Ableton Forum

I have an i5 27" imac, and I get 25% (page 19), so I don't think it would be impossible for a i7 to get closer to 10%.

Well maybe it's true, but I'm surprised it seems even more fast than the Mac Pro Xeon Dual-6 Cores that cost 3 times more...

My new MBP finally arrived today so a quick test:

1. Ableton Live CPU Meter 14%
2. Laptop/Desktop? Apple MacBook Pro 17" (Feb 2011 model)
3. Operating System? Mac OSX 10.6.6
4. Ableton Live version? 8.2.1 (Suite)
5. CPU Make, Model, and Speed? Intel Core i7 @ 2.3GHz (Sandy Bridge Quad Core)
6. Amount of Ram? 8GB @ 1333MHz DDR3
7. Soundcard (and driver version if you know it)? USB2 NI Audio 8 DJ (v2418)
8. Hard Disk Drive Speed (if you know)? Internal: 500GB 7200rpm SATA 2, External: WD My Passport on FW800
9. Number of playback tracks? 8

OK, Im officially impressed with this thing so far - only 2 points behind my 4GHz i7/920 Win7/64 PC decktop machine when it was freshly setup and installed etc. Real test of course when running disc intensive projects.

General other perceptions - Superdrive is very slow (way overdue for a refresh) - Took hours and hours to install logic pro, dreading installing Komplete 7, Omnisphere/Trillian and other large libraries. Conversely, I'm Pretty sure that Ableton 8 Suite did all its post-install package unpacking far faster than I remeber the my PC doing which was odd, but then Ive allways thought some file realted bits of Live seemed really slow on a PC.

BTW I also tried internal sound card as well - MUCH slower - similar to the 2.2GHz 2011 MBP result someone posted.

Khazul wrote:My new MBP finally arrived today so a quick test:

1. Ableton Live CPU Meter 14%
2. Laptop/Desktop? Apple MacBook Pro 17" (Feb 2011 model)
3. Operating System? Mac OSX 10.6.6
4. Ableton Live version? 8.2.1 (Suite)
5. CPU Make, Model, and Speed? Intel Core i7 @ 2.3GHz (Sandy Bridge Quad Core)
6. Amount of Ram? 8GB @ 1333MHz DDR3
7. Soundcard (and driver version if you know it)? USB2 NI Audio 8 DJ (v2418)
8. Hard Disk Drive Speed (if you know)? Internal: 500GB 7200rpm SATA 2, External: WD My Passport on FW800
9. Number of playback tracks? 8

OK, Im officially impressed with this thing so far - only 2 points behind my 4GHz i7/920 Win7/64 PC decktop machine when it was freshly setup and installed etc. Real test of course when running disc intensive projects.

General other perceptions - Superdrive is very slow (way overdue for a refresh) - Took hours and hours to install logic pro, dreading installing Komplete 7, Omnisphere/Trillian and other large libraries. Conversely, I'm Pretty sure that Ableton 8 Suite did all its post-install package unpacking far faster than I remeber the my PC doing which was odd, but then Ive allways thought some file realted bits of Live seemed really slow on a PC.

BTW I also tried internal sound card as well - MUCH slower - similar to the 2.2GHz 2011 MBP result someone posted.

You might want to look out for this:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jsp ... 5&tstart=0

auditory canvas wrote:

blakjesus wrote:

commuter wrote:Anyone with results of one of the new 2011 macbook pro ???

+1

Here you go:

1) Ableton Live CPU Meter % bounced around a lot, but settled around 20%

2) Laptop/Desktop? Apple Macbook Pro 17" (feb 2011)

3) Operating System? OSX 10.6.6

4) Ableton Live version? 8.2.2b3

5) CPU Make, Model, and Speed? Intel Core i7 Quad 2.2ghz

6) Amount of Ram? 4gb (1333mhz DDR3)

7) Soundcard (and driver version if you know it)?Internal (haven't installed SC yet)

Hard Disk Drive Speed (if you know)? 5400 (stock internal)

9) Number of playback tracks? 8

Just ran the test with an external soundcard - Tascam DM4800 Firewire mk2 card, 32 channel firewire card for the mixer.

Results were 15% at 512 buffer, 8 tracks. I was able to get 16% with a 128 buffer, pretty happy with that result.

Nice - that more like it

Any issues with yours yet? I saw that thread a while ago. Have to see how it goes I guess.

Mines been fine so far, but not pushed it really hard yet as Im still installing stuff - spent the last day and a half just shovelling DVDs into it - and not even half way yet - groan...

