Push 3 Users Thread

Hey Earthangel,
where are your studio monitors connected to: Push or 18i20?
cheers
Ron

Can you elaborate a bit on this? By spectral you mean for example eq 8? Where do can I see “the added plugin frequency” in Push or Ableton Live?

I am using only 8 channels but I do have some instrument and effect racks on my master template so I wonder if that is what it’s adding all the noticeable latency.

It seems that Machine plus when would hit a cpu limit, you would hear it on the sound - crackles. The P3S seems to first makes everything slower in the UI, and then note input/ knob twisting latency, before it crackles. I don’t even remember on being able to push my p3 cpu to a point where it starts to affect the sound, which is great. The note input/knob twisting latency on the other hand is quite annoying, specially because it is not consistent. You start with a blank project with a certain buffer setting and its great, and then when you create a - what I consider to be - fairly simple project it adds that latency that you have no muscle memory of. This is specially noticeable when playing drums on the pads, not noticeable when twisting knobs.
It would be good if that could be optimised. It makes sense too, once you choose your buffer and latency settings to have that consistent throughout the project. Otherwise it does really feel like computer controller and not really an instrument.

Sometimes I feel that I have a different push from a lot of people here :exploding_head: :grinning:
The experience that I have with Max for live is that most of the stuff that I try does not work in a way that can understand what it is doing, if working at all. I get very often the missing object message, and I just try to avoid M4L stuff now. I am guessing that what makes my experience difference from a lot of users here is that I have almost no experience with M4L, so I don’t know what instruments/fx do what. Im guessing that if you already have some experience you can make them work/understand what they are doing?

When I bought my push I only had the Ableton Live intro in it, and I upgraded later to the Suite version. Even though I think the suite version is great, I feel that it adds a lot of clutter to the Browser of push 3. When the intro version you go to the browser, select an instrument or fx and 99% works with P3. With the suite version there is a steep learning curve, because you need to understand what works and what doesn’t. I think what will help is using it simultaneously with the software version, but I haven’t had the patience to do that just yet.
What I do for now is avoiding all the stuff that might not work - aka max for live - and use the Ableton instruments/fx/midi fx. I’ve read that there is a lot more stuff that some instruments can do in the software version, but if you are not used to using them like that, you don’t miss those extra features as much, most of the times.
I love my p3 but on my 3rd month with it, what I can say is that I am still overwhelmed :).

Spectral effects. They have spectral in the plugin name. Not the eq.

You can see plugin latency when hovering over an effect/instrument or audio effect/instrument rack’s name.

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Not every M4L plugin will work on push. Despite what has been said here a few times. Controls need to be made available on push by the m4L device’s developer for starters. Ableton has said that M4L will become more integrated down the road but for now only a select few devices work fully and have all controls available. If you’re unfamiliar with M4L and its capabilities I’d suggest focusing on the stock plug-ins first as that is already a huge amount of stuff that is available and powerful. There’s a dedicated topic in this forum where people list M4L devices that currently work.

Regarding UI sluggishness, you must be adding a lot of heavy audio effects racks or complex instrument racks for that to happen?. :man_shrugging:. Haven’t encountered any of that so far and I’m running push 3 at a buffer of 32 currently. Feels responsive as any device should. But again, I’m not really stress testing it nor am I trying a lot of diffeeent M4L devices yet as most simply don’t work fully yet :).

Maybe start a clean project and just start creating your own effect chains with intention :).

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This is gold. I opened up a project and I had 6,48 of added latency of all plugins. Interestingly enough the fx I thought where heavier didn’t had any latency.
The plugins that added more latency where:
1 limiter - 2.7 ms (!!!)
1 compressor - 1 ms
colision- 1.3 ms
Thanx for this

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:pray:

Limiter due to look ‘look ahead’. This way it can catch all peaks (brick wall).

The spectral time plugin adds 120ms of plugin latency for example in ultra mode. Which is really a lot and unfortunately (though logical). I’m still contemplating if I’ll take that hit and leave live pad playing alone except for arpeggios. Or to leave that plugin alone. The effect is so cool though.

My monitors are connected to the 18i20.

Broadly speaking, my routing works like this:

Hardware stereo out -> 18i20 -> ADAT channels 9/10, 11/12, etc -> Push -> ADAT 9/10 -> 18i20 analog out -> Monitors.

