Hum/noise near electrical devices on the set

Question

I soon have a filmproject and a have a problem with the equipment i have rented. Now, when i'm to close to electrical devices like a laptop, tv or even the ceiling lights, i get an electrical hum.

I never noticed this problem with other gear. I'm now using an edirol r44 field recorder and an sennheiser me66 shotgun mic.

Does anyone recognize this problem and knows what it can be?

Answer 1

Have you swapped the mic cable yet?

Answer 2

Is it a 60Hz kind of hum?

Go through these steps to determine the problem (listen after each adjustment):

-Change or remove batteries from the ME66 mic. I've had problems with my mics that have a AA battery in them acting strangely when it is low on power.

-Remove the microphone completely from the mix and just listen with a cable and the recorder only.

-If you have the Edirol plugged in to the wall, make sure you go off of batteries only. Double check your phantom-power settings.

-Replace the cable with something like Star-Quad for extra shielding. Replace the cable any way - crack open the connectors to make sure there everything is soldered down right.

If all else fails, take some copper braid, affix it to an anti-static wrist-band, and see if you can drain out the ground into your body.

Answer 3

• 1 on the use of StarQuad cable, I use it for all of my cables. I also make up all of my cables, I find that the reliability of my own cables is higher than that of ones I have bought. I have found in the past that bought cables have not been wired correctly and some have not got the ground connected, ridiculous I know but trust me, it happens. Get handy with a soldering iron!!

Answer 4

Thnx! I'm going to try does steps. I'll let you know what my foundings are!