4
Rode has now a device which allows to plug in microphones which need to be powered by power usually provided by smartphones (2.7v) through TRRS such as Rode's Lavalier Go or Shure's MVL/A to a USB sound card or any mic entry using XLR.
This is Rode VXLR+. The XLR has to provide 12-48V phantom power.
From Rode's site:
The VXLR+ is a 3.5mm female TRS ...
3
Won't work.
The output from a turntable is about 47k ohms. You need to get it to about 600 ohms for a standard line. Your mic is about 150 ohms (well, these can vary heavily though).
You need a RIAA pre-amp just to get to mic-input so might as well go for line.
3
It won't necessarily be lower quality, but it could be.
USB ports can quite happily deliver 5v at 2 amps - but if your PC/laptop/mac is under heavy load you may find that it drops a bit, or the 5v isn't very pure so you may get fluctuations in the power supply to your mic adaptor.
The same thing happens with a mains supply, but it can be easier to filter ...
3
Note that the Zoom H4n can record 24 bit samples. If you set your input level so that the loudest sound peaks at half your available headroom, your recording will effectively use 23 bits. That's still plenty of bits left if you plan to downsample to 16bits for your finished product. Unless you are looking for the coloration of a specific limiter or preamp, ...
2
High-quality linear components generally need more than 5V supply, insofar the claim is reasonable.
However, it is nowadays not a big deal to include a DC-DC converter to attain a higher voltage. Of course this needs more current, but USB offers rather plenty of Amps. Then you also have enough headroom to smoothen out most interference with fixed-voltage ...
2
The difference between those two products is that one includes an analog to digital converter and a digital output, in addition to the analog outputs. You might want the digital output if you have a mac (most modern macs have digital input) but no outboard audio interface. Or if you have other gear with S/PDIF digital input.
Don't trust me (really). Check ...
2
Go with the audio interface. The "mixer" borders on useless. It is basically just a cheap interface with some near useless features worked in to it. You are paying for unused features rather than an audio interface that includes a clean pre-amp and quality ADC. You want an audio interface for your purposes. The reason to go with a mixer would be if you ...
2
I've no experience with this type of gear, but functionality depends on the use-case.
This device (and there are several others available with similar function) is mostly useful on ribbon and dynamic mics. But in most cases, as a sound designer or sound engineer, those types of mics are used on loud objects (drums, guns, explosions, cars).
If you want to ...
2
Yes you need a preamp, but you already have one (its just not that good)
A good preamp is one of the most important tools in a studio and perhaps one of the most important in the recording input chain. With out a decent preamp you will never get a decent recording since you will start out with a bad signal. Here is the issue in a nut shell:
A microphone ...
2
Speaking as an electronics engineer, the general rule (below radio frequencies), when designing amplifiers and various audio interfaces is try and make outputs low impedance and inputs high impedance. If you connect a high output impedance to a low input impedance you get signal loss and when restoring that signal loss (with gain) you'll amplify the noise ...
2
It depends a lot on the kind of equipment. Sometimes equipment is designed to have a low impedance output and be connected to a much higher impedance input. Other times equipment is designed so that the output and input impedances are to be matched as closely as possible.
The possible consequences are wide-ranging. Anything from loss of signal strength to ...
2
The MTX isn't just a matrix box that you could do on a mixer but actually the power supply of the microphone. Think it like two neumann km100 bodies for two ak20+ak40 capsules. The signals that the rsm alone is outputing or inputting from the DIN connector, according to my manual are
-50 V
+50 V
Side
Mid
GND
+10 V
N/C
So nothing like Mid Hot-Cold-GND and ...
2
Actually, the mic pre amp you are mentioning is a pre amp plus a processing chain (a dynamics processor and some filters and eqs).
You cannot emulate the pre amp itself in software as amplifying the mic signal is inherently done in the analog domain. The cost of a mic pre amp is related to the analog components included, their selection and association to ...
2
I'm in full agreement with audionuma's answer, but just to add that a 3 grand mic preamp will not fix a 10 buck microphone.
