Does Ableton not care about Windows users?

[mekanism1200]

Warning Rant Alert!

Since the release of 9 I have had constant issues with crashes, the "not responding" always comes on when adding new intruments and Max 4 live sucks up ram like you wouldnt believe. I'm running a high end ADK laptop with good specs on Win 7 Pro. I rarely get the chance to produce these days (I have a toddler) and when I do get the time I just need this stuff to WORK! I'm so fed up with this program at this point. I have sent over a dozen crash reports since its release with none of these issues being fixed. Max 4 live is a joke, crashes Live every time now. I am running 2 drives, an SSD main and a HDD for my sample and Packs storage. Could Live not be playing well with 2 drives? I dont know how this company can get away with charging so much money for buggy software. Ableton Live is the most buggy software I have used on any platform. I love using Live when it works but at this point with my limited time for production I need a stable tool. I spend more time troubleshooting than making music at this point! If Ableton favors OSX than they just should NOT sell on Windows at all!

[Fossiel]

Could Live not be playing well with 2 drives

I use about the same specs as you, with even more drives. Don't think this is causing the poop.

[SLEEarts]

I'm running Live on two Win 7 machines with none of the problems you're experiencing, although yes M4L uses plenty of RAM. It does on OSX too.

[dtomaloff]

Do you have problems even on basic projects WITHOUT M4L? I ask because, for the most part, I gave up on M4L. Seems like every time I have a problem with a project that cannot be explained, it's a project that uses Max.

Also, pardon my ignorance, but having two on-board HDs shouldn't be much different to Live than a setup with an external HD, right? I have never had an issue with that if that's the case.

I'm particularly interested in how this works out for you as I too have an ADK machine on the way (not a laptop though).

In terms of OS, I have one machine running Win 7 and one running 8.1. Both seem to work as expected with very few crashes. Any crashes I DO have usually involve M4L or a third party plugin.

Do you have any other DAW software? Any issues with those?

I hope you get it sorted!

[login]

I am on win 7 in a more modest computer and I dont have this kind of problems. M4L is quite CPU intensive so I only use devices form time to time.

[H20nly]

i can't remember at the moment... and i don't have time to look... but does M4L have any dependencies, such as Java updates??


Live 9 works on both my iMac running Mavericks and my laptop running Windows 7.

[doghouse]

mekanism1200,

I hate to say it but Windows is the culprit, not Live. Being on a Mac I can't give you any pointers about how to stabilize the OS on your machine but I'm sure others here will be able to.

[yur2die4]

mekanism1200,

I hate to say it but Windows is the culprit, not Live. Being on a Mac I can't give you any pointers about how to stabilize the OS on your machine but I'm sure others here will be able to.

I read about more Mac users having crashes than windows users on here, BUT, a Lot of people use Mac,
So it may just be because it is a popular platform. Moral of story, it isn't proven Not to be Windows, but you can't jump to the conclusion that it is.

For all we know he may have wrong versions of Max, interfering plugs, a bad or poorly organized HD, etc etc.

It'd be nice if you had a real piece of advice, you simply said "I don't use windows, but your problem is windows." Why did you even bother commenting?

[doghouse]

I meant Windows in the sense that something else is running on his system that is messing up Live.

He needs to do a full review of his system, every device, every driver and one by one disable things until he finds out what it is.

[H20nly]

25.4 Max Dependencies

As mentioned earlier, there are some special file management considerations when creating presets for Max devices. Additionally, Max devices themselves may depend on other files (such as samples, pictures, or even other Max patches) in order to work properly. In this case, you may want to use Live’s file management tools to collect all of these dependencies into a single place, particularly if you want to share your Max devices.

...

https://www.ableton.com/en/manual/max-for-live/

it might also be something as simple as your anti-virus settings. you haven't said what you've done to troubleshoot, so all we can do is guess.

[mekanism1200]

Thanks for chiming in everyone-

To the Apple fans- Windows 7 is a solid platform. Live 9 is the ONLY software out of a myriad of other programs I use that has these issues. It is clearly an Ableton or Max issue, its not the OS. No I will not switch to Apple because they are better blah blah blah! I will switch programs before I do that.

So it definately seems to be more of an issue with M4L device projects than not. If I stick to audio and very minimal use of midi devices things seem to be ok. The problem is I have some really nice M4L stuff I like to use, and should be able to use it with minimal issues since I payed good money to use it! So yes, it seems to be related to M4L devices. I will look into my anti-virus settings, good tip!

