Anyone running Ableton on PC laptop without lag/sound probs?

[yamaz]

I have ableton live 8.1 running on single core 3.0 ghz laptop running 2gb ram with 7200rpm hard drive with asio4all drivers and am maxing my cpu out before I can complete a song. But I don't have audio issues until cpu spikes.

Does anyone here have any problems with their pc laptop? I really don't want to get a macbook pro just to produce. I'm wondering if buying a newer dual core will fix this problem or if getting an external audio interface sound card will bring down cpu % usage.

Thx

[knobby_roots]

do you have vista?
is it 64 bit?

i ran ableton on a 64bit machine with the asio4all drivers and mine did the same thing.
i really think its vista.

im at the same point as you right now though, im replacing my hard drive atm and installing XP.

[yamaz]

I'm running windows XP 32-bit, sp3.

My friend had audio problems But not cpu spikes with his, so he switched over to xp and it only helped a little so he got a macbook pro instead.


I don't want to have to go the same route and I'm hoping some people here use a pc laptop without probs!

[gnome]

Yeah was using vista for ages without lag and my laptop nly has 120gb space, 1.7ghz dual core, 2gb ram

[yamaz]

What brand/model of laptop and did you have an external sound card/audio interface?

[yamaz]

Bump.

Come on you pc peepz, I need to upgrade soon and would ratharrr not get a mac!

[gnome]

What brand/model of laptop and did you have an external sound card/audio interface?

Advent 5301. no I didnt hav an external soundcard I used the built in soundcard.

[upstateface]

Running 8.0.4 on a processor that's a lot worse then yours and i'm fine.

[wayoftheworld]

im also running live 8 on a 3 year old acer aspire (piece of shit) and don't really have any problems. unless my hd is filled or ive got a bunch of synths running and doing something like browsing the net

i'll be switching over to a macbook pro within the month tho

[jaydot]

Nah, my CPU is pretty low.

[angryrancor]

I think the CPU spikes are because of all the VSTs and track channels eating up your cpu... Not the pc. Live renders the audio every time you hit the play button.

File->Save As your live project with a new name, then go through delete each track one by one and undo the delete after until you find the track that is smashing your CPU the hardest. Then freeze and flatten that sucker. Alternatively, just "save as" the track with a new name and then freeze and flatten everything you're done with. If you wanna edit it again later and need more than the waveform just pull it out of the file you save as'd.

That's what I do. And my PC has less horsepower than yours (2ghz single core 2gb ram). And I make crazy ass bullshit like this->

Soundcloud
Soundcloud
Soundcloud

and I usually have 20 tracks in the Ableton project by the time im done.

ps guyz how 2 maek excision bass????

lol just kidding

[abZ]

I know people are saying they are running less but the specs seem a little low. You should be able to run it but you are going to have to compromise. I use a core 2 quad with 4 gigs ram. I sometimes get pretty close to maxing it out and I honestly don't use a ton of tracks or vsti. I do use a lot of vst fx tho. I'd recommend not running more than an instance or two of a cpu heavy synth as most of them are really. You are going to have to learn to freeze and flatten some stuff to keep things running smooth.

[bum robot]

maybe try deleting a bunch of unneccasary things on your laptop, try keeping music and or samples/loops on an external hd or somewhere else, ive noticed the more you have on your comp the slower it runs atleast in my case it seems. OK so im running on xp sp3 with intel core 2 duo, 1.80ghz and 2.00 gb of ram,and using external soundcard and i beat the hell out of this thing but aside from ableton, vsts and some other things that is all i have on this comp if i need samples or anything else ill just plug in my external hd and bring it from there.. ill use this laptop for online browsing and whatnot btw. Also try looking for that thread on keeping your computer running well from awhile back sorry i dont remember the thread name, since that thread tho my laptop has been running beautifully. Hope thats of any help to you man.

[Stab Master Arson]

welcome to the board angryrancor... GHF not enough for ya? lol

Im running ableton on a Vista 64bit SP2 and I have problems almost everyday. Honestly I think it's vista. I'm rockin a Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2Ghz with 4Gbs ram, when I was using the asio4all drivers I didn't get far, especially when I tried connecting my electronic drumset to it. brutal latency. Now I've got it hooked up through an Maudio Fast Track pro and it works much better but still not flawlessly. I find my asio driver will crash between every 30 min - 1.5 hours and I'll have to shut down the fast track pro and restart it, kinda a pain in the ass, but I'm used to doing it now.

