Live Rewire with FL Studio Problems

temporal · 03-23-2009, 03:24 AM

I have been experimenting with rewiring FL Studio 8 into Ableton Live 7 (also tried the FL Vsti plug-in), but I am having some weird sync issues. For one thing, when I change the project tempo in Live (the host), it changes the project tempo in FL (the slave), but when I change the tempo in FL, it does not change the tempo in Live. Also, if I play a pattern or song in FL using the FL transport, I cannot make it stop using the stop control in Live's transport. However, I can start and stop playback of FL with only the Live transport controls. Another annoying thing is that if I stop playback of FL from Live transport, and hit stop a second time to return to the beginning, it does not return the FL pattern/song to the beginning, it just leaves it at whatever point it was stopped at.

The worst problem, however, is that there seems to be a ~1 quarter note delay between starting playback in Live and the audio from FL actually starting. So if I try to record a loop that I sequenced in FL into an audio clip in Live, the playback starts about one quarter note into the loop, rather than at the beginning. When I click the play button in Live, there is a delay of ~1 quarter note silence, then the loop begins one quarter note into the loop (so the beginning of the loop gets cut off and replaced with silence, basically). I thought this might be some sort of latency issue, but I have a low buffer size and I am using an ASIO driver with my E-MU 0404 USB sound card.

I tried rewiring Reason 4 into Live to see if the same problems occurred, but it worked fine. No delay, and the transport controls also seem to be properly synchronized. The tempos also sync properly when I change it in either program. So the problem would appear to be specific to FL.

Has anyone else experienced any of these issues? Any suggestions?

temporal · 03-23-2009, 08:44 PM

I just tried rewiring FL Studio into Sonar 8 PE, and it does the same thing (on a different PC). There is a little bit less delay at the start, but it is still there (~1/8 note chopped off). The transport sync has the same issues here as well. Maybe there is some plug-in delay thing in FL I could use to delay playback by exactly the right amount for each rewire master, but it still would not resolve the transport problems.

It would seem that FL just sucks as far as Rewire slave synchronization is concerned. I liked using FL for it's step sequencer and piano roll/midi features (not so much for any of the FL plug-ins), but this is really annoying. I think maybe I will start using Live rewired into Sonar so I can use Sonar's piano roll/midi editing, since I don't really like Live's midi stuff. Sonar has a step sequencer too, maybe it's about time I learned to use it.

temporal · 03-24-2009, 02:50 AM

As long as I am continuing this conversation with myself, I might as well add that I just found out that Live currently does not support vst plug-ins when it is in rewire slave mode, which would make it useless for working with midi while slaved to Sonar. This is unfortunate, as I think the compositional workflow of Live is unmatched. As it stands, I would have to sequence midi for softsynths and the like in Sonar, and could only use Live for looping audio. I don't think it would be worth bouncing midi clips to audio in order to manipulate them in Live, this would be too much of a hassle. The whole point of Live is that you can put down ideas quickly, LIVE, and edit, arrange, etc. as you go. Ableton should definitely get on this, as it appears a number of lesser DAW's like Reaper and Orion support vst in rewire slave mode.

And since FL seems to have serious rewire problems, I might just consider trying out one of those programs (I heard Project 5 has this capability as well, is this true?). Anyway, just wanted to post this in case someone does a google search on these issues in the future and comes up empty-handed as I did.

gbsr · 03-26-2009, 06:59 PM

all is as its supposed to be though, so there is no problem. live is hosting fl. fl is acting on its own, unless the host controls the slave. when you tell live to play on its global transport for example it sends out "hey, fl, its time to play, you game?" and fl goes "whatup. lets dooo it!" and they play happily with each other. however if you are working in fl while its hosted in live and you tell fl to play it doesnt relay this with live since fl is the slave of live. it only obeys its master, the master doesnt obey the slave.

rewire and you cant use vst plugins with live, i think this is standard with rewire in all host applications, but i could be wrong so dont quote me on that

however this can be worked around by using rearoute (comes from reaper, check their webpage), syncing up midi and audio through rearoute and runing both applications standalone. theres more information about that on their official forums.

shotguns · 03-26-2009, 08:05 PM

Yeah, there's really no need to rewire 'em, just load it up as a vst. I know people who do this all the time without any sync-issues and no configuring.

gbsr · 03-26-2009, 08:12 PM

ohyeah thats right. fl has a vsti aswell. use that

temporal · 03-27-2009, 03:31 AM

No.

First of all, Fred (aka reflex on Image-Line forums-- one of the main FL devs) told me on the tech support forum that rewire slave FL and vsti FL are basically the same in terms of the protocol for transferring information between the programs. This fact is borne out by my experience of having exactly the same issues with FL rewire as FL vsti in Live.

Secondly, several rewire slaves do sync transport in both directions. It works fine with a number of combinations of rewired apps I have used before.

Third, the issue where FL drops the initial events at the beginning of the audio stream get lost is a known issue with FL rewire/vsti. Fred himself told me this, and also told me that it cannot be fixed due to the 'internal structure' of FL's code. The only way to get around it is to use FL vsti (not rewire), since it has a little delay option in the vsti box which lets you delay recording in the master. Then you have to manually edit out whatever silence remains at the front of the recorded loop, because the delay only goes in quarter notes instead of milleseconds.

Lastly, you can definitely use vsti's in the rewire slave with several applications. One of those is obviously FL Studio. I am fairly certain Reaper, Orion, and Project5 can do it as well.

Thanks anyway. I have heard of that reroute thing, maybe I will look into that.

gbsr · 03-27-2009, 03:47 AM

it is what it is. now, if you know this guy at imagine line, then you talk with him about your problems, because live has no problem and live acts as it does act in rewire mode, always have and always will.

temporal · 03-27-2009, 04:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gbsr

it is what it is. now, if you know this guy at imagine line, then you talk with him about your problems, because live has no problem and live acts as it does act in rewire mode, always have and always will.

Yeah, I know-- my problem is not with Live at all-- FL Studio is at fault here. I love Ableton Live! I just wish it had a better piano roll and midi composition/editing features.

gbsr · 03-27-2009, 05:03 AM

the piano roll has improved very much with live 8 though. the editing side has not (still no automation curves for example -.-).

napalmbob · 03-27-2009, 05:12 AM

Have you tried rearoute yet?

temporal · 03-27-2009, 07:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by napalmbob

Have you tried rearoute yet?

lol, I think you posted on my parallel KVR thread on this issue in the Hosts subsection (I go under the name SonicDimension on most audio forums). I have not tried rearoute, but can that only be used with Reaper, or would it also work for connecting FL Studio and Live, say?