As you didn't mention in your question what mic & preamps you currently have, this is a bit of guesswork, but assuming it's a fairly basic setup, you can gain a reasonable amount of sound quality by using a USB pre-amp - they ...
1
Most of the popular-priced two channel mic preamps as you are asking about include USB audio interfaces built-in. So keeping your UCA-202 while finding a low-price standalone dual mic pre severely limits your choices nearly to zero.
Behringer makes a rather nice dual mic preamp with built-in USB interface in the "U-Phoria UMC202HD Audiophile 2x2 USB Audio ...
1
The standard electret bias network is simply a 1.5V - 3V battery with a 2k2 or so resistor in series.
Connect the sleeve connection to ground and connect the free end of the resistor to the plug tip connconnection. The tip connection also feeds the preamp input.
You may need a DC blocking capacitor in series with the preamp input. Most preamp inputs ...
1
"to be heard above the music" – above what music? If it's some fully-mastered mixdown that you're replaying at 0dB, then this is no surprise: such a track has lots and lots of compression on it, making it way louder than a clean microphone track can ever possibly be. You may feel that it's the microphone that's too quiet, but in fact "everything else is too ...
1
Actually, there is already a preamp stage of sorts in your signal chain in your PC's in-built MIC IN (I assume you're using mic in, and not line in, right?). In-built sound inputs, however, are usually pretty poor in quality - noisy, not much gain, etc.
Another potential problem in your signal chain could be the XLR-3.5mm cable connection. The output of ...
1
The problem with the RE20 of current production is that they make use of an SMD PCB and the PCB has errors in the layout and components which are noise generators.
This can be verified by taking any RE20 with filter assemblies from previous iterations and compare with the newer style RE20 A/B on an FFT. You will find the newer RE20s have an unaceptable ...
1
The mic100 only has balanced in/outs. If there is some specific reason you want to use this piece of gear then I would suggest you get a DI-Box. It takes a 1/4" unbalanced and gives you a balanced XLR output. The pre-amp is not needed in a functional sense for what you're doing so keep in mind, unless you're trying to get the "sound" of that ...
1
Guitar amps have a different type of preamp than a phono preamp and it is not surprising that it is unlistenable. The guitar preamp cannot produce the sound of the record properly and from what I understand generally produces a 20db cut in the lows and a 20db boost in the highs, which could explain the screeching.
However, there are extremely affordable ...
1
So strange you asked this question 19 days ago. I've had this model in a drawer for 5+ years and only tonight took it out to clean rust from the battery compartment and re-familiarise myself with it.
I think the problem for you is that this model is not sensitive enough for voice recording, at a distance, hence having to boost the gain on your PC.
I've ...
1
If you are using a mic, you need a pre-amp. Microphones produce weak signals (mic level) which must be boosted up to line level. This is what a pre-amp does. It may be integrated in to the microphone or the mixer or the audio interface or a stand alone unit, but there is one somewhere with any microphone you use.
1
For reference, such a mic is typically called a condenser mic rather than a capacitor mic. Condensor is a former term for capacitors, but condenser continues to be used to describe microphones that work on the principal. That's a type of mic that uses changes in an electrical field between two wires to detect sound and it is more sensitive in general than ...
1
For me a mic input is usually a balanced input and has "extra" electronics inside that give a few dB more gain with a lower noise circuit.
If you put your mic into a normal line-input connector the gain (amplification) will be lower and when you correct this by upping the volume on that channel, you'll hear more hiss and background noise.
When you say "...
1
Mic
A ribbon mic for flute is quite an interesting choice. Might sound great, however you should be careful not to get too close to the mic: ribbons tend to be very sensitive to air flow. Now, it depends what you mean by "solo" flute;
if you mean classical solo pieces than a larger distance is not a problem, however using just one mic will never give a ...
1
Both the Apogee Duet and Apogee One are USB interfaces, which is a good thing since your MacBook Air doesn't have Firewire.
I don't have much experience with microphones, but it looks like you have picked reasonable gear at a reasonable price point. One of the reasons I haven't worked much with mics is that that particular rabbit hole runs deep, and I'm ...
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