Ableton Forum

Hi peeps,

I'm a new live 4 user, and i really like the program.

Ive been thinking about buying a mac laptop when i go overseas next year. But from the threads i've read, i understand that live 4 runs substandardly on a mac.

I know mac has logic. How does it fare against live 4?
I dont know anyone who uses macs so i cant ask them.

I really want to have an educated opinion before i fork out $x on a mac.

thanks guys

Comparing Logic to Live is like comparing a swiss army knife to a scalpel. In theory, the swiss army knife has a lot more functions, but in reality, you just end up hurting your fingers trying to pull out the tiny pair of scissors. The scalpel always works fast and does what you need it to do.


-lm

Grab the Live demo and try it on whatever platform you have now. If it fits the way you work and fulfills your requirements then choose whichever platform you know best/have the most friends using. Performance-wise PCs currently allow Live more power, but many Mac users (myself included) love using Live too. People choose their OS for their own reasons and so should you. A hands-on try-out is always best so check friends' gear out, download demos, read around forums (don't take too much note of Mac/PC hysteria) and make an informed choice you won't regret.

i own a powerbook and noticed a decrease in processor performance in live 4, but tha's what you'd expect with midi + audio processing...

anyways, even with pc's at half the price, forgive but i would NEVER use live in a live situation with a pc... pc's crash for the stupidest reasons, like some spyware/adware you got while online the day before... i wouldnt depend on a pc.

and i have a pc to compare.

good luck!

If raw CPU power is what you're after and you don't care about the OS, a PC laptop will provide more bang for the buck. There are a lot of guys on here who can help you. Personally I like OS X, the iLife programs, and I also use Logic Pro which is Mac only.

miasma wrote:
anyways, even with pc's at half the price, forgive but i would NEVER use live in a live situation with a pc... pc's crash for the stupidest reasons, like some spyware/adware you got while online the day before... i wouldnt depend on a pc.

good luck!

bad, bad boy....never, ever use your pro audio machine to surf the net....rip out the network card, now!

only time your daw should touch the web is when you are updating some drivers....or us micro$oft windows people, to download the endless patches *uuhum cough*, i mean service packs... *looks around cautiously* ...

so yeah, i would highly recommend to stay off the net with your daw, as this can lead to all sorts of troubles....of course i dont mean micro$oft in any way... *looks around cautiously, again* ...preferably download anything you need on another machine, burn it to disk, and then run the disk apps on your daw...

miasma wrote: anyways, even with pc's at half the price, forgive but i would NEVER use live in a live situation with a pc... pc's crash for the stupidest reasons, like some spyware/adware you got while online the day before... i wouldnt depend on a pc.

and i have a pc to compare.

hmm .. quite obviously you dont know how to operate the pc. spyware ? are you mad ? my daw is on the net 24/7. it has _never_ crashed on me during live/sequencing.. only the times I use jeskola buzz (where crashing is a feature) yes I admit that an XP machine does require some finetuning after installation.. but it is no way worse than mac.

oh .. and I have a mac to compare. (and I depended on one for a live and it let me down ... )

good luck.

Hhmmmm...
All of my DAWs are online contiously. Strage how they do not have spyware, and viruses? Oh right! I forgot... thier macs. Then theres my PC's *sigh* those silly old things. They do not have spyware or viruses either. But of course, that is because they are never on!

ALRIGHT!! ALRIGHT!!! PUT DOWN THE FLAMETHROWERS!!!!!!

I was kidding already!!

USE THE PLATFORM YOU LOVE, AND LOVE THE PLATFORM YOU USE, OR YOU WILL NEVER GET ANYTHING DONE!

or try a woman, that's my advice at least, and I have one to compare computers with.

::mic-minimal:: wrote:or try a woman, that's my advice at least, and I have one to compare computers with.

Why isn't she in your sig, then? eh?

ok maybe i was too harsh saying pc's crash that much, but defending pc's by saying you can bypass those problems by using it exclusively for audio is obviously not an advantage for pc's.

I use my mac for everything, graphic, motion apps, web/mail... and i dont have to disconnect it from the world and dedicate it just to audio. If audio is all you do, that's fine, but most of us want a machine that runs a wide variety of apps and is stable: that's a mac for me.

Maybe with a lot of not-so-fine-tunning you can mantain a pc, but the common user would be swimming in troubled waters in no time. If you can do it congrats, i used to do it when my pc was my main machine but it took a considerable amount of effort and a huge inicial effort in setting things up nicely without hardware conflicts and a million other potencial problems.

so, it depends on you, your patience, your technical know-how, your money, your taste...

i'm happy with mine:)

BoxofDirt wrote: I know mac has logic. How does it fare against live 4?
I dont know anyone who uses macs so i cant ask them.

hey fellow Melbournian....

Mac's don't come bundled with logic.... but i can tell you, as a former logic user, that live is really good in comparison... maybe not as deep... but what live does is so much cooler, and useful from a musical point of view.

as for mac vs pc laptop.... ahhh the endless, pointless debate....

my advice, from someone who used both.... get a mac... not because they are "sexier" or any of that shite... but because they are stable, and user friendly, and easy to network, and have a good way of getting software updates. Yes, you can't have more than 4 reverbs in live at one time on my G3 ibook... but who gives a crap.

-am