Ableton 12 Finally Fixed their Latency Issue!!
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- Опубліковано 16 чер 2024
- Yup, I'm talking about a new feature that's kind of hidden, but it's called 'Keep Latency'. If you're struggling with your drum computer or synth recordings being late, then this will totally solve all your issues.
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0:00 The Issue
1:53 The Solution
3:26 Driver Error Compensation
4:50 MIDI Latency
yes, that is by far the best feature in live 12 for me
Super helpful, was looking for this
I’ve been searching for ages for a tutorial like this! Thank you very much!
No way? This has been around still all these years? Damn i remember back near ~2005 when I was testing various DAWS, this was a major deal breaker for my setup and workflow and ended up using Cubase because i didn't get this problem.
Wow. Nearly 20 years later 😮 its finally addressed.
lol yeah same, just like splitting notes, but better late than never I guess 😅
I'm sorry, but WHAT. How has anyone ever taken ableton seriously with such a basic thing missing, that should have been included ON RELEASE? Are ableton users masochists? Jesus H Christ this is absolutely insane...
@@jonirischx8925 The problem has been solved, but the program will keep recording with latency unless you activate the fix, which is hidden LOL
Finallyyyyyyyy! Thank you for sharing!
Thanks for this! Succinct and informative.
Wow super cool, funny this didnt get much or any buzz at all as it was frustrating af. Thanks for sharing!
Added this to my Ableton must have tips playlist
Thank You! What a great video.
this is dooope thanks man!
Excellent. Thank a lot dude!
Nice thanks for this. This is a must-watch IMO. Finally in 2024 this is fixed!
Indeed, better late than never 😅
I am very grateful for this video. Thank you for explaining the latency issues and how to resolve them in 12.
As an aside, I remember being in a discussion on the Ableton forum over 10 years ago where the whole thread was exactly about this issue - i.e. Ableton Live would "compensate" for latency by adding its own delay instead of letting users work out how to deal with it best for themselves. It is the absolute worst implementation of dealing with latency I have ever come across. None of the other DAW's I have used (Reaper, Cubase, Logic) had this stupid approach. Not only is one, as a musician, trying to deal with latency whilst recording, but now you have Ableton doing a completely counter-intuitive thing that messes up the recording process even further. But what really blew me away was the arrogance of the Ableton tech guy trying to explain it away on the forum, saying that, actually, this process was "better" than what literally every other user suggested - he was obviously parroting what his bosses told him to say. I came within in an inch of giving up on Ableton right then and there as it was abundantly clear that Ableton was more interested in protecting their ego-invesment in going down this path than listening to their users... and the sheer arrogance of that didn't bode well. Even now, that they have finally implemented an option that should have been implemented years ago, it blows me away that their traditional approach is the default and one has to dig through multiple menus to choose the more sane option. I wish Ableton would get out of their own way sometimes.
I totally agree, this is the main reason I always went back to Cubase for recording. I get that they're trying to make Ableton as streamlined and easy to use as possible, but giving users the option to tweak things is always the better option.
So many useful revelations, thank you!
In fact, wow, just did a test - - really, really big difference. Anyone used to compensating for that delay in previous Abletons will think this is right on beat, really. I just thought I didn't have the right gear - now I do!
Nice to hear that man, glad it isn't your gear :)
Bedankt! Goeie video!
Ooo, the video I’ve been looking for!
Clear explanation, Thanks
Thx for the explanation man.
That was useful. Thank you.
I've always used the external instrument feature on a midi track for this and then had an audio track taking in the audio from the ext-instrument track.
Has the advantage of compensating whilst playing back the instrument in-synch live, before recording. Keep latency seems possibly more useful for tracking recording of acoustic instruments...?
Great video, thanks! I do however think it's a better solution to compensate for midi latency using the External instrument device rather than fiddling with the track delay.
Place an External Instrument device on the MIDI track, set the correct audio channels there- then on the Audio Track you wish to record to, remember to set the audio input to the External Instrument device. People often forget this and set the audio in to their audio interface input channels. Super easy to miss this. Great way to waste hours troubleshooting MIDI track to Audio track latency
Steinberg with Cubase managed to solve this problem with ASIO Guard like loads of years ago
Ableton is a sketchbook. Cubase is a factory.
Cubase is much older than Ableton…
I would not have thought of that
Latency was the main reason i left Ableton Live. I was really sick of it. Between all those DAW alternatives i decided to give a try on Reaper and i was amazed that it can do everything that every major DAW's do, it is fast, light on CPU, really really flexible and adjustable, it have major community support, many many of good freebies and it doesn't have that really annoying latency problem no matter how many heavy plugins you put on a track and i use the default DAW settings. I'm still on Reaper DAW ever since.
