Best contact mics with Sony PCM d50

Question

Is anybody using contact mics with a Sony PCM d50? Any suggestions that are very affordable? I want to record inner workings of laptops and other electronic devices. Cheers!

Answer 1

Jez riley French is an established name in hydrophones and also contact mics, especially for people who find Trance's offering "on the expensive side".

Also see this: Can you suggest a good contact mic for sound design? (average cost of proposal would be much appreciated)

and http://www.musicofsound.co.nz/blog/the-first-rule-of-contact-mic-club

Answer 2

I can vouch for JrF: http://hydrophones.blogspot.se/2011/05/c-series-pro-contact-microphones-new.html

I never leave home without them. Using an H4n. They are used by BBC, which according to me is a good reference.

Answer 3

I use the trance audio amulet with my D50 and it works and sounds great. Probably the best contact mics on the market seeing as they have a matched preamp - super quiet and clean!

http://www.tranceaudio.com/stereomono.html

Answer 4

If you are looking for a "very affordable" suggestion, you may want to try buying piezo disks, shielded cable and 1/4" jacks. Check tutorial 5 from this page. You might also try tutorial 1 if you are looking for electromagnetic sounds.

Answer 5

I recently bought a couple contact mics from hydrophones.blogspot.com to use with my sony PCM-M10. They're handmade, they sound great, extremely low noise, and a great price!

He also makes an induction coil pick-up mic that would work perfect for what you're wanting to record.

http://hydrophones.blogspot.com/2010/09/induction-coil-pick-up-now-available.html

Answer 6

I have bought one of Jez Riley contact mic (with the impadence matching adaptor) and used it with my sound devices to record, I got quiet a good result as those mic are interesting to and to play with.

The downside of this mic and any similar in that price range is the limited frequency response, especially on the mid to high, tim prebble (the link above) provides an excellent explanation post about it.

Trance Audio or Barcus Berry Planar Wave will be a good investment.