LIVE audio best-practices

whiterabbit · Post by **whiterabbit** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 5:32 pm

I'm very new to Live (just bought it last week). I was searching the web tongight and found these posts on another site:

-Nobody produces or mixes down in Ableton (their offline rendering sounds like s#$@); and,
-Nobody renders down a mix in Ableton. It comes out sounding thin and muddy.

What I'm wondering is that, assuming the above is true, how are people using their LIVE audio? Is the issue specifically related to mixing-and-rendering, thus I could export individual tracks' audio and mix in another program (like Sonar)?

I'm just trying to understand what the best practices are for using Live and working around the aforementioned limitations.

Best Regards,
Max

laird · Post by **laird** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 6:26 pm

The web is a wonderful thing. I'm sure you can find posts claiming all sorts of erroneous things. That, and porn.

Some people do mix in other programs (Live lacks the crossfading and dithering capabilities of other DAWs) but you hardly need to do this.

Live, like any other DAW, abides by the golden rule

Garbage in garbage out

(I suspect people who are good at sonar will produce good mixes in Sonar but poor ones in Live. Its not Live's fault)

So relax, enjoy Live, you can produce very good tracks entirely in Live
No need to spend extra $$$$, especially on another DAW. Maybe good monitors, a good soundcard and pre-amps, good acoustic tratment for your studio... but not on another DAW.

whiterabbit · Post by **whiterabbit** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 6:31 pm

(I suspect people who are good at sonar will produce good mixes in Sonar but poor ones in Live. Its not Live's fault)

0

I was just using Sonar as an example (I already own it.) Cevin Key uses Logic for example.

Curious to hear more peoples opinions/experience on this topic.

Thanks!
max

Michael-SW · Post by **Michael-SW** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 7:15 pm

That has been proven to be bullshit.

Mixes done in Cubase and Live cancel each other out if one is subtracted from the other. If you use a lot of warped audio you might get sub par quality (but the same goes for heavy timestretching in any other DAW). Just mixing plain audio is a quite straight forward process and Live does it the same way as any other DAW.

whiterabbit · Post by **whiterabbit** » Sun Jul 01, 2007 3:43 pm

Yes I use warped audio, one of the primary reasons to use Live in the first place right?

Live definitely has it's strengths, but the mixer isn't one of them.

Best,
Max

hacktheplanet · Post by **hacktheplanet** » Sun Jul 01, 2007 5:55 pm

Personally, I could give a shit if Live's audio engine isn't up to par with PT or Cubase or Logic. I tend to believe that sounds pretty transparent, but there are lots of people who swear that Live's engine sucks.

If you're mixing down a track and mastering it yourself, you're probably making a mistake. Unless you have the knowledge, experience, and gear to do it properly, you'd be better off spending the money to hire an engineer and a professional studio. The engineer will use very expensive equipment and their skill to make the track perfect, something that an amateur producer would have a hard time doing in their bedroom with a pair of KRKs and free plugins from KVR.

So yeah, not that I agree, but perhaps Live's audio engine doesn't sound as good as other DAWs. However, if you're writing dance music, it probably doesn't matter much. All you really need is a solid groove. Stop worrying about the trivial shit and spend your time writing music!

whiterabbit · Post by **whiterabbit** » Sun Jul 01, 2007 6:41 pm

the_planet wrote:Personally, I could give a shit if Live's audio engine isn't up to par with PT or Cubase or Logic. I tend to believe that sounds pretty transparent, but there are lots of people who swear that Live's engine sucks.

If you're mixing down a track and mastering it yourself, you're probably making a mistake.

Mixing and mastering are two different things.

However, if you're writing dance music, it probably doesn't matter much. All you really need is a solid groove. Stop worrying about the trivial shit and spend your time writing music!

Not making dance music, and it's not a trivial waste of time for me. But appreicate your deep concern.

And I already own and know how to use Sonar 6 Producer Edition. Just writing to find out the best way to get audio out of Live. Think I got my answer. but surprised there are no user-defined dither options...