Thanks, did not know!
finally!thanks for the tip.
Hey man thanks for sharing! I have a question: sometimes when I create a new track and record the audio from an existing track, the dynamic range of the recorded audio is different from the original audio. Do you know why? It can happen during resampling too, even after I turn off all the plugins in the master channel.
Maybe you're clipping your track? There's no problem peaking on an individual track, since it's 32 bit float. And try to keep your fader at zero. Otherwise I can't think of anything.
Damn, why didn’t the ableton support telll me, that I’d just have to turn monitoring off all those years? also awesome feature for me in live 12, finally
😮😅
They did tell you though, it’s in the manual!!
Hi do you know if Push 3's audio interface has 'direct monitoring' integrated? I'm using it to record vocals and when I monitor my audio in for recording I still get that slight doubling sound. The recorded audio is fine as you'd expect. So how can I monitor my vocal whilst singing without the doubling using Push 3 as my interface? Great content btw 👌
I don't have a Push 3 so I can't confirm this but I doubt it has a direct monitoring path to be honest. The only way to get around this is with a mixer or external pre-amp. Maybe if you lower the buffer size enough, it's not as noticeable.
@optoproductions I read it doesn't which has annoyed a lot of people. However the interface isn't the reason i bought it. Trouble is another interface = one less slot on the dongle 😵💫
Thanks❤
Wow , finally!
Ableton will add an additional sample at bounce as well (if your session is 48kHz and you bounce you’ll have a 0.02 ms delay on each track, it’s annoying especially if you work with timecode)
Oh yes that's annoying indeed, that's why I still use Nuendo for detailed editing and video work.
@@optoproductions I still don’t get why they don’t make it a decent experience when it comes to working with videos, I don’t want ProTools or Cubase features but at least make it viable without obstacles and problems in the way, no wonder you have to use other DAWs (and rightly so)
@@micheler.3439 yeah I'm not sure, maybe a lack of budget or demand. It took them long enough to add a simple note splitting feature haha. All we can do is hope it gets better.
Hey thanks for this video! Do you know how to turn the 'ms' button (next to keep latency) yellow? Mine are grey in Ableton 12. Thanks!
Maybe delay compensation is turned off in the options menu? Or Ableton is following an external clock.
@@optoproductions Thanks I'll check :)
I found a trick ....I create a duplicate track set to IN then record first track set to OFF, this gets me results i can cancel out (perfect render) ..im still in 11. soo anyone else using 11 this will work for you, same idea. Also I would freeze/flatten the midi-track if your going to use it to check against the recording.. Midi just the trigger, sound might have a later start time, who knows. Thanks for the info, nice video
Yes I briefly explained this, that's what most people used to do. But you can't really freeze a MIDI track though, as there's nothing to freeze.
I was using driver error compensation since live 10, had to manually dial in the latency in ms
Yeah i record my external synths totally different. ive always used the external instrument device and just dail in the delay on that device. I then save that external hardware device as a preset so its ready to go for any session for delay free recording.
Each of my hardware synths has its own external device setup and saved in Ableton so i can just drag the device onto an audio track and go.. each synth or hardware effect has different latency settings depending on different variables. Like i run some of my stufg through an ADAT and some through my main interface, they both have different latency. I just save that latency delay setting into the external audio device plugin and also the audio I/O. I never record my external audio through the actual channel input like you have here, i have over 24 channels of I/O so i would hate to be constantly sellecting which channels i want.
It takes a little work to set up and save individual external audio effect plugins as presets but once its setup its super quick and easy .
That's a good solution as well, but when it comes time to record do you then add another audiotrack with the external instrument track as an input? My main struggle with external instruments is the offline bouncing aspect.
@@optoproductions Yep - I do just that - have a midi track with the ext-instrument, and then an audio track for recording. Been doing it that way for some time now.
I can't believe they finally did it.
yes finally!!!!!!!!
Live 12 should be free, latency fix is not a feature and what they offer in the upgrade is not an upgrade, it’s an update. That’s why I switched daw and not going back to ableton
Thanks for an epic video - I implemented immediately. I noticed you have been replying to answers in the comments, so I thought I'd chance my arm at asking a question, if you have any insight or ideas. I Send CV clock from Ableton to start my modular synth. (I use the Expert Sleepers ES9 interface, and the clock starts my "pamela's new workout" module.) I do not use midi. I record my audio tracks back in to ableton via the same ES9 audio interface. While your video has massively helped reduce the recording latency, I am still seeing around a 12ms delay when recording. Have you any idea how I can make it so the kick drum (and all recordings) line up on the grid, without the delay? I would love to be able to mix in audio samples from ableton into my performances, but due to the recording latency, the ableton tracks are never in time. Many thanks to anyone who may be able to point me in the right direction.
