Fucking Impossible To Sync Ableton With External Hardware

[sir_bass]

hi,

i have some similar problems:

i'm trying to synchronise a ableton live 6 project and a virus ti. midi-connection is via motu i thik the ultralite. after some time, the virus looses the clock and sometimes it even hangs up (switching off and the three lfo-led's keep pulsating). this happened with three different viruses and is an unknown issue for the virus-people...

is there a cheap device that can change an audio-click to midi?

regards,

sir_bass

[leisuremuffin]

i gotta admidt, i've never been happy with lives sync.
seems like its always a struggle to get it happening.

shit gets weird when you change tempo mid set too.



.lm.

[BASSbüro]

icedsushi, i feel you.....once again:

so after several tests i have to accept, that lives sync-mechanism sucks big time. sync external hardware with the midi-clock-delay-function is the one side of the story, the other side is, how you record the whole external songs into ableton without delay? so you have two beasts to control, the midi-clock-thing and the track-delay-thing.

i thought i was fine with my little e (evolver), but the next step was to record the evolver-patterns into ableton, and that's fucking painful. lots of delay, doesn't matter if you hit monitor off. so you have to manually re-warp all your synth-lines and that's mostly impossible, cuz you'll loose the whole groove. and trust me, i can warp. i warp 50-100 tracks every week. warping a pony-beatles-song is a breeze compare to that.......

so how you guys handle this issue? should i buy fl-studio? he, he....

[bhuvan]

I'm a little late in this thread, but adding my own syncing horrors with Ableton:

I was using precious, precious studio time to dump audio outs from my MOTU Traveler through Avalons, GMLs, SSLs etc -> in to Prism Dream AD -> in to Pro Tools HD. The sync was coming from PT and my Ableton was slaved to this.

For sometime, the session was going ok and then the sync terror took on! Till the end of the session and till now, I couldn't figure out what was happening.

But this thread explains all what happened:
After a few runs, I deleted some of my tracks to reduce the session load. That obviously changed the delay time. So to figure this problem out, we changed from MIDI clock to MTC and back again. I did a software restart followed by a system restart. All the times, getting a different delay on each record run.

At the end of it, we just had to live with these delays without knowing the cause and choosing to nudge the audio files in PT afterwards.

I was seriously doubting my setup but this thread has given me the answer - Don't change anything in the session and don't restart!

thanks; merci et prost!
תודה

[icedsushi]

I was seriously doubting my setup but this thread has given me the answer - Don't change anything in the session and don't restart!

Yes you've got it exactly! This is the only way I've found to keep your sync delay time from shifting all over the place:

After you've got a template you're happy with to start composing, follow these 8 steps and your sync delay should remain consistent:

1.) don't restart or shut down your computer
2.) don't add or delete tracks
3.) don't go over 50-60% CPU
4.) keep CPU load the same (no more no less) as the timeline progresses
5.) don't add or remove plugins
6.) don't change the buffer size
7.) don't activate or deactivate midi ports in Live's prefs
8.) don't change the track monitor setting

This steps should not be necessary but unfortunately they are...

[bhuvan]

wow!

* conditions apply(?)

[BASSbüro]

bhuvan, i know it's counterproductive to close the session, restart the pc/laptop, add more plug's, tracks, bleeps and blops etc.

but hey, i can't run the session the hole day. so everytime i restart the session, i have to re-sync the whole set. waisting my time. what i need is

a) a stable midi-clock

and

b) a workaround for the track-delay-problem

yes, not to close the set etc. are some solutions, but i want to have the flexibility to work in a set without to worry what happen to the midi-clock. or i want at least to be able to control the whole midi- and trackdelay with one finger-button. like beatmatching. now i have always to go in the ableton-preferences and have to manually re-sync the midi-clock. to my mind, this function you can't assign to a midi-controller. so that would be cool......concerning for a better workaround.

but there's another problem: what you hear is not what you fucking get. you hear your session in sync, than you record a external synth-part and have to realize: it's unsync. and don't tell me the chrimbo-romance about the monitor-status "in, auto and off". doesn't matter which status you choose, you'll always have a delay and have to manually re-warp the record-session.....

i need a beer......

