How To Eliminate Audio Latency?, Audio Latency on a Mac Options

[Mr. Jason E. Lec...]

how the heck can i eliminate latency when i'm recording audio?! it's so annoying. i can edit and compensate, but that's so tedious.

i have a newer iMac Intel with 2 GHz and 2 GB Ram, and i'm using Ableton Live 6. I thought my newer and more powerful mac would eliminate this problem, but it doesn't. and it's not just when i'm using a usb or firewire interface. i've even experimented with just recording with the built in microphone. is there something i need to adjust? is this a general issue with my computer itself or is it more of a DAW issue. my old 1 Ghz 512 MB Ram iBook has roughly the same amount of latency, and it's a much less powerful machine. any ideas?

[ronaldl]

The first thing I would suggest is to go to your Live Preferences and click on the Audio tab. Halfway down the window you will see the latency section. Try adjusting your buffer size to 256 or even 128 . . . your iMac should be able to handle that. As you change your buffer size you will see the Overall Latency change in direct proportion. In general, you want as low a buffer size as your computer can handle when recording in order to minimize latency. Unfortunately, this is more CPU-intensive and if you're using lots of plug-ins it's more of a balancing act.

When you're through recording and you start mixing you can increase your buffer, say to 512 for example. This will allow all your tracks and plugs to play more smoothly and any latency will not be an issue.