Ableton DJ Set File Formats

Music Production Music Tech Discussion
1

I need some clarification on file formats in Live… especially in the context of a DJ set in Live 7.


  1. On a MAC are AIFFs and WAVs both usable in Live? It seems like they are, even though WAVs are supposed to be PC? Beatport sells WAVs but not AIFFs of tracks.


  2. Can you hear the difference between an MP3 and a non-compressed WAV/AIFF in a Live set? Lets say you mix from a MP3 to a WAV, will it sound different?


  3. Can you really reformat a MP3 to a WAV? It seems a compressed file doesn’t inherently contain the data… similar to how a low-res image can’t really be made into a high-res one (completely, although you can resample to a certain extent) But I know you can make a JPG into a TIFF…


  4. If I really want to tweak my tracks is it better to be working with MP3 or WAV… seems like WAV/AIFF is better to start with and then compress entire mix to MP3 if necessary?



    Thanks for any help!!
2
  1. PCs & MACs can both use aiff or wavs… theyre essentially the same type of file except for a slight difference in the header data.


  2. Anything under 320kbps mp3s you can defiantly hear the difference on a good club system… they sound squished and fuzzy on the hight frequencies. hard to tell the difference on an average home system.


  3. You can change the file format but the low quality of the Mp3 will be passed onto the wav.


  4. Ableton Live automatically converts mp3s to wavs (it saves them in the decoding cache). so your really always working in wavs… but yes its better to start with a wav in the first place

    :smiley:

    .