I won't be playing any live shows any time soon but this is a real concern of mine. Shit crashing live would be brutal. I fuckin hate macs and will not consider switching. I'm hoping formatting this computer keeping it barebones and running XP will solve my problem but thats a job I am not willing to undertake just now...

Which operating system do you guys find to be the most stable? I'm hearing the 32 bit versions are a little bit better till developers get more used to 64 bit, perhaps in a year or so? anyone agree?

[abZ]

I use Windows 7 on all computers now. I haven't used it much with Vista but I used Vista on my laptop for a couple years. Used it on XP too. Not sure I would blame the OS. Vista gets an unnecessary amount of flack. There is some things I don't like about it but honestly I found it fairly stable. Try dual booting your computer with XP and see if it does any better I dunno. I won't ever go back to XP at this point. Was a good OS for a long time tho.

[Stab Master Arson]

Yah eh? How do you find Windows 7? What kind of specs are you running? I'm not sure where the blame should fall, I'm starting to consider my fast track pro, i dunno..

[abZ]

Yah eh? How do you find Windows 7? What kind of specs are you running? I'm not sure where the blame should fall, I'm starting to consider my fast track pro, i dunno..

Modest quad core and 4 gigs ram etc. I like Windows 7 a lot. TBH I have problems with my audio device too. I don't get crashing but I have some strange shit going on. It never happened with XP. Still trying to get to the bottom of it. Ableton itself does not crash. You do run into some compatibility issues. If you don't go on the internet with your production computer XP is probably the way to go. It just seems kinda vulnerable now. I am not sure if it is officially not being supported? But if it is still being supported by MS, they won't for long. Best to move on now. Windows 7 might be the last decent MS OS you get for a while. I hear they want to go cloud with the next one

[angryrancor]

welcome to the board angryrancor... GHF not enough for ya? lol

Thanks dude, and good luck on the competition. Yeah thats definitely home, and the signal to noise ratio is much higher there... but there are definitely great posts on this board as well you just need to search a bit more

Which operating system do you guys find to be the most stable? I'm hearing the 32 bit versions are a little bit better till developers get more used to 64 bit, perhaps in a year or so? anyone agree?

On my studio machine i'm on XP SP3 32bit. Windows 7 is great, XP SP3 is still good, Vista is workable with issues (for me) but in comparison to xp and 7 vista is a headache. Keep in mind that in my non music life i'm a programmer so i'm about the most advanced user as you can find... YMMV

Most major programs work ok on Win7 64 bit now I think, but if something is critical for you to have (Ableton for me... assorted VSTs... audacity...) definitely make sure it'll work before getting the OS.

In general I think the best advice I can give is to use all legit software if at all possible because some cracked softwares have hidden issues and spyware, or will corrupt your registry in some way or other etc. For many/most I understand this isn't do-able, so just try to minimize your exposure (install less cracks). It is also VERY worth it if you are having performance probs to try making a new drive partition and installing a clean OS and installing just your music apps on it. Then for your other apps you boot to the old OS install, and for music you go to the new one... New OS will be running at max performance, have nothing but essential apps running at any given time, and none of the crud/registry errors/hidden services/exploits/spyware an OS install builds up over time.

2cents.

[paravrais]

What version of Ableton are you using? Because when I upgraded to 8 I found things ran a bit faster/smoother on Vista, plus if your on a crack then Ableton cracks are notoriously unreliable. I only have an intel core 2 duo 2.10GHz CPU and 4GB of RAM and I have no problems running many instances of Alchemy with lots of effects on all of them. I very, very rarely flatten tracks too. Think I had 10 Alchemys in a track I did the other day, plus 2 drum machines, 3-4 audio tracks and maybe about 5 other things like multisampled pianos etc. No lag for me

EDIT: The above poster just reminded me, I don't use *any* cracks at all so maybe that's why I run so smoothly?

[abZ]

What version of Ableton are you using? Because when I upgraded to 8 I found things ran a bit faster/smoother on Vista, plus if your on a crack then Ableton cracks are notoriously unreliable. I only have an intel core 2 duo 2.10GHz CPU and 4GB of RAM and I have no problems running many instances of Alchemy with lots of effects on all of them. I very, very rarely flatten tracks too. Think I had 10 Alchemys in a track I did the other day, plus 2 drum machines, 3-4 audio tracks and maybe about 5 other things like multisampled pianos etc. No lag for me

EDIT: The above poster just reminded me, I don't use *any* cracks at all so maybe that's why I run so smoothly?

Probably not. Usually cracks either work or they don't. You have twice the ram of the OP. Ram is quite important. I have 2 gigs and a single core on my laptop. I can use Ableton on it but I have no where near the options I have on desktop.