Ableton VS Bitwig: CPU Stress test. Leaving Ableton after 2 weeks with Bitwig.

[@mossgraber]

Some comments: 1) In case you are not aware, you can click the little CPU icon left of the tempo which opens a window with detailed info about CPU spikes (you can assign a keyboard shortcut as well). 2) If you compare Bitwig to other DAWs there are 2 things to point out: First, Bitwig is optimized towards performing live which means there must be no dropouts whatsoever when e.g. inserting/removing devices (try that in Cubase ;-)). But this comes at the cost of some performance. Second, plugin isolation has some performance impact as well, therefore, it should be mentioned which setting you used.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for the tips! Checking out the CPU icon now! Also, massive thanks for all the drivenbymoss work, absolutely amazing!

[@FurkanTopal]

2) What costs are they? And who says it's optimized towards performing live? Then it would be something like MPC live, or Ableton's standalone push, but this is software right? This is a DAW, a complex daw to produce music. You talk like if it's a programme for making live music. I don't get these kinda "optimized for live sessions" stuff, so what happens if it supports live sessions? What are the drawbacks? Prove your statement. I'm curious.

[@mossgraber]

@@FurkanTopalOK, let my try to rephrase: with towards "live" I mean "performing" where ever that is. On a stage or in your studio. This means the highest goal is to not interrupt the audio output in any way whatever the user does. Technology wise this requires some pre-cautions, normally the audio engine is separated from the user input queue and they communicate via an event queue (there is much more to it, this is just an example). Both Bitwig and Ableton are targetted to such a scenario and this is why they normally look a bit worse when performance (number of tracks and plugins) is compared to classic DAWs like e.g. Cubase, which are tweaked towards a high number of tracks/plugins in a mixing scenario. E.g. insert a plugin or add a track in Cubase when playback is active and see what happens.

[@FurkanTopal]

@@mossgraber Thank you so much for giving your time and rephrasing but you said the same thing. I was hoping to hear something includes numbers, solid facts etc. I especially wonder "this is why they normally look a bit worse when performance..." part, because I don't think their performance is worse. Maybe the thing is, Cubase stayed as it is, but Ableton and Bitwig also added some revolutions to theirselves and surpassed traditional DAWs. Maybe that's why Pro Tools, Cubase etc users are decreasing day by day. I wondered this statement because I don't think I can take these DAWs are designed for live performance or targeted live performance. These are their extra features and I don't think they have any compensations. Still the tracks made in Ableton could slam the tracks made in Cubase. I'm an Ableton user, now this Bitwig seems appetizing and although I have Push 3 etc, I'm not a live performance guy at all. I'm just producing. I never use the session view in Ableton. Only arrangement view. Does this mean Ableton or Bitwig usually slower than Cubase in arrangement view? Or they open the VSTs slower than Cubase? PS: I used FL and Ableton only, never used Cubase before. Just trying to comprehend this statement and questioning if there's a reality.

[@mossgraber]

@@FurkanTopal In the normal daily work these things do not really matter. And for sure you can get good results out of each of the DAWs on the market.

[@nomad1517]

Well, hopefully ableton sees this and does something about it instead of focusing on push 3. They are lagging big time.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Yup. They will probably not change too much because they are so comfortable and established

[@sebbosebbo9794]

😂😅😂😅 Live lacks always inovation...

[@Emily_M81]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE 22 years of code. I haven't used Live since v9; have they ever done a major code overhaul? >_>

[@nachoci6876]

Live is boring as hell @@sebbosebbo9794

[@sonorous8028]

Bitwig was written with much more modern coding techniques whereas Ableton is, well, old. It was a selling point of Bitwig from day one.

[@powermix24]

This is amazing, been eyeing Bitwig for Ambient live production and I see several artists doing it and this just sealed the deal. I have a 12900K 32GB of RAM and Ableton's performance is just lacking big-time! Thanks

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Give the trial a shot. Would love to know if it out performs Ableton on your machine

[@powermix24]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE I'm hooked!!!! everything seems to be ROCK SOLID! it just feels snappy and more stable to me. Using a software sequencer like Stepic to control my HW synth seems so straightforward since each track can do both MIDI and audio! My VSTs just worked, they are organized much more intuitively than Ableton. Don't get me wrong Ableton has cooler features but as far as Stability Bitwig is where it's at. For some reason, my CPU would spike to 20-25% for a second randomly in Ableton doing the simplest things, but not anymore.

[@Emily_M81]

what if I tell you that you can put a Reverb inside your Reverb. Or a chorus. Or a vocoder, or a resonator bank... Bitwig is like LEGOs with audio effects even before you get to The Grid XD

[@jrvinwav]

this is such a helpful and informative video. yes if you have the best in class MAC maybe this doesn't help you at all but to anybody else who doesn't have unlimited budget for the computer in their studio, this is very helpful.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Try the Bitwig trial and let me know the results you get.

[@dnalyen]

When the m1 macs first came out I was looking for a compatible daw. My only choice was logic or bitwig. I always thought logic was for dorks so I looked for anything I could on bitwig. The most compelling argument for it to me was that it was like 15 years younger than Ableton and the rest of the big daws and so it didn’t contain old outdated code that would limit it in the future. And so I’m not surprised it was holding up better here.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Took me waaaay by surprise! Just another reason

[@Tigerex966]

Actually I love the outdated 32bit cold tons of the best music software and plugin are 32bit. There was no reason to end support for these other than to sell new versions. Luckily you can buy software to still use them. And old logic is in many ways better than new but not all. Soon everything will be m series CPU only not because it's better but to force computer update sales.

[@foljs5858]

" I always thought logic was for dorks" that's like an argument by a 13 year old

[@dnalyen]

@@foljs5858 im just saying why I have no interest in logic and why bitwig caught my attention. It has the same vibe as a Hyundai. I’m sure it’s a great value for only $200

[@ItsWesSmithYo]

Well, until it’s old like the others 😂

[@nick.fredman]

Love this series please keep it going!

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Next week we go over vocal tracking. Bitwig actually really shines here, up there with protools and logic. Ableton and Studio one are the worst.

[@nick.fredman]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE ​​⁠ Brilliant, I generally use logic because of ARA for Melodyne with clients/friends. But sometimes Ableton when it’s my own projects (can freeze to get melodyne data, and I don't always love switching DAWs mid session). Am curious how bitwig compares. I’ll be playing with it over the weekend!

[@ramskiramski]

5 years ago I was running my day with Ubuntu on a Lenovo S130, a very cheap little notebook I could just carry anywhere and did not need to worry about. It has a dual core processor on 1.1 Ghz, 2GB of RAM and 32GB of disk space. Out of curiosity I installed Bitwig and it was running more smoothly than expected. The startup was quite fast and I could produce a little song with 4 tracks. Drum, Bass, Chord and Melody track with inbuilt Bitwig instruments. I think this was really the limit, but I am still impressed how well this was running.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

It’s been sooo smooth since I switched over

[@michail_777]

Hi.I'm not a professional, just recently started making music - it's my hobby for now. I had a long time to choose which DAW to buy and I got myself Bitwig. There are two main reasons why Bitwig. 1st I have everything in front of my eyes and I don't need to open tabs and then windows in which I need to open tabs again. And the second reason is the modular system - this is more possibilities than in other DAWs. Of course in Cubase, Ableton, Studio One, other DAWs you can create the same music as in Bitwig. But for some reason it seems to me that in Bitwig you can do faster what you will spend a lot of time on in other DAWs. As for productivity, only once in a month have I had one note bounce on the first pass for some reason, but the same note played perfectly on the second pass and beyond.And also when you save the Project everything is fine, but when you export the project there are problems, maybe I did something wrong or it is a problem in the betta-version of Bitwig 5.1.But I'm very happy that I didn't buy any other DAW. Good luck with your channel and making music.

[@drindy5166]

Definitely leaning towards adopting Bitwig as my DAW of choice, however will definitely make for interesting times as a lot of fellow collab partners are running ableton. Definitely will be taking in more knowledge of Bitwig with your upconing vids. Great stuff brother! 👊🧡👍

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for the support brother. Im in the same situation. all the others I collab with are on Ableton. what I've been doing is just importing a bounce of their session, then doing my ableton thing and sending back stems for them into Ableton.

[@drindy5166]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE that is what I am thinking in the back of my mind if I do go through with Bitwig. Always work arounds for sure! 🤘

[@TonyThomas10000]

I personally never run at the low a latency. I usually run at either 256 or 512 for big MIDI sessions.

[@MrBootsauceTV]

Bitwig is definitely a little beast

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

I was impressed! Try the trial and test your system. Would love to know the results.

[@lokologico]

I jumped to bitwig from ableton many years ago and I am happy I did. Bitwig has been very stable, and its feature set, not only for DAW, but creativity, even bitwig as an instrument, is amazing!

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Great to hear!

[@mariopaz7503]

para los que hacemos música en vivo la opción es Bitwig, me ha sorprendido tremendamente, cosa que esto no pasa con ableton. Nos tendremos que pasar a Bitwig entonces! Muy buena info, felicito el contenido, gracias, "la comparativa que estaba esperando" Saludos desde Argentina.

[@ADibley]

Great test, bitwig is extremely performant and rock solid under Linux as well using pipewire. Seems to perform better than when running under Windows using asio.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Great point!

[@alfvetvik9106]

I have found that the 'Plug-in hosting mode' option, which you can find under the 'Plug-ins' area in 'Settings' can have quite a big effect on Bitwig performance. Somewhat counter intuitively, the 'Most Safe' option generally has the best performance, as it creates a seperate cpu process for each plug-in. This allows the cpu to more efficiently load balance across the plug-ins. I would suggest you try this, and run the test again. You might find that you get even better performance using this.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Great tip! I’m going to try this!!

[@alfvetvik9106]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE Another thing which I noticed in Bitwig, is that there is quite a high CPU spike just AFTER loading a new plug-in. This probably explains why you get clicks just after adding a new track, which then goes away again after playing for a bit. On heavy plugins this spike can last maybe for up to five seconds after the 'Loading plugins' bar is completed.

[@alfvetvik9106]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE In your example, the 'By plug-in' might actually be better, as it will save some memory. Anyway, it's worth experimenting with the different options.

[@mixalis1nl]

If you see the Ableton load meter, it spikes randomly. Fabfilter plugins send on the audio thread constantly a parameter change message. This is not wrong, this is allowed and that's how they chose to do it (you can send messages which are not on the audio thread). If the host (DAW) reads that message constantly on the audio thread it could cause what you see in the video and the crackling/popping sounds because the audio thread when it is under stress (Pro-Q3 in linear mode) disrupts the audio processing. If the host does not choose to ignore these constant messages, it can cause that behavior. Perhaps you can repeat the stress test with other plugins as well to confirm the findings. I may be wrong, however when you see the load meter spiking and jumping like that, it is a sign that something is disrupting the audio thread. I am not for/pro Ableton or Bitwig :) just mentioning this.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for the information.

[@RocknRollkat]

Excellent presentation, thank you ! Bill P.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thank you kindly!

[@RocknRollkat]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE My pleasure ! 😀

[@Marko-nx9eq]

I switched to Bitwig after only 30 minutes.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

HAHHAHA!, good choice!

[@johnnydark4802]

Thank you, great vid man! Been pondering between these two. Seem like this is no brainer. Setup, hardware wise, any windows users, experience? (ED: Music production in mind).

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Glad I could help! Every now and then I go back to working and Ableton if a collaborator has a project but I end up quitting after about 30 or 40 minutes of using the browser because it just gets frustrating and the look is very uninspiring to me now. I have every single one of my devices in Bitwig custom mapped so I can fly through mixing and sound design just using the eight knobs on my controller.

[@vroteg]

Bitwig has the best optimised code being the newest daw on a market. But they just arrogantly refuse to listen to users. There is one bug that not apparent right away but was pointed out to company many times. They just decide to ignore the bug even though it’s a huge one. The bug is in larger projects with substantial amount of automation time is not compensated and automation begin to drift from what you actually automated time wise. This is huge bug, but again. Developers just ignore it for last 5 years…

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Just so I can test this, is the time drift with automation drawn in, in the automation lane. Or is it automation of a modulator going out of time as it progresses? How long until you start to notice the issue?

[@vroteg]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIREwhy KZbin deleted my comment? Hm… anyway. It’s an actual automation lane. Not sure if it happens with modulators. If you look up on forums about bitwig automation latency issue there are a lot of information and ways to reproduce it. If you use automation on plugin that have a lot of latency or use plugin with alot of latency after automated plugin you may be able to reproduce an issue. In a nutshell bitwig do not latency compensate automation.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Great to know. Hopefully I can ask them directly about this.

[@vroteg]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIREyes. So basically what I did was just put one proq3 in linear phase mode. It introduced 1300ms of latency. Automated on off of lp filter and pressed play. Automation happening even before play head start to move. So automation happens instantly while play head latency compensate.

[@Italliving]

They do listen, yet they are German, and Germans tend do to things in a German way, it needs to do the job or else it won't make it to the diner plate, nevertheless they do listen even if it takes a few years longer ... but they keep innovating in their own way

[@HarryAdee]

Funny things is, I am on Bitwig 5 with my very old PC. Intel 5, 8gb Ram and I am able to use this Daw for my projects. Of coz there were audio dropouts now and then but still able to finish all my studio project.

[@scottyelstromm881]

Bitwig has a really accurate feel in general. Love the way it handles. I hope to replace my other daws with Bitwig, but there is some learning curve.

[@myshark9735]

I did the test with some Vitals VST3 in Reason 12, Ableton 12 and Bitwig Studio 5. In the end Ableton won. I’m using Reason studios. For Ram/Cpu usage and lagging maybe I’ll switch to Ableton.

[@thetheoryguy5544]

Cap

[@geraldschwab3974]

awesome content! just a heads up how the 100% thing works in the activity monitor, look at the idle% to know how hard your actual system is being pushed. another way to say this is, you have 1 -> 100% per core, so if you had a quad core CPU you could go to 400% (and that would be 0% idle) .... a quad core cpu at half load would be 200% loaded and 50% idle. similarly a 10 core cpu at half load would be 500% loaded and 50% idle.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks

[@audiunt]

Strange, I don’t understand why the audio is failing while the performance meter in Bitwig isn’t even at 30%. And a 4-5 times performance difference isn’t realistic. Something is off…. Also how is it possible to have no midi latency with a 2K buffer? It really doesn’t make any sense to me…

[@Pasta221]

I'm curious, in Ableton the cpu meter inside the DAW was going crazy jumping around and stuff, but in bitwig the cpu meter is just chilling at the bottom not moving at all barely. How did that happen? 😯 I can only run a few amp sims and a drummer vst before my PC gets grumpy 😂

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Amp sims in Ableton or Bitwig

[@Pasta221]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE I'm using Bitwig!

[@josephdaniel7777]

Btw I love this series... I've got my eyes on bitwig... nice video....

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

More to come. Loving it

[@josephdaniel7777]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE can't wait...

[@rhythmace1]

Interesting, but not surprising to me: I was toying with both but one thing that helped steer me to Bitwig was loading a drum part and a Rhodes part from the factory library in Live and seeing my M3 Pro Mac register 25% CPU load!

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

I left a while ago and can’t imagine going back. I only use Live now when teaching and doing videos, all personal projects are 100% Bitwig

[@rhythmace1]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE That's good to hear from someone doing serious work with it (so far I've only watched your "after 1 day" video and not the 1 week or 1 month one yet), given that I've just committed and taken advantage of their half price offer and bought a full Studio licence! I have seen some stuff about weaknesses of Bitwig which concerned me, but it seems all DAWs have something that makes for a bit of a pain point. So far I'm loving it and I'm happy to be supporting development of an "underdog" product and one apparently written in a very efficient and modern way (hearing about the complete separation of the audio engine and user interface code was particularly interesting to me).

[@leo.nordmann]

if you're concerned with cup efficiency, go for Reaper.

[@apoplexiamusic]

but then your eyes and brain will hurt because of the UI and weird functionality for selecting clips that makes it such a pain for me. I don't think i'm the only one who just cannot bear to use it because of the way selecting works

[@apoplexiamusic]

What about the CPU Load graph and numbers in Activity monitor? It shows that the "User CPU load" is around 10 to 15% the whole time...

[@damiengreen28]

The latency is because of the linear phase eq which will add many samples of latency. Abletons playhead does not take this into account

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

I couldn’t stick with Ableton. After teaching it for 3 years at Icon Collective… fully in Bitwig now and can’t imagine going back.

[@InnerHacking]

A video about Bitwig vs FL Studio would be awesome too

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Trying to get hands on a copy of FL

[@williamshaneblyth]

Well my macmini 2011 yes 12 years old 16b with an SSD works fine in bitwig usually set to 256.

[@andreas-franke]

Did you check with the sandboxing set to Individual? Would be interesting to see, how Bitwig perfoms, if every plugin got its own process.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

I found it best with by Plugin, The individual was a bit more CPU but the By Plugin worked great

[@MarvinLeak]

I see Bitwig has a 50% sale and wanting to know if I use an Intel i5 processor with 8Gb Ram for Bitwig Studio 5? New to electronic music production.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Oh ya. You will be fine

[@therealdjsephiroth]

The Ableton Live "CPU meter" is not measuring CPU load. It's really the "buffer utilization" meter. You can see the difference if you look at the actual CPU utilization in another program like the Windows Task Manager and compare it to the "CPU meter" in Live.

[@MrSonicAlchemy]

40ms would be very obvious in terms of audible delay. 10ms is enough to throw me off when recording guitar for example.

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for supporting.

[@Slatona]

10ms throws you off when recording guitar? 10ms is the amount of time it takes sound to travel 3.5 meters or 11.5 feet. Do you also notice people's lips moving at a different time than you hear their voice if they're more than 11 feet away from you?

[@MrSonicAlchemy]

@@Slatona when it comes to sound synced to picture, 1 frame (approximately 33ms) is an obvious and audible delay which is noticeable by almost anyone when compared to audio which is actually in sync. I have often nudged sound effects and dialog in 1/4 frame increments (about 8ms) or get them to fall into proper looking sync. That said, I did double check and while 10ms wasn't noticeable when recording guitar, a 28ms round trip (512 samples in this case) was enough to throw off the timing for me. My apologies. There may have been other delays introduced into the signal chain such as plug-ins or I may have been looking at 10ms OUTPUT delay with a longer round trip delay which were causing me to remember being thrown off by 10ms setting. I should have done the math. 40ms, as mentioned in the original comment, would still be unacceptable for recording in my opinion.

[@ttttiiimmy10bit]

Bitwig is rent to own too, which is probably why i might buy it

[@cabebeats]

Something is clearly off with your testing. Maybe a buggy Ableton version or something. I did testing myself: 64 samples, 48000 Hz Serum with Saw OSC A & B on 16 voices and max detune, also SUB OSC, Noise OSC and Filter section are turned on. A was duplicating 1 channel at a time before the audio becomes inaudible - both Live 12.1.0 and Bitwig 5.2.3 maximum is exactly 48 channels in my case. Specs: MacBook Pro 16" M1 Pro, 16 GB RAM

[@bjornark]

Interesting. In my testing I have found that Ableton is not really that optimized. Logic seems like its more optimized when we are talking about Macs. Logic can utilize the hardware in an more efficient way it seems like. Havent tried Bitwig since I really dont want to learn a new DAW. But maybe at some point. Also, the VSTs/AU can affect the tests as well. Make sure you are testing with an up to date VST3 or AU plugin that can utilize modern hardware. Good video!

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for watching. I love Logic, actually track all the vocals in it. It will be featured in the next video.

[@nukenoly8751]

Besides Logic, Reaper and Cubase are the most optimized

[@FurkanTopal]

Dude I'm just uploading a video about an audio reading comparison between Ableton and FL Studio. The difference is unbelievably massive. And can you tell me what are your experiences on Bitwig after watching my video on audio reading?

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Bitwig seems to triple the track count of Ableton. I ya pretty amazing

[@FurkanTopal]

I just uploaded now, I was gonna keep it unlisted and just publish on Ableton forum but to show you I made it public, the video's name is "Why is Ableton like this?" Can you watch and give feedback about it?@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE

[@FurkanTopal]

holy shit I just downloaded bitwig and dragged the files, it has read super fast!@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE

[@ueberlicht_]

BITWIG is better than good old Ableton

[@ItsWesSmithYo]

Does bit-wig have a MaxForLive equivalent? I wouldn’t even consider it without that type of community 🖤🙏😎

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

They have something called the grid which is essentially an easier to use max for live. It allows you to build synthesizers or media effect or pretty much whatever you can imagine.

[@PaulEubanks]

What was the CPU architecture used and amount of RAM?

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

M1 Pro Max, 64gb ram

[@vroteg]

Hm. Just reproduced the same stress test. I used Diva followed by same proq3 in linear phase maximum mode. I took time and used different random preset on all instances of Diva. 44 tracks in Ableton without cracking. Bitwig was not able to play this project. Had to delete 10 tracks to play this project in Bitwig. So 34(bitwig) and 44(ableton). MacBook M1 Pro 32gb. 🤷

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Interesting results. Do you still get the visual lag in Ableton between the playhead and the sound? Drives me nuts

[@vroteg]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIREyes same lag. It’s known issue in ableton. Ableton don’t latency compensate gui. I guess it’s cannot be fixed without rewriting code from ground up. And we all know it’s ain’t happening.

[@jambonmama]

I tested too, same result: my Live-created set handled the load slightly better (occasional crackles) than Bitwig (extreme audio breakup) when opening the same set, so the behaviour shown in the vid in far from universal.

[@anbanb8787]

could this result be caused by playing only one track in bitwig

[@Submersed24]

The thing about ableton is I realllyyy like the flat design and the minimalist look of it. Bitwig kinda looks cluttered

[@MIKAELAMONET]

🔥🔥🔥🔥

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

You fire

[@partlysimpson5154]

Some say Ableton is more CPU efficient, bu maybe the real world tat in projects are what matters, if u stack same channels it may not be the real test, but different channels different midi patterns, audio effects

[@calebdany5085]

Is it possible to create an instrument setlist for keyboard players like mainstage and ableton. In ableton i will create an empty clip and trigger the scene to activate the instrument tone and i will play in my midi keyboard. My need is, i need 24 different instruments in a single setlist. I tried bitwig instrument selector but since i used 24 instrument layers and each layer has 2 different vst like korg triton and kontakt, the daw is getting slow. Is there any other way in bitwig to create a instrument setlist with 24 instruments so that i can switch between these 24 instruments using my Arturia keylab 88 mk2??? Thanks in advance

[@calebdany5085]

And i am using mac book pro m2 but with 8gb ram. Please suggest a way to configure a instrument setlist in bitwig

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

I would be curious if you opened the Ableton project inside of Bitwig and see how BW interprets it.

[@michaelsnowviolin]

I suppose it depends on your exact instruments and computer setup. I just played a gig with 30 instruments loaded up in Bitwig (some of them layered in single tracks), including a bunch of different VST synth engines, some of the sample-based, linked to three different keyboards, using my LaunchControl XL to switch programs for my Novation 88 and KeyLab 67, and using my Novation 49 programmed to switch its own instruments. Worked brilliantly. I'm using a Macbook Air M1. I also had a couple of custom programs, and since Bitwig allows multiple sessions to be loaded in tabs, I just clicked the tab I wanted and then enabled audio for that session, then switched main to the main 30-instrument session. What computer are you using?

[@calebdany5085]

@@michaelsnowviolin thanks for your reply. I am using mac book pro M2 8gb ram and 512 gb ssd. If possible can you please make a video of how you are configuring 30 instruments and switching between each instrument and playing for live.

[@michaelsnowviolin]

Don't know that I have time to make a video about this. I create tracks for each instrument or instrument layer, then set the input of each track to the keyboard I want to use. The LaunchControl lets me arm whatever tracks I want to have active for the particular song/piece. The KeyLab can do this in DAW mode; turn the big knob to go to the right track, then click the Record button in the Track Controls (even though you're not going to record). That's pretty much it. For my Novation 49, I use Bitwig midi-learn ("Map to Controller or Key . . .") to assign pads to turn on and off the instruments I want that keyboard to use (these tracks aren't armed; they have the monitor modes set to "Almost monitor input", and the pads activate and deactive the instrument VSTs).

[@Jdinrbfidndifofkdndjoflfndjdk]

Freeze is the way :)

[@sebbosebbo9794]

some GUI , groove pool , Controller GUI optimasations etc. I miss .. ( warping is now better ).. PDC Bitwig 1-3 was a mess, Push 2 too,.. soundesign , modulation A dream...

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Agreed

[@glennfordsolinap8606]

let's just keep adding until it explodes!! 😂😂 seriously though, a good run through for bitwig

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Loving Bitwig

[@freddymercury2259]

Hi, I was just curious, can u install bitwig on a usb and use it on other machines?

[@Italliving]

if you stick to maximum 3 yes above that you going to run into licensing issue's

[@jadk77]

What are the best practices to reduce CPU overload then?

[@paradoxic1888]

Bounce in place or set less voices and voice stacking for native devices. You can also utilize tricks such as instead of having multiple tracks with same audio files (example choir effects), you simply route the audio to many tracks and change the delays. Grouping tracks and treating the bus with plugins instead of putting the same effects on each track. Lots of options really.

[@thetheoryguy5544]

1# Avoid cpu intensive vst's

[@wernerxldata]

I don't understand the performance complaining... Really, until two months ago I used a i7 2600k with 16GB ram, that stuff is more than 12 years old, never gave me any trouble. You just need to configure stuff right and keep your Windows clean, disable unneeded crap and so on. Use a good audio interface with a decent driver and low latency. I always used the LTSC version of Windows, without all the crapware. Cleanly installed, kept clean and worked brilliant for years. Got me a new system now, Ryzen 9 7900X with 64GB, so bring it on, it's so stupid fast. Can run the same track in 12 DAW's at the same time :) So in my opinion, there's no performance problem. Maybe if you prefer a laptop to work on but then why would you except for if you have to work mobile, laptops are slow (yeah even most mac's) compared to a slightly above budget desktop setup. Don't get me wrong, I love my Macbook Pro but if I'm at home I always choose the desktop. I'm not gonna try Bitwig, I really, really don't like the interface. And I'm fine with Ableton, some stuff could be better but that's personal for everyone's workflow. In my case it has been stable, fast and does the job every time.

[@shinyisshiny7780]

its hard to compare. My friend says the same thing when im complaining, but he generally has 30 or 40 tracks. I have sometimes 200 tracks with bussing, sends, premastering plugins etc etc. I do a similar session in bitwig and i still have room

[@wernerxldata]

@@shinyisshiny7780 True it is hard to compare, and I can't say anything about Bitwig in that sense, but in most cases Ableton works fine with a decent setup. For most cases almost any daw will work fine. Modern hardware is really a beast and still moving forward.

