Ableton Forum

When you connect the tethered Push 3, and turn it on for the first time, and open Live, what exactly is supposed to happen?

When I first turned on my Push 3, I noticed an OS message briefly notifying me that a new device was detected and a driver was installed, but I do not recall its name - because, unfortunately, I didn't pay much attention to what it was called because I was more excited about using my long-awaited Push3.... <sigh - lesson learned>

In Windows Device Manager, under "Other Devices", it lists "Ableton Push 3 Display", and "Ableton Push 3 xPort", and both devices have the error message:

"The drivers for this device are not installed. (Code 28)
There is no driver selected for the device information set or element."

Even though, as mentioned above, a driver was installed when I turned my Push 3 on for the first time.

There is a process called "Push3.exe" running. (I checked for any Push 3 related processes in Task Manager.)

Is "Push3" supposed to appear in the drop-down of control surfaces in Preferences? And if not, what am I supposed to choose? The drop-down lists "Push" and "Push2", among all of the huge list of other companies' products.

This section in Preferences does show now (after upgrading Live to 11.3.10) two Push 3 MIDI inputs and two MIDI outputs and their respective check-boxes. These options were NOT present until I upgraded Live to 11.3.10 today.

When I turn Push 3 on when Live is NOT running, the Push displays the following message: "Connect Push to a computer and open Live to make music".

Then when I open Live, the octave pads then light up white and "breathe". So something is being communicated between Push 3 and Live... I would think.

I'm using a USB-C to USB-3 adapter between the USB-C cable included with my Push, and my laptop USB port. (I have the tethered version of Push.) Is that problematic? (I've tried inserting the USB-C connector into the adapter both ways. No luck.)

I can't find any information about this white, breathing octave light problem anywhere, except from another user on this forum, but they had a different problem, that just happened to display the same "symptoms".

My Push 3 has never shown anything in the screen above the pads but the message I mentioned above about connecting to a computer. No firmware updates, like when I turned on my Push 2 for the first time - nothing but what I described above.

I have relaunched Live, rebooted my computer, held the Push power button down for 10 seconds.... I'm a novice, I've exhausted my limited troubleshooting abilities.

When I held the power button down for 10 seconds, the "Save" button on the Push lit up in green. I pressed that Save button. Then I tried holding it down for a little longer. I tried holding both the Save button down while holding the power button down. However, nothing changed in this situation.

I have Push 2 - is there some uninstall process I needed to do - can there be some conflict? I simply unplugged Push 2, and plugged in Push 3. (I didn't see anything about uninstalling Push 2 in the Push 3 online manual.)

I am running Windows 7. Live runs fine. Push 2 works fine. I had contacted Ableton customer support before I ordered - specifically to ask if Push 3 worked with Windows 7. They said Push would run if Live 11.3 and above would run. I've had no issues with Live 11.3. So I bought the tethered Push 3 when it became available.

Quite nervous because the clock is ticking - less than 30 days of the return period, and technical support is majorly busy.

Any help, information, advice, would be really appreciated.

Sorry I'm not a Windows user so there's things I can't answer, but:

- Unlike Push 1 and 2, there's no Push3 in the Control Surfaces. So that's normal.
- I'd try another USB cable or adapter if possible (or try with another computer)
- The white "breathing" lights pattern is the startup process, nothing to worry about. Why it doesn't go further... that's the question.
- Can try turning Push on by holding the User button and pressing the power button. Are you seeing any options?

In any case, stay in touch with Support and don't worry about the 30 days period. Support is busy but is taking this into account regarding the 30 days return policy.

[jur] wrote: ↑

Wed Aug 23, 2023 12:17 am

Sorry I'm not a Windows user so there's things I can't answer, but:

- Unlike Push 1 and 2, there's no Push3 in the Control Surfaces. So that's normal.
- I'd try another USB cable or adapter if possible (or try with another computer)
- The white "breathing" lights pattern is the startup process, nothing to worry about. Why it doesn't go further... that's the question.
- Can try turning Push on by holding the User button and pressing the power button. Are you seeing any options?

In any case, stay in touch with Support and don't worry about the 30 days period. Support is busy but is taking this into account regarding the 30 days return policy.

Hi jur,

Thanks for your reply!

There are no user options when I press the User key when turning on my Push 3, unfortunately.

When it comes to the list of control surfaces, which should I select? Options for Push 3 do appear under the "Input" and Output" dropdowns, directly to the right of the "Control Surface" dropdown. Those options are "Ableton Push 3 MIDI (Port 2)" and "Ableton Push3 MIDI (Port 3)". It seems like some communication is going on between Live and Push - so close but so far!

I'll try on my other computer. Thanks for the advice!

apocatiel wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 28, 2023 3:46 pm

[jur] wrote: ↑

Wed Aug 23, 2023 12:17 am

Sorry I'm not a Windows user so there's things I can't answer, but:

- Unlike Push 1 and 2, there's no Push3 in the Control Surfaces. So that's normal.
- I'd try another USB cable or adapter if possible (or try with another computer)
- The white "breathing" lights pattern is the startup process, nothing to worry about. Why it doesn't go further... that's the question.
- Can try turning Push on by holding the User button and pressing the power button. Are you seeing any options?

