Lots of tracks (not used, even empty) slow down Live

sszssz

New member
Hi everyone,


I'm currently working on a live set in session mode with all my songs in it. The final goal is to be able to play live with all elements of each song, not only stems of them. The session is organized with many groups and automations in order to bypass plugins that are not used. For example, if I play the song A, all plugins of this song are ON while all plugins of the other songs are OFF. This way I preserve the CPU.

The problem is that the more a session has tracks (even not played, muted, no input, no output, no clips), the more the CPU increases and Live is really slowed down (cracks, clips are sometimes played one beat later, creating a new track or load a plugin takes a long time, etc.). I've created a test session with 1000 audio tracks (as Live has no limitation about number of tracks) with nothing in it, no input, no output, speaker OFF and all of these problems appear.

However, it's written on ableton.com "Generally, every track and device being used in Live incurs some amount of CPU load. However, Live is "smart" and avoids wasting CPU cycles on tracks and devices that do not contribute anything useful." It seems to be false...

Does anyone have the same problematic? Do you have any idea how to solve it?

Issue tested with these configurations:
- Ableton Live 10.1
- MacBook Pro end 2011, OS El Capitan, 16Go RAM, 500Go SSD
- PC Lenovo Thinkpad, Windows 10, 16Go RAM, 500Go SSD
- Built-in soundcard and Focusrite Clarett 4Pre USB


Thank you for your time and your help,

Romain
 
Hey Romain.

That does seem odd to me too. I use a session with a shed load of tracks with no issues, and my cpu specs are nothing on yours.

You could consider loading your instruments into a rack instead of individual tracks. This way you can have them all set up in far fewer tracks, and use mapping to activate/de-activate them and their effects, via midi clips - bit of a complicated way to work it, but I like this method as it allows me to skip through entire setups with one button push, and you can also automate the midi clip to change the instruments and effects in real time if you want to.

There is a good article about this, but I can't seem to post it as I haven't written enough replies on this forum... but it's something like this

forum. ableton. com / viewtopic.php? f=1&t=195844

This doesn't really explain why Ableton would be running so slowly for you though... but it might help... mostly just something that might make live performances a bit more fluid.

C
 
Hi C,

Thank you for your answser. I use the same method with midi/audio clips with automations but I don't use instruments in rack that much. Thanks for the tip and the article!

I've contacted Ableton and they've got the same results as me. They registered a bug that might be due to the graphics card.

But nevermind, I think I found a way to play my tracks live sets one after another:
- create one Live Set per tracks with organized groups and routing (in each Live Set, create one main group with everything in it and call it by the name of the track);
- create one "Main Live Set" (with anything you want in it (FX, midi mapping...)) that will be the same for every track (like a virtual mixing desk);
- open 2 instances of Live (on Mac: youtube.com/watch?v=qptY6NoCLoM) with "Main Live Set" in each;
- link both instances (at the top left-hand corner of each), this way both Live instances have the same clock;
- drag & drop a track main group (from the Live browser on the left) in one instance, play any part of the tracks you want;
- apply the same in the other instance in order to mix tracks;
- you can delete track groups you don't want anymore as long as the corresponding "Main Live Set" doesn't play (otherwise you'll get dropouts).


- if you want to edit a track, open its corresponding Live Set. Next time you'll play this track in "Main Live Set", modifications will be applied;
- be careful with your tracks midi and sound card I/O initialization when dragging & dropping them in the "Main Live Set".

Romain
 
Back
Top