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I bought Behringer - C1-U microphone and I would like to ask about this noise I get when recording. You can hear the noise in this short recording https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxEYfpSTfDGJTTRDOEpMWkpTdGc/view?usp=sharing My question is, what causes that noise. Is it some natural noise of my room? Could it be the laptop? I have seen some videos online showing what this mic can do and some of them don't have that noise. I have even seen a video comparing unedited and edited sound from this mic and the unedited still sounded good. Could some of those windscreens help?

Thank you.

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What you're hearing is called signal noise and can be caused by a large variety of things. Different mics have different ratings when it comes to signal noise. The term signal-to-noise ratio (abbreviated SNR or S/N) is used to describe the amount of noise in a signal.

Microphones ads often use SNR to make their product appear to be of a higher quality. SNR is usually not a huge problem in higher end or just higher quality microphones. Not to hate on Behringer, but I've had many people complain to me about a wide variety of their products and even with this exact issue of yours when it comes to their mics while working at GC.

If it bothers you a bunch, I'd consider looking into a higher quality mic. Rode Microphones are known for having a low SNR.

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  • Thing is I found this video youtube.com/watch?v=QoCzmriLTjc I don't understand that language, but there is "Behringer C1U" in the title, so I guess that's what he uses in that video (visually confirmed I would say). How come there is no noise?
    – Denco
    Feb 9, 2016 at 20:40
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A USB mic has the problem that the power comes from the usb, and thus from the laptop. I found that out when connecting C1U to raspberry pi. It had noise, while on my desktop it had less noise. Still noisy though. Noise sitting at -65dB, knowing that 16 bit audio is 96 db. -65dB means 10.5 bit per sample. With 16 bits available you throw away at least 4 bits. Those 4 bits will wreck you when you try to amplify your audio. Therefore you must try to use the mic at no more than 2 inch and make the loudest sound possible so you need not amplify.

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I had a similar issue when the power supply was hooked up to the PC. Try disconnecting it from the laptop and unplugging it.

If you're still getting it you could try to swap out some cables.

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  • I think I have tried disconnnecting everything from the laptop (I have definitely tried disconnecting the power supply - no change). But I can give it a shot to be sure.
    – Denco
    Jan 30, 2016 at 8:13
  • No change, everything unplugged and the noise is still there.
    – Denco
    Jan 31, 2016 at 13:16
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Noise level in the sample provided is really low and is quite normal for this type of microphone.

The foreign guy in the video most likely uses compression or a preamp - also he speaks close to the mic and at moments pop sounds can be heard - so a pop filter and a close proximity to the mic can help with the signal-to-noise ratio by increasing signal

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  • If the popping was the only problem I would solve it with pop filter of course.
    – Denco
    Apr 8, 2016 at 9:07

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