Ableton Forum

Running Live 8 on a dual-core HP with 2GB RAM. The only recommended spec that I am not using is the sound card. Since I am at work, I am using the laptop's built-in sound. I loaded an mp3 and when I hit play, the audio sounds choppy. Not sure why. The CPU usage at the time is about 15%. Will an external sound card make all the difference?

well, first thing you could try is using the 'asio 4 all' driver with your internal soundcard; you can download it from the internet. A lot of people use that without problems. (me too)
Secondly, an external soundcard will make al the difference! (it's about the drivers and digital-to-analog converters) you can go firewire or usb (like presonus firepod or NI Audio Kontrol 1)

Hi DJ El,

also: which warp mode do you use? Does the MP3 does also sound "choppy" when "Warp" is turned off? Which exact version of Live 8 do you use?

Best,
Jörg

you could increase the audio buffer size, that usually fixes such problems. an external sound card will allow you to run a smaller buffer (which means less latency).

The problem went away when I installed my American Audio Versaport sound card. I'll try messing with the audio buffer size, too. Thanks to all who replied.