I'll try a POLL....and see if the $49 mic is not good enough for HR.
It sounds fine to me, maybe not as perfect as a $9000 mic but its not that far off either. It doesnt sound like crap.
Well..that $49 mic is clearly the worst sounding of the bunch. Yeah, there were others that had some similarity in tone, but the $49 mic to my ears had the most annoyingly strident/harsh sound of all of them...and I'm only hearing it on cheap computer desktop speakers. I'm sure if I heard it on my studio monitors, that would be even more obvious.
But you don't need to go from $49 to $9000...and there's no implication that the $9000 mic is $8951 better than the $49 mic.
The way to look at it is more about tonal personality, finding the one that absolutely complements your voice (or a variety of voices) in most situations, and delivers vocal tracks that just seem to fall into place without a lot of work...and also the overall build quality.
I can bet that the $49 mic has about $25-$30 in the build quality, and I bet if you got like 10 of them, they would be all over the place with their specs, since they are obviously churned out on some assembly line, with parts-is-parts.
Hey...if it sounds good to you, and you don't hear anything bad about it...then go for it...but just comparing those two sets of vocal clips...doesn't tell the complete tale about every mic in the shootout.
EVERY voice is different...and man, sometimes you can go through a dozen mics trying to find one that really works for a given voice...other times you have a voice that sounds the same or as good even if they sing through a soup can.
Also...there's something to be said for brand names. Maybe that doesn't always resonate with the "I got $200, is that enough for a home studio setup?" crowd...but if you are buying from a build quality, specialized use, and resale value perspective...if you are buying for the long-term and looking to build up your studio, rather than just put something together on the cheap, as long as it gets you recording...then there's more to buying than pure price.
Like a car.
You can say that a $10k compact, or even some cheaper used vehicle will get you from home to work just the same as an Audi...or a BMW...or what have you...but really, what would you rather drive?
That said...don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you should always buy the most expensive audio gear. I'm a deal hound and will window shop and research for a long time before I commit even $49 on something...but one thing that's been repeated over and over for me throughout my studio recording years...is that even though I've bought cheap when I needed to, I have never, ever once regretted buying up when I could, yet there have been many times that I regretted buying cheap just so I could save a few bucks to then spend on some other cheap items.
It only feels like you're getting a deal when you stretch your $$$ real thin and buy a lot of cheap items with it, rather than buying a couple of better quality items, and then having no doubts about them and thoroughly enjoying them...rather than making do.
YMMV....