I also have a hardware FX send / return loop that uses the Push analog i/o.

The Push is essentially being used as a mixer.

Is it possible to create macros for my fave vsts that normally wouldn’t work with push so I can get control of a few parameters?

If your tracks - I had 9 tracks running, and you want to Sidechain, selecting the input track while it’s playing will also cause it to lag. Yeah, annoying for a 2k machine.

Only for Push controller NOT when its in standalone, Have your plugin on a Ableton track, in the device title bar select configure, then select the parameter you want by moving it with mouse, once done, then select configure to turn it off, then you can save it as default state for that plugin, you can after that Instrument/Effect rack it, and setup macros as normal & save it.

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So how do I go about making the Push usable in User Mode? So far I only got to it doing a limited number of things, with the entire pad surface remaining dim.

I was hoping to build out a surface for the Syntakt and see how far I can make it behave like a Rytm. Mute pads, play pads, selecting different “tabs” for each machine so the encoders behave differently. Performance macro pads (e.g. open up the filter as I pressure a pad, etc)

Where do I start?

By arpeggios you mean using the “repeat” function? That is also an option that I have been using sometimes, also in drums. It’s great for fills and had variation to a pattern but also to play sequences, and it’s much easier to time it right, specially if the system has considerable latency.

I also had a mid/side mastering fx rack that was adding a lot of latency. For now I managed to do a base template with all my mappings and zero latency added. There are so many fx and options that one can easily skip the plugins that add latency and still have a very, very powerful machine with tons of options. It would just be good to have an easier way to figure out what adds latency.

Im sure that they will still iron those imperfections. But It will not ever be perfect, it might be smart to find workarounds and just live with it for now. For my personal experience once you do them often enough you end up forgetting that there is an another much easier and cleaner way of achieving something.

No I mean the arpeggiator midi effect

Looking for advices…

Do you think it’s dumb to keep P3 Just as a sound module/interface and sequencing It with a Vector sequencer?

I currently own the controller version and planned to upgrade when possible but…

I Just don’t like the push sequencer, I’m more a step sequencer guy and I’m more inspired with the Vector workflow.

I’m following a minimalist approach to music (sold a bunch of modular/hardware) and I’m more into the performative aspect rather than producing complete tracks.
I’m considering returning P3 but It could be quite a compact setup Vector/p3 without needing any external device…
but I’m torn because for now I Will be using it Just like a super fancy midi controller with the future possibility to work standalone.

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Honestly, don’t get caught up in the some of the comments about the stock synths. They’re not inferior, they’re just different.

If you read some of those posts, you find people trying to recreate something in another synths and comparing it to that, but just like hardware things are different.

In live you are working with core oscillators. You do need to choose which effects to run through (or use presets to start from). If you don’t like the setup, you could also just do this once and save as your synth to work from moving forward.

Now there should be absolutely no complaints about filters in Live/Push 3. Andy Cytomic collaborated to add algorithms from, or based on the Drop. These additions (from 2015?) will make anything large as needed… just look for Drive options on selected algorithms.

Cytomic’s the Glue is also there.

With a soft synth the built in effects are often sub-par compared to 3rd party plugins, but they become part of the overall sound especially when pushed by sound designers who look for sweet spots… again no different than in the hardware domain.

Live’s tools have sweet spots and M4L offers even more tools (think routing, sequencing, modulation and use of IRs) to build even more options than any soft synth.

Again, think different and let go of what you’ve used before. If you haven’t spent time designing your own sounds (not assuming/I just don’t know) then it’ll seem a little convoluted at first, especially if you don’t know where to look.

If you’re building out in Live to export to Push 3 (strongly suggested as not all parameters are available yet) then remember to right click on the device bar for more options and look for additional menus.

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Have you tried the Melodic step sequencer on push as well?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj03AHwm23M

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its more that its pages upon pages of menus to control them, with an counterintuitive gui for a lot of them.

was hoping to NOT have to build in live and export. My dream was to create patches on my couch ‘standalone’ or on the go. a macbook seems more suited to my specific needs for that.

you are right though, every time i am overly critical of something bundled within live I have misunderstood it or not been able to dive deep enough. it is frustrating to me they did not build UI out for the push 3’s beautiful screen. maybe they will, but for now it is a headache to do what i want.