Ableton Forum

To me though when recording engineer's talk about 'we mix it in this because of that' it's often because of gossip and rumours they heard elsewhere. People diss Live more because it's an unusual looking DAW than for any other good logical reason. In a blind test, he probably wouldn't be able to tell which DAW rendered an audio file if I gave him a selection of Live, DP and Logic, especially if it ran to multiple audio clips.

I've even heard respected engineer's say stuff like 'We moved from Logic to Nuendo because the bottom end sounded rounder' (note they never say Cubase, even though Cubase has the same audio engine) - Well as much as I love Cubase and Nuendo, this is just not true in my experience, but because Nuendo COSTS more, it must be better - right ? No. Placebo/correctional bias is responsible for much of these opinions. It has already been proven that people choose the shiniest GUI time and again, when people have run the same plugin, same setting with a generic interface, 9/10 people say the plugin with the fancy GUI SOUNDS better.

diskowipe wrote:something else to consider is for all of you naysayers to look inside yourselves

these types of threads get more hits on the forums than any others by triple at least. what does that mean?

It means that this is the Ableton LIve forum.
Everyone here who regularly contributes to the forum enjoys using this software and feels a certain level of brand loyalty to the product. Naturally, if someone pipes up yet again with this hoary old chestnut about Live sounding bad in comparison to other DAWs, it's a topic that nearly all of us have a strong opinion about.
That's why these contentious ( and frankly fucking tedious) threads attract a lot of posts. It's not because we're all 'looking for something' or we're unsatisfied with the performance of Live.

How about posting some evidence or something? These threads are only tedious because almost no one posts anything even remotely objective. I thought my little realtime vs rendered test was pretty decent but diskoasswipe wouldn't even argue anything real about it even though it directly contradicted said asswipe's main argument concerning Live.

I care mostly out of technical curiousity and because its annoying to see people using logical fallacies to make proofs.

[speaking from beyond the grave]
real-time V rendered isn't nearly as interesting as host V host though
[/end]

leedsquietman wrote:To me though when recording engineer's talk about 'we mix it in this because of that' it's often because of gossip and rumours they heard elsewhere. People diss Live more because it's an unusual looking DAW than for any other good logical reason. In a blind test, he probably wouldn't be able to tell which DAW rendered an audio file if I gave him a selection of Live, DP and Logic, especially if it ran to multiple audio clips.

Are you a moron?

this is always the problem, people assume something completely irrationally. here you say "often because of gossip and what they heard elsewhere"

the guy fucking said the program sounded a certain way. deal with it. he has an opinion, not because he heard it from one of his drinking buddies. he hears the software and he spoke an opinion, stop speculating just cause you dont want to believe it

this is the same thing with the Ricardo interview. he must have meant this, he must have meant this, he must have meant that.

he said ableton sounds "ok" just fucking deal with it and stop trying to justify to yourself that any of them mean anything different from what they plainly said just to make yourself feel better

diskowipe is just trollin'.

51 posts.

ethios4 wrote:How about posting some evidence or something? These threads are only tedious because almost no one posts anything even remotely objective. I thought my little realtime vs rendered test was pretty decent but diskoasswipe wouldn't even argue anything real about it even though it directly contradicted said asswipe's main argument concerning Live.

I care mostly out of technical curiousity and because its annoying to see people using logical fallacies to make proofs.

read the live 8 audio fact sheet

kb420 wrote:leedsquietmuppet was just trollin'.

fixed - from beyond the grave!

diskowipe wrote:read the live 8 audio fact sheet

Done it. Many times. Your point is?

4/4 wrote:[speaking from beyond the grave]
real-time V rendered isn't nearly as interesting as host V host though
[/end]

the simple and annoying response to this is User Error.

take a 100 stem track
give them to dickwipe
give them to Timbaland
dickwipe can use any DAW he wants
ask dickwipe what a bad DAW is, make Timbaland use that.

whose tracks will sound better?

IMO usability differences between DAWs far outweigh this sound quality n00b bullshit.

automation recording in session view, sysex support, multiple midi channel outs on a midi track, midi sync, Windows and the USB device reconnect problem, a time readout display and other issues concern me much more.

of course if anyone can demonstrate flaws in the sound engine I'd love to hear about it, I like to know the good and bad of the crap in my home studio.

leedsquietman wrote:I am from the null test philosophy but that is my experience. I'm happy enough to mix in Live

...