Wish the dvd drive was alot faster!

Had a quick play with Logic 9 as well - just basically loaded the demo song with my UFX and cpu use seems rediculously low (8-10%) for whats in the track. Nice even core use as well - they definately seem to have the multi-core support nailed. Looking like these new MBPs should be pretty good audio machines if/when ableton can get this sorted as well.

That is very impressive. Time to sell my Dell and get MBP.

1) Ableton Live CPU Meter 15-16%
2) Laptop/Desktop? Make/Model? 15" MacBook Pro
3) Operating System? 10.6.7
4) Ableton Live version? 8.2.1
5) CPU Make, Model, and Speed? 2.3GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7
6) Amount of Ram? 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM
7) Soundcard? buit-in
8) Hard Disk Drive Speed? SSD
9) Number of playback tracks? 8

1) Ableton Live CPU Meter 18%
2) Laptop/Desktop? Make/Model? 15" MacBook Pro 2011
3) Operating System? 10.6.7
4) Ableton Live version? 8.2.1
5) CPU Make, Model, and Speed? 2.0 GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7
6) Amount of Ram? 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM
7) Soundcard? buit-in and MOTU ultralite@ 512 buffer
Hard Disk Drive Speed? seagate momentus 500gb 7200 rpm
9) Number of playback tracks? 8

That's one of my friend's new macbook pro..
Impressive!!

1) Ableton Live CPU Meter % (if it bounces around, please list the peak) 24%
2) Laptop/Desktop? Make/Model? 2011 MBP 13"
3) Operating System? 10.6.7
4) Ableton Live version? 8.2.1
5) CPU Make, Model, and Speed? i7 2,7
6) Amount of Ram? 4 GB
7) Soundcard (and driver version if you know it)? tc konnekt 24d, tc near software 2.5.0.6906
Hard Disk Drive Speed (if you know)? 5400 rpm
9) Number of playback tracks? 8

1 ) Ableton Live CPU Meter: 15%
2 ) Laptop/Desktop Make/Model: 15" Apple MBP (Feb'11)
3 ) Operating System: OS X 10.6.7
4 ) Ableton Live version: Live 8.2.2
5 ) CPU Make, Model, and Speed: Intel Core i7 quad (sandy bridge) 2.2ghz
6 ) Amount of Ram: 4GB 1333Mhz
7 ) Soundcard: Focusrite Saffire LE
8 ) Hard Disk Drive Speed: 5400 RPM SATA
9 ) Number of playback tracks? 8

as an extra test i duplicated the 8 tracks until i started getting breakups.
i can get a steady playback of 48 tracks at around 82%. after that i get breakups and the fan goes insane, and the cpu jumps around wildly.

garyboozy wrote:as an extra test i duplicated the 8 tracks until i started getting breakups.
i can get a steady playback of 48 tracks at around 82%. after that i get breakups and the fan goes insane, and the cpu jumps around wildly.

Hmm... I managed to push my 2.3Ghz MBP 17 upto 64 tracks before it broke up at 72 tracks. 64 was however clean and even stayed clean when I droped the buffer size down to 64. This was with an RME UFX via USB2. Live CPU use was 75-80%, system use at 68-70%.

yea i thought i'd get more out of it, and at first it managed the 64, but once the fans ramp up, things get warm and unstable. i personally think it might be the soundcard. had a few problems with it losing connection recently. would like to try out the rme ff400 and see how it gets on.

did you try running it on loop for a minute or 2 to see how it fared?

Left it looping for about 30 mins each time just checked for about half a minute every few minutes. Everytime I checked it sounded fine, but you cant listen to that racket for long

garyboozy wrote:1 ) Ableton Live CPU Meter: 15%
2 ) Laptop/Desktop Make/Model: 15" Apple MBP (Feb'11)
3 ) Operating System: OS X 10.6.7
4 ) Ableton Live version: Live 8.2.2
5 ) CPU Make, Model, and Speed: Intel Core i7 quad (sandy bridge) 2.2ghz
6 ) Amount of Ram: 4GB 1333Mhz
7 ) Soundcard: Focusrite Saffire LE
8 ) Hard Disk Drive Speed: 5400 RPM SATA
9 ) Number of playback tracks? 8

as an extra test i duplicated the 8 tracks until i started getting breakups.
i can get a steady playback of 48 tracks at around 82%. after that i get breakups and the fan goes insane, and the cpu jumps around wildly.

wow i can only get 16% with my i7 2.93ghz, great stuff!