Ableton Forum

dpel wrote:I'm still experiencing the spikes ans glitches. anyone else?

I would have thought that with all the feedback from
other users using 5.0.x Ableton would've fixed this by now.

-notice my system config in my signature, quite similar to most Live users here.

very trivial.

check your power


i just did a gig tonight and it was power

well, i'm one of the lucky ones that never has pop and clicks in tracks that running. For my main work i use a G5 dual 1.8, but i also run a powerbook 1ghz. I have used a tascam us428 for many years, works just fine on both macs. I've recently moved to a Terratec Phaze 24, again works just fine.
On the G5 my projects oftne push up to 60-70 stereo tracks. I never actually run all of those together, i'm not dumb enough to think i could realistically get away with that with just the stock 7200 drive in the G5 and CERTAINLY not on the pbooks 5200.
My tracks are 98% bounced and i only ever run light vstis like Trilogy or other sample based plugs like impulse. I very often have Ozone on the master, and this is generally the biggest gas guzzler that runs live. My buffer is pretty much always set to midway, ie about 1024.
No click or dropouts. There has been the times where i've got a red overload light and a little bit of audio dropping out, but this has ALWAYS been resolved by putting pretty much all of the audio clips into my 2 gig of ram. It seems that trying to play say 40+ tracks of short audio clips (perc and drums kind of thing) just stressed the drive out with access issues and that's when the red overload appears.
I always have delay compensation switched on, and i always have clips set to beats mode to as i rarely play with transpose.
I know many of you have had horrible issues, but there are many of that have not.
Every plug and OS i use is alway fully up to date.
Just my 5 cents.

supster wrote: to adam: youve been around for a long time and - even if your happy with the way the program has been working for you - im sure yours is not the only rig youve ever seen or heard it used on

so im sure you have seen people working with it on a lot of different setups and if so there's no way you can believe that this is an "ok" state of affairs - specifically in reference to the audio performance and the arrange view lockups

i never said the state of affairs was ok.

I get huge CPU spikes with Live 5.2, somtimes up to 150%.
I didn't have this issue with 5.0.2

My set-up:
ibook g4 1.02ghz, 768 ram
What's connected: m-audio firewire audiophile soundcard, trigger finger, evolution UC33e and a Roland FC-200 footswitch controller.

A summary of hard and software modifications would be very nice.
Thanks.

very puzzling.

I have to "warm up" live most of the time. I'll open a set and listen in arrange. When the first major transition happens, eg. verse to chorus, I'll have a glitch on the first transition. After that first glitch everything runs relatively smooth. I have many times hit the GGGGWWWWRRRKKK, in the middle of a scene. I noticed this warm up as well on 5.03.

I use many other types of software and am not really happy with performance of live Seriously why is the audio dropping @ 20%? It dosen't drop with any other host.

My system is clean and solid, glitches are software, plain and simple, my other software dosen't do this.

I also must add, I only use ableton live and midistroke at the same time in one partition I don't use 10 apps at the same time. I don't go on the net with my lap-top and download porn or whatever.

Lamont wrote:I also must add, I only use ableton live and midistroke at the same time in one partition I don't use 10 apps at the same time. I don't go on the net with my lap-top and download porn or whatever.

i realize cpu spiking and glitches when i start playback. not always but after working for 10min on ableton. after restarting ableton this issue is gone. i think its more likely a stuffing of cache and not empting or something like that. could this be?

spacy

I just got my macbook pro 1.83ghz, 1.5gb ram, 80gb HD yesterday.
5.2 doesn't have any outrageous CPU spikes anymore on the mbp. The CPU is around 4% - 10% compared to the 200% peaks I was getting on my ibook G4.
I played around with 5.2 for 2 hours and I haven't experienced any crackles, pops glitches yet with my m-audio audiophile firewire card.

I'm relieved.

Hey up,

Just got a spangly new laptop, purpose built for audio (sonoma processor 2ghz, 1gig ram, 7200rpm drive, using partitioned outer edge for live work...) and upgraded to live 5.2. I get an average of one audio drop-out per set. I really, really don't want any!

Why no reply from the abletonites? Even if they could give a checklist, so's we could try a range of things to make it better?

Having said that, there are some features of the problem (I've been monitoring it!) that make it seem odd.

1. It doesn't necessarily happen when there are large amounts of files playing from HD, or during particularly processor-intensive activities. It can happen at any time.
2. Sometimes there's a processor spike, sometimes not. Again, random.
3. As a previous post has said, 'warming up' live seems to help. Once there's been one or two glitches, the problem seems to diminish.

Ableton - please write back! Show us you care! Playing live - and improvising while audio remains solid - is supposed to be the foundation of Ableton. This is gonna stuff that unless something happens soon; even letting us know you're on the case...

