Ableton Forum

Fair enough man. Once again, sorry for exaggerating, I know a lot of people are pleased with Live 7.

Some of the folk over at ALDJ are quite disappointed with this release, yes.

To be honest though, I'm just feeling a bit underwhelmed personally, and its more about DAW features for me than performance stuff.

I shouldn't be angry, they've obviously put a lot of work into this update.

I just feel a little frustrated at the omission of certain features which I wouldn't have thought would take a huge effort to impliment, but then again, I know nothing about software development.

I guess I was hoping for an absolute bonanza, my expectations were obviously a bit high after reading about recent upgrades to Logic and Sonar.

forge wrote:

Poster wrote:...
pure speculation, because Live's userbase does not end at this forum..

even if it did, the views on this forum seem a long way from suggesting everyone is pissed off

Of course, this is Ableton's crib.
BUT!!
Both of the other music related forums I go to, BigBlueLounge and KVR are decidedly unimpressed with Live 7 as a whole. The fact that Ableton had I'm sure already set their schedule for release, made their business deals with AAS etc. before Logic 8 came out etc. is of no consequence to people who look at the package and notice that Live complete, is more expensive than the other DAWs except maybe Nuendo.
That, and the 128 cc limit, no new Arrangement features...... things that would make Live a DAW worthy of a costly embedded orchestral library.....

I love Live, but yeah, not impressed with the embedded plug in plethora. Really, VST is a great concept, and every company is trying to rope people into using only their product..... Blah!!

forge wrote:

headquest wrote: 1) the marketing stance puts the spotlight firmly on the instruments and samples which cost extra

I'm not sure you could fairly say that really - look at the graphic design here as an example:



the bottom 3rd is devoted to the instruments and content, the EMPHASIS is on Live 7

Click on that link, and after a short paragraph on Live 7 there are twelve more about instruments, and then a lengthy section saying how much each package costs. That's the first page I read, and it's the first impression I got.

By the time I clicked on the "read more" link for Live 7 to find out what is really in the upgrade, I was already very upset to have discovered that I cannot afford the majority of what Ableton is offering me at this point.

And with the Cycling '74 stuff presumably around the corner, I gotta anticipate that they will be offering me even more stuff I cannot afford within the year.

forge wrote: I dont go to that forum much, but if that's the general view over there then it should be heard

You should see what Ableton users are posting at KVR if you've not been there. Some enthusiasm, certainly, but several people unhappy and some long term users saying this is where they get off the Ableton bus.

As for the most frequent user requests, perhaps people don't post them in the correct section of the forum - maybe Ableton aren't seeing how many want, for example:

* Full VST automation, not just 128 parameters
* VST support in Rewire slave mode
* Automation recording in Session View clip envelopes
* Auto crossfading in the Arrangment, and ability to fade clips in/out using handles.

I have seen plenty of requests for a slicer, time sigs, etc as well. And the audio quality issue had to be knocked on the head once and for all. So I'm pleased to see them address that. Genuinely. But I think some people are sure suprised to see those ones I listed not done, especially. These aren't minor requests down the list someplace - they are real dealbreakers for some.

what I want to know is all you people who think this update is so stellar -- do you remember the previous ones? I mean, 3 and especially 4 were major leaps forward --- clip envelopes, follow actions and then the whole midi and vstis, c'mon! 5 had a lot of good ideas if not all fully implemented -- delay comp, freeze, loading tracks from other sets, first (elegant and free!) instruments, dual-core support a bit later, this clearly was exciting and showed the right direction of development. then 6 solidified a lot of things that were started in 5 and then some, very good. I've never ever whined about Live development cycle before, in fact, I gave it a stellar review for the publication I was writing for and got several friend producers to buy it. but this one is kind of bleh for me. 30 minutes with the beta and there was nothing exciting left to explore. sure, slicer, drum racks are cool, but seriously, how do you do real studio work without multiple take comping and cross-fades??? maybe all y'all have efficient workarounds, if so, I'd love to hear about them...

wilxon wrote:

pat the dog wrote:i'm not sure about that. i think i'll be using logic more and more for typical DAW tasks.

i was really hoping for an overhaul of live's arrange window in version 7, but that seems to have dropped off the radar. which is fine of course for a performance tool, but for regular production work, i reckon logic will be getting a lot more attention.

do you know what,

If i make tunes using logic 8, they have a tendancy to be bassier and darker in context, with a smooth yet atmospheric feel.

