Ableton has announced Ableton Live LE, the new entry-level version of Ableton Live for studio hobbyists and newcomers to DAW applications. Ableton Live LE could be viewed as the Ableton equivalent to Cubase LE. It has many of the pro features of Ableton Live, but some features are limited. Ableton's official site provides a handy list of how Live and Live LE differ, including LE's 64 audio tracks per-project limitation and other details.

Live LE has two main screens. A session view screen is what Ableton calls a "musical sketch pad". Each grid in the session window can hold MIDI, loops, and song elements, or you can place entire songs in the grid.

The Arrangement view has a timeline for recording, MIDI arranging, and production.

Features include support for VST and AU effects and instruments, real-time time-stretching and warping of AIFF, WAV, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC and MP3 files for DJing and instant remixing, plus Tweak Live's controls in real time with any MIDI controller.

Additional info on the new Ableton Live LE are in the audio "Around The Industry" report. Click below to hear more details on Ableton Live LE, plus the upgraded version of Ableton Live 6.

System requirements:

• For Mac:

• Any G3 or faster (G5 or Intel-Mac recommended)
• 512 MB RAM (1 GB recommended)
• Mac OS X 10.2.8 (10.4 or later recommended)
• DVD-ROM drive

• For Windows:

• 1.5 GHz CPU or faster
• 512 MB RAM (1 GB recommended)
• QuickTime 6.4 or higher recommended
• Windows 2000/Windows XP/Windows Vista
• Windows-compatible sound card (ASIO driver support recommended)
• DVD-ROM drive