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Yes, however you will need to build your rack with LFOs and max devices to send the midi CC in the box first before using it in standalone and save it as a preset (full disclosure, I haven’t done this yet myself so open to correction but it should work)
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No, it’s another one that you’ll probably need to set up your mappings in templates in the box before going to standalone - I have e.g. DJ sets with another controller mapped and they work seamlessly when I plug the same controller in standalone.
In terms of mapping internally, it’s not standard but there are some Max devices that have started to allow for mapping parameters from LFOs etc. directly in standalone. But it hasn’t bothered me enough that I’ve tried them, so can’t comment on how well it works.
I’m still working this way too most of the time, happy enough to do most of my building in Live then go to standalone to improvise. But I have been starting to use the Push in a much more conventional way than I did for my first few months where it was all playing custom sets rather than starting with an empty set in standalone.
I think this has started to come together a lot because I’ve gotten more organised about my presets and user library with a view to standalone, back when I was just in Live I wouldn’t really bother with an extensive preset library, often I’d just build racks ad hoc to fit the project, which doesn’t work so well in standalone.
Because I started with Live long before it had sample slicing I’ve never really seen it as a core function or something it does, usually went to MPCs for this, but it’s been going really well just pulling in a track for my “to sample” folder, warping and converting to simpler all in standalone. I will say though that while it’s great to have samples and chops automatically locked in time, the downside is that Everything. Is. On. The. Grid. feel of Ableton that kinda made me gravitate away from it in recent years, but that can be worked with … I know I could always turn warping off but it’s really handy for just working ideas up to finalise later.
Personally, I still haven’t really tried it for sequencing other gear, there’s a whole universe in the box just using the stock plugins and max devices, so I didn’t feel in much of a hurry to start bringing other devices into the equation. More so than a studio brain, it could easily be your entire studio, it can do everything from sequencer and synths through to high quality guitar effects and amp sims.
The key thing to bear in mind, as above, there does seem to be a baked in assumption that you’re going to do a lot of stuff in Live to customise how you work in standalone. Not an issue for me personally, though, it’s actually one of the things I really like about it.
My main problem at the moment is that I’m finding transfers to and from the device way, way slower than I remember them being a month ago, currently on the latest 12 beta. Left a 20gb-ish folder on overnight and it still only got about half way through after 10 hours. Ended doing a factory reset, which helped a little, but I still feel like it’s way slower than it should be - e.g. a 150mb project from Push to Mac took nearly 15 minutes earlier. For me, downloading packs is far quicker than doing a transfer on my home network. Not sure is this out of whack with what others are experiencing?
Thannks!
I guess it’s a sign that Ableton’s US distribution is finally under control if even the phantom tracking number was ultimately resolved.