Do you know how many users are experiencing this? Having just spent a vast wodge of hard-earned money, its pretty dis-spiriting....!

No need to worry. I'm absolutely positive that Abelton will fix this bug. That's why you haven't heard from them. They are hard at work fixing this and all of the other problems everyone has experienced. I also have all of the confidence in the world that it will be called version 6 and you will be paying for it.

supster wrote:the two main problems with Live:

- random CPU spikes, audio dropouts, and audio glitches and

- paralyzed arrange grid


.;

I just wanted to express myself on that issue too. I have done almost 80 shows in a year, I am totally fed up by the way Live 5 keeps on stressing me all the time.

Last time it was in front of 200 people in first part of Carsten Nicolai and my live 5 started to glitch at 40% just like if it was 100%, audience didn't notice it the fisrt time but they are not fool and after 5 glitches they can easily recognize that there's a problem.

So now, when I go on stage, the only thing I am affraid of is not me but the software... time is changing. That's crazy.

Macbook Pro 2ghz, 1 ghz mem, 7200 internal drive, lacie external firewire, motu 828



glitches...

i'm off to a gig next friday, and right now instead of rehearsing, i'm converting every sample in my set to mono (the ones i can) and to 44khz/16bit

one thing that's strange...

if i copy only a few clips from my set to a new one, i get no drops with that clips, everything rock solid.. after copying some more clips, trying to reconstruct the set, it starts gliching and spiking

the same set in my G5 tower dual 2ghz with 2g mem and sata internal drive, plays ok... BUT.. only after i've reconstructed the set previously when upgrading from live 4 to live 5..


i really hope it gets good in L6

I bought live when it was version 4.1.4 and it was so solid I couldn't have been happier.

Having tried live 2 and 3 I thought that the imminent upgrade path to 5 would take the software to new heights, becoming more stable, efficient and flexible.

I wish I had never saved my songs in live 5 format. i can't finish them because live has slowed down so much. Even bouncing everything down and halving the number of tracks hasn't helped much. Audio glitches, lockups and a very slow response are the most regular features of live 5 it would seem. I'm facing a very real possibility of reconstructing the songs in version 4!

It simply isn't acceptable after so many people have invested in the software that it degenerate so much in quality, both in terms of resource efficiency and poor half baked implementation of promised features.

The implementation of freeze is laughable and shows a complete lack of insight into the practical uses of such a feature.
The new flanger and phaser are cold and unmusical and that is the nicest thing i can say about them, they certainly don't belong sonically with the other live fx.
And frankly, basic stuff like the amount of wasted grey area above the timeline, i could get 2 more tracks on screen with live 4 in the arrange view. Why can't you turn off the overview or tuck the transport neatly into the corner to free up more room for tracks? i could go on like this listing (to me) obvious flaws for another 2 hours if i had the time!

Earlier in the thread someone expressed annoyance at the small group of people defending ableton as if they were relatives or something. I quite agree, and after reading oddtones001 post you wonder if they are not also under abletons payroll!

It is quite right and reasonable to expect an old set saved from 4.1.4 to play back fine in version 5. if anything it should use less cpu etc not nearly twice the amount.

Ableton should upgrade Live 5 to 5.99 if necessary so that it is AT LEAST as efficient playing identical sets as Live 4.1.4 was. This goes for the Slow arrange response as well! Asking us to pay for 6 when 5 never worked well is asking too much imo. Come on Ableton we are waiting for a response! It is for you to restore your user's faith in the product.

I will not pay for 6 if version 5 is not as stable as version 4 was in it's last incarnation. As it stands, Live 5 is relegated to studio toy for messing with a couple of loops. A real shame as i thought it was all i was going to need.

strange things happen..

just did a crazy test, spotlighted for.aif in my book, and randomly choosed 800 files, put them in 40 tracks x 20 scenes, setted the quantisation to none, and start shooting. amazingly, no dropouts at all....

can't understand this.. my live set uses 8 audio tracks, and a couple midi ones..

check the image @ http://www.bbox.tv/live/wtf.png

are you using any audio effects? are you using VST instruments for your MIDI tracks - or are you using the MIDI for external instruments?

some audio effects and many VST instruments can pay a large toll on your CPU (much more than just playing back audio files). so, you may be able to load hundreds of audio files without any issue (especially if you have a lot of RAM and use them in RAM mode) - then you could load only one VST instrument and bring the whole thing down because of the amount of CPU the instrument may use (same thing for an audio effect that requires a lot of CPU).

as an example, I have one Tassman intrument that I use frequently that eats up over 20% of my CPU by itself. obviously, this can cause an issue when trying to use it with a large set that already requires a good amount of the CPU to run.