixer I only turn on Sync. The last option is Output X-Session Port 1 and with that one I don't know what to turn on so I leave them all off.

So as it should the little square beside the EXT (External Sync Switch) flashes in time to what is coming out of the mixer. I am thinking at this point I am home free. I load my sample press play and hit the EXT button and everything is playing at is should with sound coming out of the mixer on my channel with no delay.

This is where I get to my problem. Once I hit the EXT button all controls for the song turn off. I am unable to stop play, pause play, change to a new starting point, anything. It is like as soon as I hit that button all controls are turned off. The mixer has a midi start stop button and if I press that the song stops and starts but I am unable to do anything like that in Ableton or with my midi player.

To get this to work I have tried everything I can think off. Going into the soundcard with the mixer, all different scenarios in the midi sync option panel, everything. But no matter what I lose control of the song as soon as I hit the Ext button.

Please help. Maybe this is how the program is suppose to work, or maybe after so many hours trying to get this working I am missing something small.

Thanks so much.

Marc

[electropoet]

Figured i'd chime in on my experiences.

Using Live as a master is simply NOT stable and the explantion for this (from what i can remember) is the problem has more to do with the computers ability to keep solid time rather than some sort of software problem. I don't remember specifics, but everytime I've ever tried to sync delays, arp.'s, etc. the timing drifts and I never get the same thing twice.

The result has been to make Live the slave and sync off an external clock...set remote on for the midi input of the timing master, and make sure 'EXT' is on near the tempo box. I currently use the adrenalinn as my timing master and it works flawlessly. Quite simply, this is the only option as far as I'm concerned...

btw-i had the same results, on both my macs (g4 powerbook, g5 tower), and my trusty old pc desktop.

Live as Master=sync unreliable
Live as Slave-perfecto

[justin]

still makes me laugh that an old atari st with cubase is still better than the latest computers at outputing a steady midi clock... but on a more serious note, WTF?

the only other bit of kit i'm aware of that gets close is the old emagic unitor.

[D DAS]

+1 on everything said. live sucks for syncing. i have now spent my second day off trying to slave my mpc to live. good luck. if i adjust the sync delay it will sync for a while, then if i stop live and start again it will be off again? wtf?

what did that abe mean by "set the monitor to off?" great advice considering i am trying to monitor the sound coming in from my mpc. can't do that if i can't hear.

and once i do get everytning synced while playing it will be off when i record, there will be a space at the beginning of the recorded sample that puts the whole recording off, and yes i adjusted the driver error compensation as well, nada. turned monitor off, still nada. i love live, for software, now with hardware in the mix it is proving to be unreliable when it comes to syncing. please say there is a work around for this.

i am using an m-audio firewire audiophile as an interface. (i know shitty)


if there is no other workaround then suggestions please on a good daw for this. cubase or logic?

this is really really annoying. live used to make work flow rather easy, now i am just plain bummed. great, 1000 bucks on a new daw, not really what i wanted to do

edit: just tried live as slave to pmc and all started out well, then sync was lost and now does not stay. if i stop then start again it will usually be off. why is this?

[krikor]

I also have big sync problem, i experienced the weiredest thing on saturday, i was planning to play in sync with a TR626 and a TR606, using a dopfer sync box and a MFB502 modified.

Ok i will try to make it simple:

1st case: 2 drum machines are in sync, MFB and 606, if one starts the otherone ends up losing sync and just stops, this happens on both machines, depending on the times, sometimes the 606 stops sometimes the MFB.

2nd case: 1 drum machines, the 606, the midi latency is set to the - value of the overall audio latency of ableton. Everything runs fine, if i set he midi latency to 0, the 606 is runing but with a delay.

3rd case: the 606 and the 626, in sync, both machines starts, but sometimes the 606 loose the sync and stop by itself. The midi latency is set to the - value of the audio latency: the 606 is in sync, the 626 is running but with a delay. If i set the midi latency to 0, the 606 has a delay, but the 626 is perfectly in sync.

4th case: the 626 by itself, midi latency sets to 0. It runs fine.

so on the end i jsut used my 606

I use my UC33 to provide the midi synchro. this is with a macbook 2,16g and ableton 601.
It seems that the midi clock signal is too weak to take care of those machines.
The thing that i don't understand is that still with ableton5 i did some live using a 606, a 626 and a 505 in sync and I never had such a problem.
Do you have any idea of what can be causing that. Do yo plan to fix that.

Thanks
K

EDIT:
Forget to mention i'm off course on patern mode and not song mode

[D DAS]

that's no good.

i sent the abes an email about this, hopefully i will get a reply soon. i am having a little better luck making live the slave but it is still not perfect. the latency aletrs.

[[Galo]]

me too, my electribe start a little time afetr live and all my patern are wrong

If this problem does not have a solution I will not buy live and will remain under cubase

same here.... electribes MIDI is not synced, patterns all wrong, and it wasn't the case in 5.0.3 afaik

anyway, it made me buy Pro-Tools so that's the good side....

[bynoe]

Having the same problems. Mine's not as bad as some of yours though. I have an MPC1000 synced as the slave to live. I'm using a midisport 2*2 as the interface. Everything starts syncing ok, but then every couple of bars it just goes out of sync and then comes back in again. Not for a great period of time just a short while. Very annoying.
come on Abes please help.

[bradelectro]

I'm not synch'ing but just trying to control a h/w tone module. I'm using Live 6.01, Echo Layla (via PC Bus), and a Roland XV2020. No matter how much I tweak the delay compensation, Live simply does not trigger the 2020 accurately for any length of time. I don't mean to be harsh, but I've never used such a poor s/w sequencer, at least for external gear.

So yeah, tighten it up baby!

[krikor]

Ableton, are we doing something wrong with our machines that we don't understand? or is this a bug you noticed? i think i renember that there was some issues with ableton 5 lke this too, i think it was fixed in the late updates though... right?