I'm new to Ableton and just learning how to use it. I'm running the 90 day trial version of Ableton Live 11 (Suite) on a Windows 10 laptop. I have a Zoom L-12 digital mixer, which is also a USB interface. I'm trying to figure out how to record guitars, vocals and an electronic drum kit into Ableton via the inputs on my Zoom L-12. On my digital mixer, I've got my guitar plugged into input 2, a vocal mic plugged into input 4 and the electronic drum kit plugged into input 8. However, when I open up audio tracks in Ableton, the inputs on my digital mixer don't correspond to the Input Channels in Ableton. This is really weird because I've tried other DAWs such as Cubase and it works fine. I've gone into Options > Preferences > Audio > Input Config (and Output Config), and selected the inputs (and outputs) which correspond to the tracks on my mixer. I've opened some audio tracks in session view in Ableton, each with the Input Type set to Ext.In and the tried different Input Channels from the drop down list below that, so I can see which inputs Ableton is detecting audio from. So, for example, with my guitar plugged into input 2 on my mixer, I notice that it's detecting signal for Input Channel 4 in Ableton when I play the guitar. Why doesn't Ableton detect signal for Input Channel 2, the same one my guitar is plugged into on the mixer? The vocal mic is plugged into input 4 on the mixer, but Ableton is detecting signal for Input Channels 1, 2, 6, 7 and 8. Why not input 4, where the mic is plugged into? The e-kit is plugged into input 8 on my mixer, yet in Ableton it's detecting signals for Input Channels 1, 2, 7 and 8 when I play something on the e-kit. Why is this happening, and how do I know which input on my mixer corresponds to which Input Channel in Ableton so I can record each instrument correctly? Thanks.

Hi - I don't have any access to that mixer/interface, but as far as I can determine, input channels 1-12 on the Zoom device should automatically appear as inputs 1-12 in the DAW, just as you'd expect. Live simply list the inputs generically, and it's not uncommon for DAW inputs to sometimes not reflect the same channel numbers as the hardware inputs of the interface [that might depend on how the DAW communicates with the interface or on the interface driver setup], but in this particular case I couldn't say why the numbers don't correspond in Live but do in another DAW.. [I assume you did the usual shutdown/restart test] If Live is consistently seeing a single input on the Zoom showing up on a different-numbered input channel or on multiple input channels in Live, my only guess would be maybe there's some interface setup/mode in the Zoom device or in its driver/software utility [if it has one] that allows remapping of the Zoom inputs to the interface channel connections, and that might have to be tweaked when using it with Live..? For example, if all the input signals are showing up in inputs 1&2 in Live, maybe the Zoom is mixing all the physical inputs together and sending them to Live as a stereo submix, and then offsetting the individual input channels by 2 [which could make input 2 show up as input 4, etc]..? That's what I meant by 'interface setup/mode in the Zoom device', but again, I don't have access to one, so I'm only guessing here.. [I suppose there might be some i/o configuration specific to Windows audio drivers that might affect things, but I'm strictly a Mac user so I couldn't speculate on that]..

Thanks for your reply. I've tried your suggestions and I still can't figure this out. I wonder if there are any other Ableton users here who use a Zoom L-12. This is most frustrating!

After a bit of trial and error, I've figured out that the tracks on my mixer correspond to the Input Channels 2 higher in Ableton. So, for example track 2 on my mixer will be Input Channel 4 in Ableton. The other Input Channels that were detecting signal with the e-kit were caused microphones plugged into the other inputs picking up the residual sound of the e-kit! Well I'm getting there with learning Ableton! I still prefer Cubase to be honest, but I'm looking at Ableton more for running tracks live with my band and using Cubase for recording.

Glad you figured it out!