3dot... · Post by **3dot...** » Sun Jul 01, 2007 10:50 pm

whiterabbit wrote:I'm very new to Live (just bought it last week). I was searching the web tongight and found these posts on another site:

-Nobody produces or mixes down in Ableton (their offline rendering sounds like s#$@); and,
-Nobody renders down a mix in Ableton. It comes out sounding thin and muddy.

What I'm wondering is that, assuming the above is true, how are people using their LIVE audio? Is the issue specifically related to mixing-and-rendering, thus I could export individual tracks' audio and mix in another program (like Sonar)?

I'm just trying to understand what the best practices are for using Live and working around the aforementioned limitations.

Best Regards,
Max

Bollocks!

HolySpiritSoldier · Post by **HolySpiritSoldier** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 2:49 am

the_planet wrote: I tend to believe that sounds pretty transparent...

agree with you completely. I've used Pro-Tools, Cubase, Nuendo and Logic, and in my opinion Live produces as good quality sound as any of them.

Audio should be every bit as good as your hardware interface is capable of recording.
I use Live as mutitrack recording DAW (as well as a creative production tool, and live sampling/loop player for DJing), and the recorded audio is always exactly what I hear going in.

Regards the mixer capabilities, its just a matter of getting used to a different (superior) interface

3dot... · Post by **3dot...** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 8:58 am

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... highlight=

leisuremuffin · Post by **leisuremuffin** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 12:07 pm

whiterabbit wrote:Yes I use warped audio, one of the primary reasons to use Live in the first place right?

Live definitely has it's strengths, but the mixer isn't one of them.

Best,
Max

you bought it last week and you're an expert on the weakness of its mixer?

don't believe everything people say.

I get better mixes in live than a lot of people do in other software. I dont think that's because of the tech specs or feature set. I do think it's from knowledge and experience. oh well, whatever.

.lm.

friend_kami · Post by **friend_kami** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 2:23 am

laird wrote:
Garbage in garbage out

i like noise.
one mans junk is another mans treasure?

Jaberwookie · Post by **Jaberwookie** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 3:40 pm

I remember Ott (engineer/producer/composer/all-round-audio-badass: www.ottsonic.com) once did a test where he critically compared the internal summing of Live, Logic, Cubase and some other DAW (can't remember)...

his conclusion was something like "fuck knows how, but Live comes out on top"

whiterabbit · Post by **whiterabbit** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:02 pm

Jaberwookie wrote:I remember Ott (engineer/producer/composer/all-round-audio-badass: www.ottsonic.com) once did a test where he critically compared the internal summing of Live, Logic, Cubase and some other DAW (can't remember)...

his conclusion was something like "fuck knows how, but Live comes out on top"

You ever mixed in Sonar 64-bit?

Some words from Recording Magazine about 64-bit Sonar:

"While being able to mix and produce audio in double precision is a notably advanced capability, the combination with full compatibility with a 64-bit OS represents a force that is unmatchable by any competing DAW product. For the purpose of writing this review I decided to take the plunge and upgrade my OS to XP x64, which takes full advantage of the dual 64-bit cores of the CPU. To say that the results were dramatic would be somewhat of an understatement. In the 64-bit environment, SONAR is capable of accessing the full memory complement of my DAW (in actuality it would be able to access 128 GB of RAM if I had that much) in 64-bit words."

"SONAR is also code optimized to take full advantage of every pipe and nuance of current multi-core CPUs, so even in double-precision SONAR 6 runs more quickly using its 64-bit audio engine in the 64-bit OS than it does using a 32-bit engine in 32-bit XP Pro. I have found that I am able to nearly double my active plug-in count in the 64-bit environment. This latter improvement has been significant enough for me to drastically reduce my dependence on networked co-processing of plug-ins using FX-Teleport

dj superflat · Post by **dj superflat** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:38 pm

i love the "leave it to the pros" responses. if you're not already a pro yourself, you probably can't afford to hire a pro (few people pay a couple grand a day for a few weeks for a studio on their own nickel). and many minor league pros, the sort you find at your local studio, aren't guaranteed to do a much better job than a truly dedicate amateur. (even real pros screw things up when not given enough time, when they don't care, etc.)

LIVE audio best-practices

LIVE audio best-practices

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