In any case, stay in touch with Support and don't worry about the 30 days period. Support is busy but is taking this into account regarding the 30 days return policy.

Hi jur,

Thanks for your reply!

There are no user options when I press the User key when turning on my Push 3, unfortunately.

When it comes to the list of control surfaces, which should I select? Options for Push 3 do appear under the "Input" and Output" dropdowns, directly to the right of the "Control Surface" dropdown. Those options are "Ableton Push 3 MIDI (Port 2)" and "Ableton Push3 MIDI (Port 3)". It seems like some communication is going on between Live and Push - so close but so far!

I'll try on my other computer. Thanks for the advice!

You shouldn't have to select any control surfaces. So long as Push 3 is in control mode it's already established a connection and should be reflecting Live's state. With track MIDI input I just leave it on "all ins" unless you have MIDI coming in from other controllers / devices.

Having the exact same issue as the OP . Did support get to the bottom of this? Any solutions? Many thanks in advance for any advice.

I had this exact experience when first trying to activate controller version of Push 3. Discovered that the culprit was using USB-C to USB-C into a powered hub. When I tried USB-C to USB-A directly into my PC's port the problem was solved. Tech support had also told me to try disabling one of my graphics cards (I have both Intel HD and NIVDIA). Disabling NVIDIA (and the usb-c to usb-a connection) got Push working on my other computer, but on my main PC I'm able to run both graphics cards without a problem so long as Push is not connected thru a powered hub. Try both solutions and see if one works...
Hope this helps.

Thanks for the post, Alfonz3. It helped me find out that I was also having a problem connecting my Push 3 Standalone to control Ableton via the Ableton USB-C cable into the powered hub on a Mac, having exactly these symptoms. I've moved to using a USB-C to USB-A into the same hub, which seems to work, avoiding using up my Thunderbolt ports on the mac.

I'm posting to add this link to the thread though, Ableton is pretty specific about what USB hub power is required for the Push 3. From my experience you may have problems even if the Push power adapter is also installed. Perhaps my hub improperly negotiates the power it can offer over USB-C, or the Push 3 does, but I'd suspect the off brand hub.

https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/artic ... -power-FAQ

Hi all, just to reinforce the outcome of this thread: I’ve had issues like this with quite a few USB c devices (push and M49 mk3).

As a rule of thumb:

- always use the cable that comes with the device. There are a lot of different variations of cable that look like USB c (I.e. bog standard all the way up to Thunderbolt 5). Each have differences in power delivery and data throughput.

- if you need to connect to a USB hub or a device without a USB c port, don’t use a different cable (with different USB connections at each end). Use the official cable and put a small converter dongle on the end, so that it plugs in to whatever you need it to plug in to.
This is what I do for Push3 SA into a non-powered USB hub and is the only way it works (same with the s49 mk3).

- if still not working, always test with the original cable plugged DIRECTLY into your computer.

In my experience the culprit is always the usb cable or hub. Either it’s the wrong type of cable (even though it may look like a usb c cable, the intervals will likely be different). Or there’s a problem with the usb hub.


Hope that helps someone save a huge amount of frustration.

what is the cable spec that ship with push3 /standalone?

I've been experiencing this too for over a month now. I've tried different cables, plugging the Push 3 directly into the MacBook Pro, and I've also reinstalled Live and put the Push back on factory reset and had the same issues. I got in contact with Ableton today and I was told that enabling too many unnecessary midi ports can cause this. They told me to check my Sync settings so I made the correct adjustments and still had issues. Both Live and Push have been acting strange since the latest 12.1.1. update, at least for me. Upon a fresh startup of the MacBook Pro there will be a high chance of everything working fine but if the MacBook Pro is on but unused for some time and then you decide to open Live it will just bounce in the dock and not open. After several attempts it will open but then my Push 3 standalone will behave just like OP mentioned. It does detect movement on the pads and knobs it's just not fully connecting to the Live page. The other day I experienced a hot pink screen when Live opened and the only thing visible was the status bar for racks and devices. Hopefully this get's sorted out soon, I'm waiting for them to get back to me.

Update:

Both Live & Push received a 12.1.5 & 2.1.5 patch update today.

From my experience it seems Live's issues where it would bounce on the dock rather than opening have been resolved. There's mention of "Fixed an issue where Live would hang on startup." which I'm assuming was that but I can't confirm. If it starts doing it again I'll update this.

As for Push the issue where it detects Live but hangs on "Connect Push to a computer and open Live to make music" page still remains. There's no mention of any fix within the patch notes for 2.1.5 so I'm not sure if this is a bug still or if it's user error. The suggested changes from Ableton's support team were made within Live's MIDI settings. I've tried using my powered hub and going directly into the MacBook Pro itself, I've tried different cables including a USB-A to USB-c cable. All methods give the same results. This is using a bare template too and having reinstalled Live and factory resetting the Push.