[@jussivalter]

What are u saying? Laptops are NOT any slower than desktop pc:s. It depends components. My laptop is way more powerful than my relative new 16 core 7950x desktop with 128 gig ram with 3070 graphic card. My laptop is significant faster in terms of CPU and GPU speed and has more CPU cores and more RAM. You are buying laptops with weak hardware?

[@wernerxldata]

@@jussivalter Sorry, this is not true... Laptop components have limits in power usage and cooling and are in no way faster than desktop components. If your laptop is faster than your desktop you must be doing something horribly wrong in your desktop setup. If you want proof, look at all kinds of benchmark resources for different application types including stuff like cpubenchmark scores, there isn't any mobile cpu/chipset near the top of the benchmark results. I am not claiming a laptop is too slow to work on but for pure power you're better off on a non mobile platform. By the way, I don't have weak hardware laptop, it's a fairly normal M2 Macbook Pro with 32GB ram, it's not slow and works super fine for my daily job, developing, system maintenance and devops automation. But @ home I rather use my desktop as it's even faster, a lot.

[@beat_tmc]

48 / 5,000 The only problem in Bitwig, for me, is the theme.

[@hleet]

seems like "live" in ableton is now only a commercial thing 😂. How can you play "live" with this sh*t ? what about repeated random crash of ableton, specially when you ctrl+s !? I should have stayed with ableton 9 ... the 11th feels unusable and bloated. I will give it a try to that Bitwig thing 🎉

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Put on the Wig;)

[@StarvedForTime]

Bitwig handles muti-core processors better by the looks of it.

[@Italliving]

you should open up bitwigs cpu and sample monitoring the square in your top display left of the cpu bar so you see how much room you have left, do not trust Mac's CPU usage nor Abletons both are off, Edit: lol now seing all others mentioning the same almost 🙂

[@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE]

Thanks for the tip!

[@Italliving]

@@CREATEEDUCATEINSPIRE Time for a review on this , I noticed since Live 12 Ableton is a little less CPU intensive now, they learned something 🙂 yet Bitwig keeps evolving too as i use multiple DAW's depending on my needs ...

[@TimeFlyBy]

Turns off average metering of the cpu... then proceeds to estimate the average from current cpu values... 😂

[@morizanova]

Just like adobe vs affinity suite or davinci family , I suspect Ableton source code too old comparing what Bitwig code used . Rewrite code means that lots of users will be have problem with compabilities in script or M4L devices they've already had/purchased If you heavy external plugins user, there is no reason not switching into Bitwig or another DAW . But if M4L is your thing , just find ways to use Ableton as creative tool and exporting any outcome from it into Bitwig or reaper😂

[@scmthh]

У них разный язык программирования. Bitwig написан на Java а Ableton C++, язык C++ намного лучше

[@jussivalter]

​​@@scmthhc++ is not "better". It is better for some and java for some things. Generally C++ code" runs faster" because it allows more direct access to hardware resources and has less overhead from automatic memory management. Additionally, C++ compiles directly to machine code, whereas Java uses a virtual machine, which can introduce additional execution delay. But this is only in perspective of how language itaelf works, it does not take account "how" bitwig and ableton is actually coded and what are those architechtures and architechtural design. It is allmost more important thing than what language is used.

[@scmthh]

@@jussivalter Понял, спасибо

[@alexsoundstuff]

ableton needs to step up their game. its embarrassing

[@gancci1932]

Bitwig open ableton projects. But in a praticam way. I produced a lot of songs in both . And ableton had better cpu performance in majority of projects. And can add more channels in ableton. Bitwig had a lot of downsides also and vice versa. Recording midi in bitwig ia a pain. They focus just in new toy devices.

[@blackout2able]

nice joke :)

[@Italliving]

tell me whats the downside i want to know , and the channel thing it looks to me you don't know bitwig i can have over 1000 channels tell me who needs that to create music

[@patkelly8309]

Imperceptible.