If you go to preferences > MIDI, you can set a delay for the MIDI clock. That's separate from sending out MIDI notes.
Thanks. So even though its not a midi clock, it's cv tools, it still is managed by that? I will try it. Many thanks
Try using an external instrument ableton device, I think it's the proper way to record synth
use resampling
It's still 'broken' in a sense because when I use Cubase for instance, I don't have these types of issues that I have when I record hardware synths in Ableton.
This is definitely an improvement, but they need to find a better way to manage delay compensation.
It now works exactly the same. I also use Cubase or rather Nuendo and you'll never get rid of latency completely because each hardware device needs some time to process information.
@@optoproductions I understand but my point is that out of the box Cubase doesn't have 'hidden' buttons you have to toggle on. It just does it out of the box.
Also, if you're not running Live 12 you're still dealing with the issue.
@@JayKaufman that's absolutely true 👍👍
@@optoproductions so in some ways this is a bad aid solution. I don't even know why they have that button to toggle it off. I can't think of anyone who would *want* latency when monitoring! 😄
Right, I don't use Live, please tell me why this is an option to toggle
Live 12 and still no PDC fix? PDC at its current state is why un-knowledgeable Live users claim it sounds worse then other DAWs. Its not the audio engine, its the PDC not doing its job!
Sorry, thats not correct at all.
Plugin latency compensation is rock solid since years. What Ableton doesn't compensate is the host transport information.
When you have a plugin thats relies on this information, like LFO Tool, VolumeShaper etc. the action of those are affected, because the host transport time based adjustments are done too early if plugins introduce latency prior them.
If you have multi fx like transit with a bpm delay, the delay reacts perfectly fine because it reacts synced to bmp but not synced to host transport, while the pumping module of the same plugin doesn't it will duck to soon. In other words the audio stream itself is always properly compensated but the actions of host transport syncing plugins aren't. Take a 1 bar kick loop with a long decay, place a Pro Q 3 in linear phase mode in front of the LFO tool in the standard preset, bounce it, you will see that the the first transient / the start of the kick will still be in place but the LFO tool has left a "bump" in the decay between the first and second kick but the beginning and and end of the kick itself didn't shift , the kick will still hit in the right position while the actions of the LFO Tool aren't. thats a different thing than PDC. To describe whats wrong in Ableton we should introduce the term HTIDC meaning "Host Transport Delay Information" PDC describes only the own latency a plugin reports, the next plugin has always the correct information about this.
Anyway its a bad design and most other DAWS solved this better.
@@rez9159 Alright, thanks for clearing that out! I did not know this. So the latency and muddy sounding problem is there, I’ve tested it and confirmed it like you, but it’s made by a different thing than I thought. A fix tip for those who don’t know: What made it a lot less pronounced through my tests was exporting the final mixes with as low sample rate size as possible. 128 or 64 samples if possible tightened up the overall muddying effect of the sum of all these various plugin latencies a lot. In my experience a lot of producers are not aware of this “fix” and some of them complain about ableton having an inferior sound engine when actually it does not. They just use the wrong word to describe an existing problem. What they mean to say is that their mixes sounds more muddy with Ableton then in other daws. I wish Ableton was better at explaining this fix that I use. Maybe they are embarrassed to admit it in the first place, because admitting this fix will also reveal them indirectly acknowledging the problem.
Those who didn't have PDC until recently are FL users, but it has finally been added there too. However, I've certainly used Ableton Live very little so you know it better than me, but for the little time I've used it, I honestly haven't had any problems with bad audio or latency. I've never had latency problems in any DAW, after understanding how the buffer works... I hear bad audio problems in FL and I also have that thought like "they should redesign the audio engine", maybe it's not that the problem, but instinctively that's what I think... but I think it's aimed at FL, not Live, I actually like the sound of Live a lot, it's a DAW that I don't use much just because I'm not a fan of the interface, I prefer something else. ..but from a technical point of view I have never had any problems in Live.
For easy audio/midi/fx in synch everything with everything , use Ableton as slave machine /as master use a hardware seq with minimal clock MIDI PPQN 480 ticks... ENJOY
does that solve the issues mentioned here or something else ?
