Moving from standalone to using DAW

Hi,

I have been happily using Maschine in standalone mode, but am now considering the purchase of Ableton and a APC40.

Will this open up a whole new world and add to my creativity or am I about to make life very hard for myself?

I have not used a DAW before, my aim is to have fun composing but ultimatley to produce tracks to burn on disc, not playing live. Will Ableton offer better song composition, mixing, effects and export?

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

Solo

 

Hey solo,

i do use the combination of Maschine and the APC40. Overall im pretty happy with the APC40 but i use it more like a mixing desk. I have Maschine pluged in Ableton and use the APC40 to change volume and send stuff to the different sends and tweak fx an synths in real time. Overall Ableton Live is a pretty awesome DAW and i think you will get all things done with it, but maybe you should try the 2 week demo version first.

Cheers

 

try the demo...., im using live for some weeks and its really useful and inspiring , esp.the arpeggios ,warp , effects and .....
u'll need some time to get in , but ableton seems to be the easiest to handle for me, combining the best of both worlds , linear and session producing.
check the novation launchpad , if your budget is limited.
@suicide server , u think having machine and the launchpad is as good as the apc 40 - machine option,
am i really missing sth on the akai thinking ; machine is my groovebox , icl. note repeat , swing ect., i dont need that big dummy ?

 

Hey pawcut,

you cant realy compare the launchpad with the APC40, i personally would miss the knobs and especially the faders for easy volume adjustment. Still the combo of launchpad and maschine could be a lot of fun together.

Cheers

 

can you ease browse through lives huge library with the akai, its a hell of a mouse scroll here

 

i dont think this is possible at the moment, at least i didnt find out how yet

 

You can map any midi controller with buttons to show/hide/jump to the browser using MIDI to keystroke converter like Bome, midistroke, or quickeys. No need for APC.

 

i use both, maschine and ableton.

I have maschine as a grove box, it is on the first 6 tracks in ableton.
Then I have 3 tracks for things I make with synths and samplers.
All together i have enough tracks to make a song/ live set. I have reverb and simple delay with auto filter and pingpong delay on the 3 return tracks. I use the faders to controll volume of each track. Untill now i didn't organise the track fx.

In maschine I have 8 song-grooves. if I use them all, I can ad another track in ableton, where I have another machine. I can switch midicontroller to the new maschine track... and have another 8 songs. I send all beats to the same channels and I can continue playing. I think this is not the best way, but for now it works.

Unfortunately producing with maschine is not so easy now... playing live with it is very good. My music comes alive, and that makes me really happy.

 

I myself own maschine, but never a DAW until about 2 weeks ago. I decided I wanted to purchase Logic 9 to expand my song creating capabilities after downloading Abletons two week demo. So far may experiences have taught me to have lots of patience, and watch as many online tutorial videos as you can. For me, DAWs of any type can be difficult to learn, and I am still trying to wrap my head around een the most basic of functions. I still havent figured out how to get Maschine to work inside of Logic, let alone Massive and my Axiom keyboard.

Have patience.

 

Logic is very good for studio recording.
Ableton is very good for playing live.

I think now (without all midi out functionality), maschine is not too good for studio recording, but very good for playing live.
So for playing live I would advise APC40 and Ableton.

(if you first buy apc 40, then ableton is cheaper, but maybe you have enough with only the light version, for free with the apc 40)

 

fwiw, maybe start by loading Maschine onto an Instrument Track in Logic.

sowari

 

If you already have Maschine, the APC40 would be redundant since Maschine already has encoders to control Live's devices using templates already provided in this forum. I would get the Launchpad in that case which gives you monome features and Automap compatibilty as well as very interesting mixer mode setup which is very conducive for performing live. Even if you don't have Maschine already, I would get the Launchpad and a nocturn or nanokontrol. Save money and space.

 

Offtopic, but thanks ew.

 

I recently purchased the nanoKontrol, and it works a treat with Maschine running in Ableton. Highly recommend this small and cheap controller to anyone using Maschine who is looking to increase their DAW control.

- Brock

 

Just saw the Launchpad promo video. Wow! Looks pretty awesome, especially when considering the low price tag.

Anyone out there started using this with Maschine + Ableton yet?

 

>)

 

i too decided today to use my maschine with logic 9 and i got it opened up on an instrument track but i cant seem to get the sound out of my speakers which is weird because when i open maschine as a stand alone it comes out my speakers, i also cant seem to record inside of logic using the maschine

 

?

are other Logic Sounds coming out of your Speakers. have you checked Logic's Audio setup? i sugest you load up a Maschine Project and press play on Logic's Transport.

you either Record Patterns inside the Maschine Software - same as you do with Standalone - or you can record MIDI on a Logic track. the second option is described
in the 1.1 Manual Update.

sowari

 

yea sorry about that i got logic coming out my speakers, and i also recorded in logic with my maschine once and there was a huge latency but now when i record in logic it wont play back its just one sold wave in love but wont play back