Am I getting the best out of my IMAC & Ableton
Results 1 to 8 of 8
  1. #1
    Tech Wizard
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    West Yorkshire
    Posts
    71

    Default Am I getting the best out of my IMAC & Ableton

    So I bought a new Imac 27 about 4 weeks ago having come from a PC background for years. However I have found the sound playback quality in Ableton to contain interferacance, glitches and pops.

    When I use the reverb effect and very long effect there is lots of distortion and crackling. This is the same with a beat repeat etc

    Sometimes the bass of a loop pinks and sounds glitchy rather than smooth, at other times it sounds flawless.

    CPU is working at max 65% when I have 8 audio channels playing with effects on each channel. I expected there to be no glitches in play back as the Imac Spec is quite good (i5 4gb ram).

    The latency is approx 9 sec and error compensation 0. The samples I have set to arround 200, I am not sure whether this is any good, however there seems to be no improvement when I adjust the values.

    I am using a saphire pro 14 firewire sound card and a vestax vcm 600 midi controller and also novation launchpad.

    Would being connected to the internet via wifi effect performance? Should I have certain programs closed whilst using ableton (I often have itunes open too)

    I expected playback to be flawless, however at the momment it is omparable to the same setup I had with my 2gb windows pc.

    Any advice / help would be much appreciated.

  2. #2
    Tech Guru TommyQuiet's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2009
    Location
    NorthWest,UK
    Posts
    1,468

    Default

    it might be your soundcard get the latest drivers etc... and yes turn wifi off

    i came from pc to mac a few weeks ago and will never go back to windows for music/audio stuff,macs just work so yes just check your sound card and your latency mess about with the settings

  3. #3
    Tech Guru mostapha's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Atlanta
    Posts
    4,748

    Default

    You mentioned distortion…where are your levels peaking?

  4. #4
    Tech Wizard
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    West Yorkshire
    Posts
    71

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by mostapha View Post
    You mentioned distortion…where are your levels peaking?
    levels are fine all in the green (all volume set to maximum 0db, master with limiter)

  5. #5
    Tech Wizard PIX-1138's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    Columbia, MO
    Posts
    51

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Mintaka View Post
    I have found the sound playback quality in Ableton to contain interferacance, glitches and pops.
    Quote Originally Posted by AboveDat! View Post
    it might be your soundcard get the latest drivers etc... and yes turn wifi off
    Quote Originally Posted by AboveDat! View Post
    macs just work
    Am I the only one that sees a problem here?
    traktor pro
    numark total control
    numark djiosennheiser hd 205
    toshiba qosmio x505-q885
    windows 7 home premium 64-bit

  6. #6
    Tech Wizard
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    West Yorkshire
    Posts
    71

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by PIX-1138 View Post
    Am I the only one that sees a problem here?
    I checked my latency settings did the test using the test tone and the 80% simulated cpu usage...these were the values

    input and out put latency 2.83 ms
    overall latency 5.67 ms

  7. #7
    Tech Guru mostapha's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Atlanta
    Posts
    4,748

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by PIX-1138 View Post
    Am I the only one that sees a problem here?
    No, but I can't replicate his problems. He's doing something wrong.

    @OP,

    You said your levels are all in the green and you're using a master limiter…what are you individual channels actually peaking at…i'm looking for numbers here. And about how much limiting are you getting?

    Also 5.67ms latency might be just a bit low. I have no such problems on an older macbook running similar things with 6ms latency and the FS Open firewire sound card. But, keep in mind that you do need to increase that value if you're using a lot of effects or synths. 10ms is not unheard of, and it really doesn't matter that much.

    Other than that, my only suggestion would be to find a sound card that doesn't need drivers. I'm not sure if your sapphire 14 does or not. I know I'm in the minority with it, but every single sound card I've ever had to install on OS X that required drivers gave me problems. I've never had problems with the Core Audio compliant interfaces that I just plugged in.

    Also, what OS X and Live versions are you running?

  8. #8
    Tech Guru MaxOne's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Location
    London, UK
    Posts
    2,942

    Default

    + 1 Core Audio compliant interfaces
    CLUB OF JACKS - RELEASES >>TRAXSOURCE
    Club of Jacks are a London based House & Garage production / DJ duo with releases on a number of underground labels including Plastik People Recordings, Blockhead Recordings, Hi Energy!, Pocket Jacks Trax, Soul Revolution Records and their own Club of Jacks imprint.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •