Ableton Live Tutorials: External Hardware Effects

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This time, Liam O'Mullane shows you how to set up hardware inserts in Ableton Live. Have a hardware effects unit that you want to use for processing? Learn how to incorporate your own hardware as though it was a plug-in with this easy-to-follow tutorial.
Check out the rest of the Ableton Live Tutorials Playlist here: • Ableton Live Tutorials...
For more expert advice, news and reviews, visit www.musictech.net
Chapters
0:00 Start
0:10 Why would you want External Audio device?
0:57 How to set up your interface
1:39 Set up routing in Ableton Live
3:51 Sound examples
4:11 Compensate for hardware latency
8:10 Using hardware as plug-ins
8:50 Recording external processing
10:37 Recap

[@nicewerk]

Thanks! that was super helpful. You have a great way of explaining the complex subtleties of ableton

[@EdvinLaura]

Amazing tutorial! Brief and all the required information provided!

[@kiosko33hz]

Thank you so much ! Very precise and simple explanation. I believe you saved me hours of headaches, got me subscribed instantly ! Keep it up:)

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Thanks for the sub!

[@Cignaleremix]

Is nice to see Jessie Pinkman finally producing music

[@sebwos1]

Thank you very much for this explanation external effects - I needed that

[@charvel111]

THANK YOU BEEN LOOKING FOR A WHILE FOR SOMETHING LIKE THIS

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Glad you found us! Please subscribe and share!

[@watchmeasifly]

So, is the best practice to put external audio effect within a track? I was hoping I could use return tracks a lot easier, but I find I get a lot of issues with dry/wet mix. Also was hoping for better understanding of setting limiters before the send or at the time of return. Good example is balancing line and eurorack levels, pedals, or vintage line level equipment.

[@Husmanmusic]

Really good tutorial!

[@pixannaai]

Thanks for sharing my friend! very useful and clear:)

[@rickann]

Thanks a lot for this learning and all your video BTW!!

[@fuzylogik]

great method to use a kick to measure the latency. many thanks very helpful

[@MusicTechOfficial]

You're welcome!

[@vvcv__00]

Yeah, since kicks are the only percussive instruments in the world of instruments. Well, perhaps to some people they are.

[@antoinevella9180]

Straight tom the point !

[@yourcitysleeps]

Great Video! Thank you!

[@pavel-g]

thank you for the tutorial! I was wondering, what can cause some inconsistency in my recordings, meaning that when i'm trying to set the latency in my daw the result is inconsistent. the result is changing over time.. what can cause that behavior?

[@obligatoryresponse5733]

Trying this for the first time using a guitar track that used to use a plugin (plugin was uninstalled) and I'm getting the dry signal on the left and wet on the right. What I was trying to do is use my Pod X3 Live to replace the distortion that the plugin provided. I tried going into the Pod's settings to center the output and swapping the cable to the other output. It's probably something simple that I'm missing. Thanks for any and all help.

[@pablovenegas5518]

Thanks for video... is correct doing this while the automatic delay compensation is turned on???

[@neil5010]

thanks. can you set up external effects to use the AUX returns in ableton? rather than as inserts..

[@tomvorburger7423]

Where did you buy that black sheet with the sun and moon, under your keyboard? It’s beautiful!

[@donnaynarc2556]

hey thanks for ya tips, but why didn't you change the driver error compensation to minus 15.9 in "Set up routing in Ableton Live", sure because it is not about hardware latency but software latency; but if I leave it at 0.00ms, do I have to add it to the external audioeffect rack? thanks for help best regards

[@stfranckmusic]

Hello there sorry if i may be late to this video , does saving those settings by saving the ms will always work even depending on session? i mean if i have 20 tracks would the latency be the same using my preset? cheers!!

[@LowTunedHalftime]

I recently got an FMR Really Nice Compressor and I have it have it hooked up to a Presonus 24c, it's hooked up to the left (Mono) inputs on the back of the RNC, in Ableton's External Audi Effect Rack I only see inputs and outputs 1/2 and audio still doesn't seem to be being sent out through the comp.

[@nathanallen9291]

Excellent

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Thanks

[@harsha_sree_t]

Thanks!

[@josevreis]

Might be a bug but as I ajusted the input signal on the external audio effect all external audio followed the the input latency. I have an external clock to run several drum machines and other sequencers, had a hard time figuring out why it does this and not only to the external audio effect as explained in this video.

[@synthesizermaschinemusic5062]

What hardware delay unit is this? I love the sound. An try to find it.

[@YiggaP]

Cool and useful thank you!

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Thanks Thomas! Are there other topics you want to see us cover? Let us know in the comments!

[@YiggaP]

@@MusicTechOfficial I don't see anything in particular I always check your ableton videos to see if I can learn something! Sometimes I do sometimes I don't, sometimes I learn very basic things too I didn't know and sometimes more advanced. But you're doing a great job so thank you! I'll keep on watching for sure, musictech is on my Google chrome bookmarks, I always check out what's new 😊

[@wisholopez1928]

Hey guys big fan out here ,

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Hey Alex, thanks for the support! If there are topics you want us to cover, let us know in the comments :)

[@aliensoldier8958]

Can I do it with an Arturia Minifuse 2 interface? And how should I connect it with this interface?

[@akkamiau]

10:00 so do you sent the recorded track to master too when recording???

[@RevTheAcid]

I feel like hardware effect & DAW doesnt work well together. First to get blended audip we need to record track by track, otherwise the wet signal will be in every track. Second thing I dont get it is that how the wet kick in TRACK2 doesnt recording anything while the snare recording the blended signal. Last thing is that, is there any possible for hardware effect work like a regular return track in ableton? THANKS ~

[@jake_dumb]

Will this not work if I’m sending audio to soundflower tho???

