Ableton Live 8

Ableton is one of the most popular daw’s right now, it’s being used by many famous artists and producers.
Ableton is a software designed to create melodies, music, grooves, basslines, to record , midi editing, midi warping, etc, some dj’s are using it for mixing even live.
Ableton has some really unique features like resampling, a completely new groove engine, a warping technique that is extremely handy on remixex and resampling.

Basically Ableton is a huge resampler with many possibilities, it has a pretty design too.
It’s pretty complex regarding the instruments that are build-in, but at the same time It’s very comfortable to work either on session view or arrangement view.

SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

The program has two main views, the arrangement view and sessions view, the sessions view is primarily used in remixex because it’s easier to handle and much faster for some people.

Skrillex is one of the persons that uses ableton in creating his beats and music, Airbase is also a fan of ableton, and many other great music producers.
Ableton Live is one of the daw’s that I found really handy, easy to use, and also a pleasure to work with, the great design, the unique features , they really make producing music to seem much more fun and endless regarding the possibilities of creating an unique sound, some great drums or just composing something completely original.

The requirements for this software are:
2 GB RAM (4 GB recommended on Windows Vista and Windows 7)

2 GHz Pentium 4 or Celeron compatible CPU or faster

Sound Card


OVERALL OPINION

You can also put your own Vst's and combine the build-in features with your own vst’s to make the next hit single.
So without a doubt, you should give it a try and compose something with the brand new live 8 which is absolutely on a different levels from another daw’s that are even more expensive than live is but don't be fooled it's one of the greatest daw's right now and the value of price/quality is superb and I would make the same choice over and over again, check their web-site for the product

Ableton Live 8 really didn’t seem to much different to me than 7 did. I mean I runs great and did crash or anything just like 7 did, it ran great too. Just didn’t seem like Ableton made many changes with 8. Mainly the interface, I have always had issues with the interface and workflow of Ableton. Its not that its hard to understand just more out of sync to me. Just doesn’t make much since coming from all the other DAW programs on the market. They are all different you can pretty much still find your way around in them. But Abelton has presented some other issues for me.


SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

The program is very stable though, there hasn’t been any issues with Ableton ever for me and I remember using Ableton years ago on my Toshiba laptop and it still worked like a charm.I remember pushing it too the limit and mixing a tone of songs an using just about every effect Ableton has to offer. Still had no issues with it and it is very cpu light (meaning it wont get choppy and glitch on you). I wouldn’t recommend using to many other programs rewired in it. But I love to use Ableton rewired in fl studio now. Its starting to be my bread and butter because some of the instruments and presets that I have in Ableton will always be used in my music.


OVERALL OPINION

Overall, very solid program. You can get some good music made in Ableton Live 8 I just don’t really feel the need to use it anymore because my other programs can do so much more than this one can. But I will always hold on to it. I recommend this to a lot of beginners in music programs and mixing and mastering. Or maybe even the “Lite” version of it. Which is almost the same thing just a Little more watered down.

I have been using ableton for a while now, so using 8 was a must upgrade. There are some difference between 8 and previous version of this software . But the set up and upgrade were easy and the manual was very clear. Even though I hate manuals this one wasn’t bad.


SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

Ableton 8 defies almost everything about what I assumed about this program. Unlike 6, 8 is about 30% more effective on the CPU than 6, while being able to handle so much more. This in of itself is hugely impressive because on a good day the batteries on my mac would only last 30mn using 6, with 8 while using more effects, my mac would last 45 to 1 hour operation time. Hard to believe but it's true. Ableton 8 has much more to offer than ever before, and it works more smoothly than 6, occasional glitches here and there, but in all manner of ways it is a huge upgrade from 6. It sounds better, has a very good limiter, a better compressor (that combines compressor 1 and 2 from the earlier versions), an easier tool like Slice To Midi that allows many users to finally do IDM/EDM music in the way it's meant to be done without having to do all the cut and paste that had to be done in 6 just to come close to doing decent to good IDM music. I definitely am eager to see how it works from video aspect. There are some improvements but I haven't yet gotten my hands wet in that dept.


OVERALL OPINION

Overall, the improvements that were made from previous versions to ableton 8 are a huge difference. A difference with stability and overall performance. They fixed a few bugs that the program had from version 6 that went into 7. But with Ableton 8 they stopped. Ableton 8 will surprise you!

There was no comparability issues on my Mac. It was a pretty simple put in the disc and install situation. If you've installed a program before you should have no trouble with this one. The general layout of the program is pretty easy to navigate as well. There was a little bit of a learning curve but that's usual for a new program. It took some messing around with the song block feature of the program to achieve results but once you get the hang of it it's simple.

SUITABILITY/PERFORMANCE

Firstly, I'm running this on a Macbook Pro OSX 10.6.8 with 2.4Ghz processor and 2 GBs of ram. I've never had any issues mixing or tracking with the software. I've only recorded 8 tracks at a time but everything went smoothly. I've mixed with somewhere around 30 tracks without any crashes. I've used several plug ins and they all worked fine. No complaints from me in the performance category.

OVERALL OPINION

I really like Ableton for writing music on the computer. The song block, looping, and live mixing make it really easy to have a creative flow. As for tracking and mixing a live band, I prefer Pro Tools or Logic. I just think the tracking and mixing layouts are nicer and the programs themselves sound better. Ableton is super nice for electronic music and live performance. You can easily splice a song and add/subtract parts in real time. This makes DJing exciting and easy. It also makes it really easy to write while recording. You just start a loop and keep adding things until your ready to move on to another part. It was a pretty good deal for the price but if I didn't make electronic music I would hardly use this program at all. Most of the time I end up slaving reason to pro tools for recording and production.