[bhuvan]

what i need is

a) a stable midi-clock

and

b) a workaround for the track-delay-problem

I think the first is a good idea anyway. As for the track delay problem in general, it's a programming issue with Ableton. I'm not sure we can find a solution to this just with tweaking the preferences.

but there's another problem: what you hear is not what you fucking get...
you'll always have a delay and have to manually re-warp the record-session.....

Once you have an open session for one day's recording, you know the delay time setting for the next few hours. The same can be fed to 'MIDI Clock Sync Delay'. This should give you audio in sync for that session.

Though I'm not sure if more audio in the session means more processing, leading to varying delay time with every take!! If this happens, have a beer on me too...

[icedsushi]

Though I'm not sure if more audio in the session means more processing, leading to varying delay time with every take!! If this happens, have a beer on me too...

Could be. Sometimes the sync will change on me and it might have been from playing more of my recorded clips at the same time. However it's sometimes difficult to pinpoint it to one specific thing since you do many different things while building a song.

What I do know is that when the average CPU of the whole set goes up (even if still under 60%), the sync is changed. Building up the session view and playing more clips simultaneously in the arrangement could very well be a cause of raising the average CPU which will changed the sync delay.

Pass me a beer too. Three's a crowd!

[Ruso]

all of your sync problems are now with ableton, nor the midi interface. The issue is with your AUDIO interface! The ammount of delay that most audio cards produce make it impossible to sync up. you must run asio and with a perfectly adjusted mode and buffer if you want to be able to sync...

[bhuvan]

all of your sync problems are now with ableton, nor the midi interface. The issue is with your AUDIO interface!

Well, sure the audio interface will cause a delay. But as a piece of hardware with it's drivers it will have its own characteristic set of functioning. The variable out here is the session dealing with the audio interface.

The ammount of delay that most audio cards produce make it impossible to sync up. you must run asio and with a perfectly adjusted mode and buffer if you want to be able to sync...

All through the thread we've talked about making the perfect adjustment on ASIO drivers with sync delays and buffer settings, only to find that a change in session load (or restart or xyz) changes the sync again!

The audio interface and it's drivers have remained constant. The only change being the what's happening in and about Ableton.

If you don't suffer from this, please tell us how you do it. We have been waiting for the messiah!

[justin]

all of your sync problems are now with ableton, nor the midi interface. The issue is with your AUDIO interface! The ammount of delay that most audio cards produce make it impossible to sync up. you must run asio and with a perfectly adjusted mode and buffer if you want to be able to sync...

i'm not sure this is true, i have experienced similar problems on osx with a 2x2 midisport, and remote 25SL... and ASIO doesnt exist on osx!

i havent tried to test midi sync in a while because i know its dodgy, and i've wasted too much time trying to fix it. i would be much happier if ableton would test this and look out for changes in midi sync delay when changing the number of trax / dsp load of a set.

clearly something isnt working here, and there seems to be a growing number of ppl with different hardware / os reporting a similar problem... ( )

j

[musicmachine]

closest i've got so far is slaving live to an RS7000 and routing a korg emx through a remote zero receiving clock from the RS. I adjusted the latency settings for the RS which is going into a saffire le to -17ms in/out and -30 for the remote zero.It's pretty close but still not perfect.Better than it was when live was master anyway.Anyone else slaving live to external gear?Any improvement or even got it synced?

[jesQuick]

Just have to chime in...

I too have major problems syncing my synths to Live...

Nothing helps but best trick is to just press stop and start one more time... Usually syncs a little better after that?!

Weird!

Can some Abes confirm these problems (maybe even solve them????)

Best

-j

[benjbowler]

hey guys,

I have a similar sort of problem, maybe u can help?

I use ableton to play clips n scenes, beats, synths, full tracks etc.

i also use hardware (electribe samplers), my problem is that i want to route the audio out of my hardware into ableton as a channel but the delay settings dont work with audio in for some reason, only midi...

so i cant get the audio from my hardware in time with the audio playing in ableton..

it sucks

ive tried numerous sound cards m-audio, novation, edirol but no joy..

It works fine if i dont need the audio routed back in to ableton but thats wot i want..


can anyone help!!!


im currently using ableton 5
edirool ua25
korg electribes, esx, emx
sony vaio dual core 2gb ram
all the latest drivers.