Re: komplete vs. ableton

[Per Boysen <perboysen@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 5:30 PM, Jeff Shirkey <jcshirke@verizon.net> wrote:
> Would you mind elaborating a little bit on what Mainstage offers you that
> Live does not, or, in any case, why you happen to prefer Mainstage?

More CPU efficient. Snappier sync. Better sound.

This is of course all related to the way I prefere to perform and not
necessarily true for a a different performance strategy. So what's my
strategy then? First I set a tempo for the entire rig system by my
playing and first loop laid down in Mobius. This means MIDI clock and
as I implied in the other post MIDI Clock is not an accurate sync but
a sort of follow-try-to-catch-up where the slave application
constantly flickers in tempo to catch up. I have had so many issues
with Live when synced to MIDI Clock but still no problems with
Mainstage as the sync slave (to Mobius). A DAW like Live is not
designed to follow tempo sync given by a plug-in it is hosting. And I
don't even use the advanced DAW functionality, that would be like
asking for trouble. I only use the host for hosting Mobius and a bunch
of tempo dependent plugins like tremolo, delay, harmonicer and LFO
controlled filter bank. Plus reverb of course. And these type of
functions is what Mainstage is all about - the sequence engine (from
Logic) is stripped out to make it smaller and more stable.

I can't see how I can elaborate on how something sounds better than
something else? Just listen! Running loops through Mainstage (i.e.
Logic's) compressors, EQ's, multiband compressor and limiter just
sounds ok. Not so when running the same loops (Mobius catching live
input) in Live. There's nothing to discuss or elaborate on, that
simply is how I'm hearing it.

As for the CPU efficiency, it has to understood to the background of
how I use the rig. I like to keep a lot of alternative effect chains
from one I call up one at a time to be placed between the audio input
and the Mobius looper. You could call it that I use the host
application as a virtual pedalboard. Again, this is what Mainstage was
designed for, since all plugins used in all patches are preloaded into
RAM as you boot the application. But when using the application only
one patch at a time is active, although the sleeping patches still
have there functionality allocated in the RAM for a kick start as you
step the "next sound patch" button. Live was not designed with this in
mind wich is obvious. Before Mainstage existed I ran into that bummer
with Live and started using Bidule instead, where you can actually set
up a multi patch performance rig very close to Mainstage.

Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se
www.perboysen.com