Ableton Live excels as one of the music industry’s leading software for creating or recording musical ideas, transforming them into finished songs, and even performing them on the stage. Many may not know that Live is designed for performance. When using Live for performances, it is essential to minimize the CPU load to avoid crashes or unwanted system behavior. Luckily, by default, many of Live’s settings are optimized to improve playback and keep CPU usage low. This optimization is ideal for performance reasons, however, it doesn’t provide the highest sound quality output available from Live. Don’t sweat, because Live is one of the most versatile DAWs on the market, and you can believe they have implemented features that allow us to achieve high-quality sound for productions.
Below are some common settings you can enable to achieve higher quality output. Keep in mind that these settings will increase the CPU load.
High Quality Interpolation
Live offers a global ‘High Quality’ option that is available from the Preferences window. This window is accessed from the Options menu in Windows or the Live menu in OS X. Preferences can also be accessed with the [CTRL][,](PC) / [CMD][,](Mac) shortcut. With Live’s Preferences open, choose the ‘Audio’ tab and look for the ‘Default SR & Pitch Conversion’ switch. Enabling the switch to ‘High Quality’ will activate sample interpolation for all new clips by default. This means Live will use an advanced sample-rate conversion algorithm that provides better sound quality when recording and playing back audio. Samples processed with the Hi-Q algorithm generate less distortion, particularly at high frequencies, when transposing a sample and/or matching an imported audio sampling rate to the system’s sampling rate.
You can also change the High Quality Interpolation setting for individual samples at any time by double-clicking an audio clip to access its ‘Clip View’ settings and then clicking the ‘Hi-Q’ switch in the ‘Sample’ box.
Optimizing Native Audio Effects and Instruments
There are different types of sound quality options available for several of Live’s native Audio Effects and Instruments. Many of these options are only available via the context menu that is accessed from a device's Title Bar using the shortcut [right-click](PC) / [CTRL-click](Mac). Let’s explore how to achieve higher sound quality for various devices.
Chorus
Chorus offers a ‘Crisp’ option that can be toggled on or off via the context menu. Enabling this option will reduce aliasing and improve the sound quality, particularly with high frequency signals. This option is enabled by default, except when loading Sets made in earlier versions of Live that use Chorus.
Dynamic Tube
Dynamic Tube offers a ‘Hi-Quality’ mode that can be toggled on or off via the context menu. Enabling this option will reduce aliasing and improve the sound quality, particularly with high frequency signals.
EQ Eight
EQ Eight offers an ‘Oversampling’ option via the context menu. Enabling this option causes EQ Eight to internally process two times the current sample rate, which allows for smoother filter behavior when adjusting high frequencies.
Filters
New analog-modeled filters are available in Simpler, Sampler, Operator, and Auto Filter. These are based on classic vintage hardware models and will self-resonate, feedback, and distort beautifully. Between the different models, the ‘Clean’ circuit option is the most high-quality and CPU-efficient.
Flanger
Flanger offers a ‘Hi-Quality’ mode that can be toggled on or off via the context menu. Enabling Hi-Quality results in a brighter sound.
Glue Compressor
The Glue Compressor offers an ‘Oversampling’ option that can be toggled on or off via the context menu. Enabling this option causes the Glue Compressor to internally process at two times the current sampling rate, which may reduce aliasing and transient harshness. Note that with Oversampling enabled, the level may exceed 0 dB even with Soft Clip enabled.
Reverb
The Global Quality chooser menu located on Reverb's interface is where you can switch between reverb quality and performance. ‘Eco’ uses minimal CPU resources, while ‘High’ delivers the richest reverberation.
Saturator
Saturator offers a ‘Hi-Quality’ mode that can be toggled on or off via the context menu. Enabling this option will reduce aliasing and improve the sound quality, particularly with high frequency signals.
Operator
Live’s Operator Instrument minimizes aliasing by working in a high-quality ‘Antialias’ mode. This is on by default for new patches, but can be turned off in the global section. Antialias mode helps to minimize high frequency distortion. Disabling this mode reduces the CPU load as well.
Sampler
Live’s Sampler Instrument has a chooser menu labeled ‘Interpol,’ which offers different Interpolation modes. This is a global setting that uses advanced algorithms to process audio and determine the accuracy of transposed samples. From the chooser menu, select ‘Best’ to achieve the highest quality sound. Be aware that raising the quality level above ‘Normal’ will increase the CPU load.
Tip: You can save the high quality settings for each device to load as default every time you open a new Live Set by right-clicking the device’s Title Bar and choosing ‘Save as Default Preset’ from the context menu.
Optimizing for Better Conversion Quality
The three Convert commands are extremely helpful and can be used to generate some interesting results. They allow you to extract the musical information from audio clips and place it into MIDI clips on new tracks. For example, you can record yourself humming a bassline, and use the ‘Convert Melody to MIDI’ command to generate MIDI that can be used as a starting point for a new bass pattern. To achieve the best sound quality, it is recommended to use uncompressed, high-quality audio files such as .wav or .aiff. Lossy data formats such as .mp3 may result in unpredictable conversions, unless the recordings are at high bit rates.
Additional Tips for Achieving Optimal Sound Quality
Below is a list provided by Ableton of recommended practices and program settings for users looking to achieve optimal audio quality in Live.
- Decide which sample rate to use for a project prior to beginning work, rather than changing the sample rate while working on the project.
- Record audio into Live using high-quality hardware components (audio interface, cables, etc.) at the highest sample rate and bit depth your interface and computer will support.
- Avoid using samples that are at different sample rates within the same project. If you want to work with such files, we recommend that you first convert them to the sample rate set for your audio interface in an offline application that is optimized for this task.
- For all audio clips, disable both the Warp and Fade options in the Clip View.
- Do not adjust the Transpose and Detune controls for any clips.
- Always render at 32-bit.
Please note that these practices will achieve optimal audio quality, but disable some of Live‘s functionality — in particular, stretching and synchronization.