Logic only went sample accurate from version 8, but it would be nice to have live 9 sample accurate.

I used to mix on analog and actually miss it - compared to your average perfect digital DAW - analog is shit period, but I still like the slightly softer sound your tend to naturally get out of it and I like the typiclly less perfect frequency response of most analog geat etc. Null test for analog? yeh right!

So digital - and timing flaw - now that i actually really annoyiong these days now that I have got so used to digital precision (compared to the typical jitter of midi & tape combined etc).

I dont however care about sample accurate - I do care hugely about anything that is out enough to be audiable, particularly if as a consequence of other sample accurate processor turning a tiny timing flaw into a horrible glitch because it gated the sound a sample or two early or late.

I dont care if a daw isnt perfect so long as it sounds more pleasing as a consequence (why else do people mix down on for eg a TL-Audio Tube console?). But I do mind when the digital processing is so perfect that every litle bit of digital harshness is delivered to you with perfect clarity. Live in this respect is very good - harsh in = very harsh out if with some significant analog simulation processing to tame it all (PSP vintage warmer and similar for eg). 64 bit to me just means it gets better at delivering that typical high end harshness with improved clarity, meaning more eq and/or other post processing etc

My favourite software mixer and mixing engine at the moment is without a doubt propellerhead's record - perhaps with everything set in a neutral position you may be able to null test it, but that completely misses the point of it - its a character mixer and far better sounding because of that. The end result - its very easy to get a pleasing sounding mix on it, but it it an accurate mix? Who cares so long as it sounds nice.

ethios4 wrote:How about posting some evidence or something? These threads are only tedious because almost no one posts anything even remotely objective. I thought my little realtime vs rendered test was pretty decent but diskoasswipe wouldn't even argue anything real about it even though it directly contradicted said asswipe's main argument concerning Live.

I care mostly out of technical curiousity and because its annoying to see people using logical fallacies to make proofs.

Because I'm happy working in Live. I get good results and I don't hear it sounding fundamentally different than other digital software mixers. For me, as others have noted, it's down to the skill of the engineer and the quality of what goes into it - not what comes out of it.

In other words, I'm not interested in performing shoot-outs and technical tests to convince anybody else.

If you are, that's great. And I agree that it's probably the only way to settle the ongoing argument from a scientific point of view.

Tone Deft wrote:

4/4 wrote:[speaking from beyond the grave]
real-time V rendered isn't nearly as interesting as host V host though
[/end]

the simple and annoying response to this is User Error.

take a 100 stem track
give them to dickwipe
give them to Timbaland
dickwipe can use any DAW he wants
ask dickwipe what a bad DAW is, make Timbaland use that.

whose tracks will sound better?

IMO usability differences between DAWs far outweigh this sound quality n00b bullshit.

automation recording in session view, sysex support, multiple midi channel outs on a midi track, midi sync, Windows and the USB device reconnect problem, a time readout display and other issues concern me much more.

of course if anyone can demonstrate flaws in the sound engine I'd love to hear about it, I like to know the good and bad of the crap in my home studio.

Truth.

"automation recording in session view, sysex support, multiple midi channel outs on a midi track, midi sync"

Agreed. How long have you been trying to midi-sync though ? Midi-sync with Ableton is a pipe dream I gave up on years ago.

4/4 wrote:How long have you been trying to midi-sync though ? Midi-sync with Ableton is a pipe dream I gave up on years ago.

this is gonna piss people off...

a few months ago after people were ranting about it I tested my system, it was rock solid.

laptop -USB-> BCR -midi-> MPC1000
no problems. it would even track tempo changes, it was a little clumsy with rapid changes but steadied itself after a two beats or so.

laptop -USB-> SL25 -midi-> JX305 (MC505)
same thing.

I think Live 8 helped. I know that on some days it would trainwreck with my gear, these days I can't get it to break. in the Live 3, 4, 5 and 6 days I was syncing multiple computers, macs, PCs with different versions of Live, they tracked.

I've seen it be shit, I've seen it be great.