Live 4 Overall Latency Test

brecht · Post by **brecht** » Wed Jan 26, 2005 2:44 pm

After a frustrating day with my EMI 2/6 I think I want to buy a new sound card. I was hoping to use the EMI with Live to do real time processing of instruments, but the achievable latency is just too darned high (even with the Options.txt fix).

Before buying, I wanted to see what overall latencies were actually possible in Live 4. In the spirit of AdamJay's Live 4 performance test, I was hoping to do a nice scientific comparison of how well all of our sound cards really work.

So here goes:
1. Create a new live set with 2 audio tracks.
2. Put a one-shot kick drum in track 1, scene 1 (how about kick033 from the Ableton Live 4 sample pile?)
3. Follow the instructions in section 5.2.3 of the Live 4 manual.
4. Post your best achievable overall latency without glitches.
5. list your sound card, driver, computer specs, and OS.

I'll start:

37 ms
EMI 2/6, ASIO Driver 1.5
ThinkPad T42, 1.7 GHz, 1.5 GB RAM
Windows XP SP 2

kabuki · Post by **kabuki** » Wed Jan 26, 2005 7:52 pm

Well, according to the process, I only have 4 ms of latency.

problem I see, is that 2 tracks rrunning that small ammount of audio won't really test my rig for buffer overload (crackling). Shouldn't we set up the buffer size to a specific ammount first, THEN run this test?

If not, I have 20 on my buffer

4 ms

Apple PB 1.5 ghs
Stock soundcard
1 gb ram

brecht · Post by **brecht** » Wed Jan 26, 2005 8:38 pm

kabuki wrote: Shouldn't we set up the buffer size to a specific ammount first, THEN run this test?

Perhaps for a different test, but what I'm trying to find is the lowest possible latency for running Live to process live audio. So I'm hoping everyone will make sure that they can actually use Live at their latency settings before posting.

Actual Latency: 10 ms
EMU APS, ASIO Driver 1.6, Latency Set to 10 ms
AMD Athlon 2600, 1GB RAM
Windows XP SP1

kabuki · Post by **kabuki** » Wed Jan 26, 2005 8:47 pm

I can use it to run 2 tracks...

we need more specifics, or at least a eliminate the variable of the buffer...

We need to decide on a specific number...

brecht · Post by **brecht** » Wed Jan 26, 2005 9:16 pm

How about this?

a) use the live demo "Making Music With Live."
b) Set the latency as low as possible so that playback works with no glitches.
c) Make a new audio track (Track 7). Arm that for recording.
d) Put the playback marker at bar 5.

Then follow (3)-(5) above.

I'm not too good with this "scientific" business.

Actual Latency: 37 ms
EMI 2/6, ASIO Driver 1.5, set to 8ms latency
ThinkPad T42, 1.7 GHz, 1.5 GB RAM
Windows XP SP 2

kabuki · Post by **kabuki** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 12:07 am

The results are as follows:

with 2 MS buffer (seems low to me, but this particular track is running fine at 2)
7 MS compensation (resample offset)

11 MS total

Stock soundcard. See my sig for other details

by-pass · Post by **by-pass** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 11:21 am

I change my latency .....
it's depend how much audio or/and midi tracks, which midi intruments..., effects...etc...

but the minimal latency with the multiface is 1.5 ms..... but for have one config work for 4-5 midi instruments tracks and 4-6 audio tracks is 6 ms and 3ms compensation

cheers

fil