It was a bug and should be repaired in version 11. This is the main reason I switched to bitwig and it was the best choice.
My thing with Ableton is it got live at the end of there name it's suppose to be the best when comes to live sets yet u can't use it live with out big problems
Why logic can create a low latency knob that allows you to record midi without latency and ableton can not? think about it
Yup, glad it's finally added to Ableton now :)
Is this feature available for all Ableton 12 variants?
I can't confirm this as I don't have standard, but it's an essential feature that's part of live, so I'm sure it will.
What about "Reduce Latency when Monitoring" in options menu?
That helps to reduce the latency a bit but not as much as this option.
and why isn't keep latency just off on default? or maybe automatically turned on when tracks are record enabled??
I think you can right click the track and save as default
So the latency setting in the midi preferences is redundant?
No that one's for MIDI clock, if you've got a drum computer or sequencer that's playing early or late.
Abelton 11 is fine here with a uad apollo but I beta tested 12 didn’t like it personally didn’t feel 250 was worth a minor update , rather get Logic 11 imo
i recently got a new audio interface ( focusrite solo), but ever since i have it my midi keyboard is pretty much useless. even on 128 samples i have a latency. its impossible to use at the moment. When playing it plays the first note when i already hit the second note and it really throws me off. I was using asio4all and i was hoping this sound card would make it better, but i am worse off then using asio4all :(.
That's weird man, I've never had any issues with Focusrite. Are you sure you downloaded the correct drivers? Maybe there are different versions, definitely send Focusrite an email.
Why you use Asio for all of you have interface? Use their dedicated software
Sadly this doesn't work on my system where I'm triggering my modular synth via Clock from Ableton over USB MIDI to the FH-2 module. The only way I can reduce latency in a meaningful way is to reduce my Buffer size down to 64 or 32 (normally work at 512). At 512 Buffer I get about 87ms latency no matter what I do. What baffles me is with the exact same setup my latency in Logic is only a fraction of that in Ableton, and in fact is almost useable at 512 Buffer!
You can change MIDI clock delay in the preferences menu, under the MIDI tab. This is separate from sending out notes, which I'm talking about in the video.
@@optoproductionsThanks will take a look later. I have tried the MIDI notes directly to an external synth as your method and still get massive latency on my system even with the settings you show in the video. As I said it’s crazy that I don’t get this happening with Logic.
@@redlester oke that is very strange. Maybe Ableton is running in rosetta mode, if you're on a M1 Mac?
@@optoproductionsNo am on an Intel Mac. 2013 Mac Pro, with UAD Apollo 8 interface. I didn’t know about the MIDI clock delay option will check later am not at the computer right now.
@@optoproductions OK I owe you several drinks sir, the MIDI clock delay works perfectly for what I need. Thank you so much!
Do you prefer to use a MIDI track instead of an Ext Inst device for external synths? If so why?
I forgot that was a thing. Does this solve similar issues for you?
This was a workaround but I like to keep my MIDI and Audio separate. This way I can overdub and use take lanes, and you can use track delay on MIDI tracks.
@@optoproductions midi tracks using a ext. inst device will still let u overdub/take lanes and compensates for specific hardware latency. I still get latency when recording midi data into Live even if reduced latency is on so I started using MIDI tracks how you are and monitoring outside of ableton. Works well so far but I miss being able to use Live's FX before printing audio :(.
@@MikhailBeltran Ah that's right! I forgot about that option. I'm just so used to separate audio and MIDI tracks. Also, when I'm using hardware sequencers, I just send MIDI clock and skip the MIDI track altogether. I believe you also have to disable the external instruments on export, otherwise it would still bounce offline.
Is not easier to just record and drag the sound to de desired start?
Easier than turning on one option?
@@RooftopKoreansMusic i'm using a hardware synth here, MIDI is just data, so there's no way of monitoring notes without an audio track.
wtf how.. thx dude i was desperate
very good tipp, btw if you use an rme audio interface, the driver error is 0 samples. rme is the only brand I know that is spot on acurate. others vary, depending on the buffer size. compensating midi latency is difficult, because it can vary and drift. this is because its a serial protocol and depends on how many midi informations are transmitted at a time.
I am using a RME Digiface, ADAT ports may have a bit of latency
@@optoproductions yes they have latency (every interface has it), but the driver is reporting the correct latency to the software, the error is 0 samples.
@@ctestestestest oke, not in my case it was 0,5 milliseconds, but that's good enough to me ;)
@@optoproductions interesting to hear, did you mesure it with the rtl utility from oblique audio?
