syncing DAW apps is not a walk in the park. luckly the rocket scientists at renoise have incorporated a latency modifier on the midi clock master and slave options. it over comes audio latency an can provide a damn steady clock source, however the low resolution of normal midi clock results in some recovery time after a hiccup or a tempo change. seems that after a tempo change or immediately after a start/stop it takes about 5 or more seconds to come back into sync. witch would be utterly embarrassing in a live setting. not that this is a renoise only issue but given renoise’s awesomeness and nerd power…
in a perfect world i would be able to use my motu midi timepice as an external clock source for renoise. providing a highly stable clock and several syncing options. however midi time code is no picnic with no latency adjustment things can become a bit more of a headache having to correct latency via audio latency not midi offset. its not too bad though the entire film industry does this on like 24 fps non drop MTC. Midi time code is a nice upgrade to a sync setup if your running compatible software. i rember making the jump with cubase vst32/5 a few years back(remember neon?). it was very much so worth the price of motu gear.
however i rember the first time i experienced the godlyness of digidesign superclock. using digital proformer an unity on a mac a few years ago in the studio at peabody. there where 3 more computers an a few hardware synths, a few kursweil k2000’s. i remember being able to jam all afternoon waking over to any computer or synth and making adjustments or remote tempo changes with no ill effect. i never herd a hiccup at all out of the motu/digital proformer/super clock combo. it was the most fun ive ever been able to have making music as there was no annoying technicalities to deal with. Every thing worked as one, an i was comfortable jamming in front of people knowing i wasnt going to make a fool of myself as a result of technical BS people dont understand.
but now in 2010 with the upcoming version of renoise looking absolutely sick, things like OSC support becoming a DAW norm are becoming a reality. but we all still use a syncing method made almost 30 years ago. an midi sync has sucked since it was invented. (sync/24 is much better in my opinion). but MTC was a nice update. but still not digidesign superclock. i think that the ultimate update to renoise would be high resolution sync. if renoise was max/msp or reaktor id simply modify the midi clock selection to send an OSC bang. but instead of on bang every second or whatnot for 120bpm, like 50 bangs a second for 120bpm. renoise would snap back into time real quick. if there was a latency adjustment on the osc connection then all would be well.
im still a bit of a renoise noob. i still use ableton for almost everything the warp engine is just to good for playing loops. and mixing an such is a step ahead of renoise. i mostly use renoise running along side ableton i want to buy renoise it is my favorite application ever made, but i simply use it as a toy right now im still trying to learn it more an use it to do more things i do in ableton,
. I can believe having different equipment drift every now and than can be a bitch, especially live… Maybe you need to try out a strictly software set-up on stage?