The "not responding" does seem to come up more with 9 than with 8 even if loading a built in instrument that is grouped and has some effects chains. Just adding a single device or effect is pretty snappy and doesnt elicit that response from the program. Not sure about conflicting drivers, I do have a lot of stuff on this system now after 2 years of using it, maybe I need to clean some stuff out IDK.

I have a project in particular that I have spent a fair amount of time on and would like to finish it but it has many M4L devices and it takes 5 minutes just to load it, and half the time it crashes. So I will attempt to bounce everything to audio and hope M4L 7.0 fixes these issues in the future, otherwise I will contact Ableton and see about getting this sorted. I just hate spending so much time wasting creative energy on fixing a program that is supposed to help me be creative. Had I known Live 9 was going to be like this I would have taken another route and bought something else.

[Stromkraft]

Warning Rant Alert!…

[RANT] If Ableton favors OSX than they just should NOT sell on Windows at all!

To me it doesn't sound like as if you haven't done the research you need to do when making music on Windows.

This info is what one could expect from someone actually wanting to fix their problems:

• Laptop model
• Motherboard
• Amount of RAM
• Audio interface
• Driver version
• version of Live
• 32bit or 64bit
• version of Max 4 Live
• Max devices in use
• what plug-ins in use
• When and in what situations crashes occur
• What Ableton support has said about your issues
• Why you are whining to us instead of talking to Ableton support

I know plenty of people using Ableton Live on Windows 7, most of which seem to be able to use Live 9.1.x without the issues you're describing. Of course these people are music producers and therefore researched exactly what to get that they knew beforehand would work with their audio interface, Live, plug-ins and all other external gear that they use. In short they know what they're doing.

[mmorgan]

I'm running Live 9 Suite on both a rack mount and a laptop with both running Windows 8.1. I'm not experiencing any of the type of issues the OP is describing and I think most users have similar performance. This leads me to believe that the issue is local to some aspect of the OP's installation/configuration.

As others have said, post your spec's and then see if someone on the forum sees something that rings a bell. If not then I would fill out a trouble ticket with Ableton support because clearly it is not Live nor is it Windows.

Hope you get it settled, I know it can be frustrating.

[login]

I always thought companies as ADK are a rip off, kind of the Apple bussiness model adapted to windows.

[mekanism1200]

Warning Rant Alert!…

[RANT] If Ableton favors OSX than they just should NOT sell on Windows at all!

To me it doesn't sound like as if you haven't done the research you need to do when making music on Windows.

This info is what one could expect from someone actually wanting to fix their problems:

• Laptop model
• Motherboard
• Amount of RAM
• Audio interface
• Driver version
• version of Live
• 32bit or 64bit
• version of Max 4 Live
• Max devices in use
• what plug-ins in use
• When and in what situations crashes occur
• What Ableton support has said about your issues
• Why you are whining to us instead of talking to Ableton support

I know plenty of people using Ableton Live on Windows 7, most of which seem to be able to use Live 9.1.x without the issues you're describing. Of course these people are music producers and therefore researched exactly what to get that they knew beforehand would work with their audio interface, Live, plug-ins and all other external gear that they use. In short they know what they're doing.

I put a rant disclaimer at the top. If you didnt want to read a post that read as whining then you shouldnt have responded, but I can play nice and post what you ask-
ADK P17 Laptop
Core I7-3740QM @2.7ghz OC'd to 3.8 GHz
8 gigs Ram
Presonus Audiobox 22vsl with latest driver
Latest versions of Live and M4L
Windows 7 Pro 64 bit service pack 1
Max devices, a bunch of Sonic Faction stuff, and mostly included suite devices. Granulator 2 now crashes any time I try to add it, even with an empty project. Crashes occur upon loading projects with devices, when adding them, many different scenarios.
I have only contacted support once a while ago and they told me to read the manual. I have submitted about 75% of the crashes through the reporting system and was hoping that would be sufficient enough for them to see an issue but I was wrong.

My intention with the post was mainly out of frustration after dealing with these problems on a very expensive program, where other expensive programs I own dont have these issues. I also wanted to see if others were as frustrated as I am. I did my homework before spending the close to $3k I have in this stuff and that's why I went with an ADK system as it was only a few hundred more $ than buying a Lenovo that many people recommend.

I will try contacting Ableton again.