[@charliegoulet25]

Hello! I have an Apogee Duet with only 2 Outs. I tried doing it with one of the outputs and just monitoring it in through headphones but I'm not getting anything. Is this even possible with only 2 outs? Thank you so much your videos are very informative.

[@xadisembodiedvoice]

i'm having the same problem, were you able to figure it out?

[@charliegoulet25]

@@xadisembodiedvoice It is you have to get a reamp box is what someone recommended. I also think that you can just switch the line input to be -10 and that can also work. but I like the re amp box because I like the idea of re amping.

[@HEC9]

Save the music!! Thanks you, SIr!! 🖖

[@omninuss6847]

Hey, first of all thanks for the video. Somehow I still can't get it to work tho. For testing purposes Im going straight out of Output 3 of my Scarlet 6i6 Interface then directly back into the Input 3. The external audio Effect shows that theres Signal being sent to Output 3, yet strangely nothing arrives at Input 3. To makes things even weirder I do get signal on my Input when I plug the cable out of Output 3 and touch it (Static Noise). I'm using normal line guitar cables which I also tested before to see if the issue lies with them. Do you have any Idea what might cause this?

[@blujay7701]

Hey, not sure if you're still having issues, but I was having this same problem. I wound up needing to change some setting in the Interface settings themselves. With my Audient ID22, I needed to change the Analogue Outputs in the Routing Matrix for my Output 3/4 from "Main Mix" to "DAW Thru". Hope this helps!

[@vpetroi3]

i know it will sounds strange, but when i record from hardware the attack of the sound hit before the time ? anyone experienced this ? all my recordings hardware going with or without external effect have a "pre latency". Seems really strange that sounds is recording before the time... thanks

[@seabreeze2792]

Good video However many of the ableton owners have lite or intro. These do not have EXT. AUDIO EFFECT. So where do the owners go?

[@KostasC]

Hey man, big fan of the channel! One question though, I use this for my H9 but I hear both the dry and wet signals and, whenever I mute the channel I can still hear the original audio of it playing so it only mutes the effect... any thoughts?

[@MusicTechOfficial]

Do you have some sort of direct audio option on your audio interface or in the audio interface software? That could be what is happening here, maybe? What interface do you have?

[@KostasC]

@@MusicTechOfficial I'm using RME's Fireface UCX, I'm guessing Totalmix may be the problem here...?

[@user-ci9px4ns4e]

Hi man, My name's Stefano, nice to meet you!! :) A few days ago the Audio Merge KTBK HPF also arrived for me but I can't get it to work. I have a sound card which is the Apollo Twin from Universal audio and I use Ableton live 11 as a daw. Could you tell me how to connect the HPF to the sound card and how should I make it work inside the daw?? Ps: I tried to follow your instructions but KTBK doesn't work for me...:( If you could really give me a hand I would be deeply grateful.:) I await your kind feedback, thank you!! :)

[@TheMaverickTaylorBand]

Tons of videos on this. Everyone covers the same stuff. Nobody talks about how to send the patch changes to the external hardware within the song. In other words, your external synth has maybe 128 patches, maybe 2 or 3 banks of 128 each. How do you save all that in the "External instrument"?

[@robertjl5619]

Jesus Christ the man just lays it out no bullshit why the fuck does every other shit vid on this problem have so many views? Liked and subscribed fuckin' A bro you've redeemed British people in my eyes...to an extent.

[@myrmur]

Hi! I’ve patched everything exactly as in your video but with the dry/wet knob 100% wet there’s no sound at all coming back into the track. As I turn the knob CCW towards the dry position I can hear both the dry and the wet signal into the track. I tried it with external delay/reverb pedals with their own dry/wet controls in many different positions and nothing changed. What may I be doing wrong? :(

[@PatientTurtle]

I'm having the same issue. Has this been figured out yet?

[@harryrowe6387]

Did you guys sort this? I'm having the same problem

[@heihei4077]

❤

[@bedtimeread]

getting feedback and no matter what I do can't get this stuff to work.. this is the only video about this.. fml.

[@AshbySound]

Getting insane feedback as well.

[@bedtimeread]

@@AshbySound bro, check the audio interface.. the audio interface was routing the output of the hardware back to 1 and 2 that's why the feedback.. so you have to rout it to the same chann as your hardware, see if that helps

[@vidoemakenoke2424]

Geen laptop meer maar laptop werkt niet meer mijn PC is kapot gemaakt mijn spullen zijn gestolen door andere mensen Ik heb zoveel nare dingen mee moeten maken En weet je door wie dat komt door de overheid en rtl4 televisiezender en mijn neef Henk van der linde en ramon moesan en Cassidy van Oeveren en nog buurvrouw en Richard lips hard

[@ted7208]

Man.............!

[@miroslavradulovic6129]

Where is Walter White, Jesse? Just kidding, cool video...

[@vvcv__00]

what the heck do you mean by "if you do an audio export" at 9:03????????????? Seriously, the whole bit after this statement is simply confusing. I really wish people would read at least a chapter or two regarding pedagogy. Too bad this is three years old, as this bad teacher will probably never read this comment.

[@user-vd3if4wq6m]

This should all be done under the hood in my opinion. So many variables with Abletons latency.. way to confusing and always renders off the mark. When is someone gonna use AI to just make sure what im sending out (or what im writing with Midi) comes back in exactly where it should be. Groove is in milliseconds. Why is Logic so much better at this

[@YoungNino2017]

Doesn't work for me... I swear it seems like ableton only has 1-4 but doesn't differentiate between inputs and outputs