@@ctestestestest I just eye-balled it, I'd have to check it with Cubase as I can measure it more accurately there, but this also seems like a helpful tool 👍
Man, why didn’t you use external instrument device for all those years? You‘d have perfectly synced recordings all the time.
I'm so glad the finally fixed this headache - only took them 12 versions. Thanks for the tip. How stable is the clock? Do you have any tips on using live with external sequencers or do I need to buy a midironome or erm multiclock?
Haha true 😆 I typically have no issue running clock signals to drum machines or sequencers. You can set a clock delay in the preferences menu, and I usually let it run for a bar as the clock may need some time to catch up
Buy a Multiclock if you can….definitely worth it.
this fix is not done through proper plugin delay compensation, right?
Delay compensation always worked, but now also when monitoring.
@@optoproductions delay compensation never worked, at least not as expected. Here is what I mean: Put a latency heavy plugin on a track & put LFO tool, shaperbox or any other time linked plugin after it, said plugin is not in sync with the project. This is because ableton is the only DAW which compensates delay per track, not per plugin. While this makes sense in a live performance setting as the overall latency will be lowest, in a production setting, this gets annoying quickly. I've always believed for ableton it should be togglable to choose between per plugin & per track compensation and I was hoping that this was that too...
@@Projektor_music Ah thanks for clarifying. Unfortunately, you're right, this hasn't been fixed.
@@optoproductions yeah unfortunate...
wow
works with vocals?
It works with anything, with Vocals I'd still recommend direct monitoring though.
@@optoproductions but even with zero latency plugins ?
Not an Live user I was merely curious... This was actually an issue that didn't get sorted until 2024? That's insane 😂
And still not fixed version 12
what about recording vocals ?
I always use direct monitoring for that.
@@optoproductions still latency - the only way to solve it before ableton 12 , was to have to audio one on "auto" the other on "off" , record both of them at the same time and keep the "off" version , i wonder if that can solve our issue with vocals ... please make a video it would be very helpful to a lot of people :)
@@numero-_-uno if you use direct monitoring on your audio interface or a hardware mixer, there is no latency, as you're monitoring before your audio enters the computer.
@@optoproductions you are wrong - check it , everyone knows it ... look it up on youtube n check it for yourself and then make a video for us who dont have ableton 12 yet to see if the pro blem still persists - thank you
So using a P.A. or fancy speakers "doesn't make sense at all"?
I have no idea what you mean
Massive W.
get global sampler vst
i don't use ableton but it captures live information
this sounds absolutely jank , we have no problems like this in reaper
There's no problem anymore :)
1 step forward 2 steps back though, plugin latency compensation feels BUSTED in live 12
Did you turn it on in the options menu? I don't notice any difference compared to live 11.
Why do they have the keep latency option at all? Why would anyone ever want latency?
No idea 😄
oh i thought this was about hardware latency.. a real issue... lol
Why would you want "Keep Latency" turned on?
Good question 😄
anyone else's live 12 crashing after a few hours of work/trying to save projects etc.
I've had some crashes with one project, not sure why though
It's rediculous for Ableton to say that the reason the latency is there on midi is because "with real instrument people play with slighly early timing to compensate" YEAH...we do that BECAUSE OF THE LATENCY! 🤦
That explanation makes absolutely NO sense lol because if the latency wasn't there people wouldn't have to compensate in the first place 😂. I know it's just a thing we have to deal with when playing guitars and stuff...but why add it to the midi also? We still would much preffer to not have to deal with that lol.
Haha yeah well it makes sense, I remember when I started drumming to a click track, it always sounded different after the recording then during recording. That's exactly the reason Ableton is talking about. I compensated for the latency with my playing and because Cubase shifted the recording to the right place afterward, it sounded off.
But leaving this option on by default doesn't make sense to me though, at least now we have the option to change it.
@optoproductions Exactly... it never makes sense to shift internally recorded audio to the right if there's practically no latency involved. It should just not do that by default
It's better latency compensation.
There is no such thing as zero latency.
If a signal moves from one place to another, you're going to have latency. It's physically impossible under normal circumstances to have zero latency.
Yup 👍
for sure but 30ms of latency its not something normal. Other daws its basically 0.5ms of latency by default
I recall 3phase continuously complaining about that issue on the Ableton User Forum…
Anyone know why audio will be latent even with monitoring off I don’t even touch monitoring
What are you trying to record? There will always be latency, but there are various solutions to make it acceptable.