If i make tunes in live, they sound a lot more electronic and upbeat, possibly a little harder.

Dude,
You know what I was thinking the other day, they do sound kinda different. Perhaps that's why? I can't qutie put my finger on it but Live and Logic definitely sound different playing back the same tracks.

Like live is more, live sounding. You know? And logic sounds more studio.

it's weird. I am going to do some testing.

Out of interest has anyone else noticed this?

placebo effect.

Live has the word 'live' in it's title, hence you think it sounds better on Live performance. By the same token you will probably think that Logic is more 'logical'.

No one has seemed to mention that Logic, despite it's name, is very illogical in it's non-intuitive GUI and ridiculously steep learning curve.

I know a few logic users (who are also recording engineers and know their shit) and they still haven't mastered logic after years of use. And yet they know Pro Tools and Live inside out.

So before switching to a completely new DAW, I think the learning curve and intuitiviness (is that a word?) need to be consideration #1.

.02

kramerica wrote:I know a few logic users (who are also recording engineers and know their shit) and they still haven't mastered logic after years of use.

That is very sad. Logic is not THAT hard to use. OK I started with Logic V.3 in 1995, but basically I was up and running doing solid studio work for clients in like 6 months. If they haven't "got it" after several years, that just shows lack of effort on their part to put in the necessary time to learn it. Logic is just not that hard, maybe if you're a total digital audio noobie, its deep, yes, with a lot of features that may seem overwhelming if you didn't know what everything is for, or does, but if you have any basic DAW nous, Logic isn't this mysterious otherworld where all the rules are backward or anything...

my 2c

I have to agree with that! I got logic studio recently (never used it prior) not even a week ago.. and yeah started poking around/thumbing through the getting started guide. and yeah, makes a lot of sense!

I didn;t think Logic was any worse than Cubase or Protools in this regard. They're all deep apps, much deeper than Live, so yes there's a learning curve.

I know many pofessional photographers that know their shit and still only use 10% of the features of photoshop

the simple fact is they ae all tools - any professional just has to use the tools that best fit the job

there have been audio jobs I've had to do and regretted using Live

IMO Live is the simplest and best for just making music becuase it is close to an instrument

the other tools are more refined and have a lot of features that are specific to tasks maybe more suited to recording, editing, scoring etc

for example there are certain shortcuts used by Wavelab or Nuendo/Cubase/Logic?Pro-tools that you literally depend on if you are editing 400 voice prompts, and Live can make this a miserable experience

but for simply getting sound and turning it into music quickly, Live is the best

in LP8 does it still do that shit where it asks you for a place to put your audio file on disk everytime before you can record?

thumperjack wrote:in LP8 does it still do that shit where it asks you for a place to put your audio file on disk everytime before you can record?

You can set a default recording path so it doesn't ask you. And you can set a recording path for each song as well. This has been the case before Logic 8.

headquest wrote:several people unhappy and some long term users saying this is where they get off the Ableton bus.

And the pendulum swings once again...

And then when Live 8 comes out, you'll hear the comments of people fed up with Logic and wanting to switch to Live...boring

Earlier this summer without an update in 3 years, people were fed up ready to leave Logic in droves...or had already left.

We've seen years of people moaning, just the direction of the moaning switches from one program to the next depending the timing when something new comes out. I just use what works best for me, not worrying about what everyone else is disappointed about.