Ableton Forum

Hi there,

I’m new to this forum, but I’ve been an Ableton user for many years and I just wanted to check a point relating to RAM usage in Ableton.

Basically, my issue is that it appears Ableton 10 is running out of memory (as plugins refuse to be added in complex sets), so I’m considering buying more RAM.

However, when I check Task Manager in Windows, it indicates Ableton is using 2.5Gb of Ram – whereas I have 16Gb in the PC...

My questions are therefore:

1) Will adding more RAM will solve this problem?

2) Is there any way to make Ableton utilise more RAM? (I presumed this is managed automatically)


It would be great to hear people’s thoughts on this.

I’ve attached more details below.

Many thanks

Owen.

PC is brand new Core i9 9900K with 16Gb DDR4 3200Mhz RAM
Windows 10 Professional 64 bit (high performance mode etc, as per Ableton guidance)
Ableton Live 10
Thunderbolt interface to Focusrite Clarett 8 Pre
UAD2 Quad card
Plugins in set include BFD3, Battery 4, Kontakt, Analogue Lab 3, and various effects
Most tracks are Frozen (which I understand doesn’t release RAM…)
CPU Usage is about 35% during set

In the complex set, with BFD3 etc frozen, when I try to add a VST to a track, I get an error saying "Some plugins cannot be loaded or are disabled" "This VST is not compatible with Live" (when it's a plugin that I've used many times in Live) ..... However, if I then flatten the track to audio, I can then add the plugin without a problem!

(I'm aware this workaround of flattening tracks is discussed elsewhere, but my query is more in relation to whether buying more RAM will fix this problem to avoid using the flattening workaround)

This link --> https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/artic ... ry-crashes suggests that problems with "Adding devices or presets" is due to lack of memory

Dont necessarily sound like a Ram issue.

A good sign you are running into RAM issues is if your disk usage meter is high.

Not necessarily a bad problem unless you are getting glitches.

That said you probably want at least 8 gigs but it all depends on your usage.

Thanks for the response.

I agree that it doesn't seem like a RAM issue (I have 16Gb of RAM, and Live is only using about 2.5Gb), but I'm not sure why else this problem arises?

All I am trying to do is load a VST plugin, and Ableton is refusing to load it unless I flatten a track (and I'm aware flattening tracks frees up RAM) - so what else could it be, and how can I fix this?

Is this simply a bug in Live 10?

Cheers,

Owen

I don't know but it could possibly an actual CPU issue. Some i5 Processors like the one I have could be causing the problem, or even a driver issue in Windows however it's probably most likely that it's not these.

However, the reason that I'm posting a reply here is because I'm having a similar issue (but in reverse). I am running Ableton and Windows task manager is telling me that it's using 1.8 GB of ram. I only have 8 GB of ram. Should I invest in more ram or is there a way to fix this within software?