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Maximum number of Overdub triggers per loop cycle?

Posted: Sun Nov 09, 2014 6:22 pm
by ZEF
Hi,
I was wondering if there is a maximum number of times one can trigger the overdub function per loop cycle.

The reason I ask is because sometimes if I trigger Overdub x amount of times per cycle, at a certain amount of x times I trigger Overdub it eventually causes the audio to cut out.
The longer the loop cycle, the less amount of Overdub triggers per cycle it takes before the audio cuts out.

A long loop cycle for me is about 00:07.00, and for a 00:07.00 loop, it seems that triggering Overdub more than 5 times in a cycle causes problems.
Adding a 6th Overdub within that 07.00 cycle causes audio dropouts. (To be clear, I don't mean after the loop plays six times, I mean when I trigger Overdub 6 times within a cycle).
The maximum number of Overdubs I can trigger within one cycle seems to be tied to the length of the loop.
The shorter the loop, the more Overdubs I can trigger in one cycle before there are drops, often resulting in the entire loop to drop out completely.

Any ideas if there is a way to remedy this?

My loop memory says 00:47.55.
I've augmented the Loop time (secs minimum) preference from 40 to an arbitrary but higher value of 120.
I'm sending the Overdub triggers via a midi sequence out of Ableton live to the AU SooperLooper instance.
I'm running a MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012), 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3, Ableton Live 9.1.6

Re: Maximum number of Overdub triggers per loop cycle?

Posted: Sun Nov 09, 2014 10:44 pm
by jesse
Augmenting the default loop memory should be the solution. Make it even bigger, memory is cheap and plentiful nowadays. My default of ~40 secs was set probably 10 years ago!

What is happening internally, is that with each overdub (or any operation) it uses up another 7 second chunk of memory (in your example) so that each can be undone/redone. It's a circular memory so when it gets back around to the beginning it has to knock out the earliest chunk to free up space... and if that chunk was the original source of your overdub and you hadn't reached the end yet, I can see it causing silence problems.

Re: Maximum number of Overdub triggers per loop cycle?

Posted: Mon Nov 10, 2014 2:36 pm
by ZEF
Thanks so much for the response. That absolutely did the trick.

As a note, after a bit of trial and error I realized one needs to remove the old loops and create new loops for the Preference change to take effect.

Thanks!