I am looking for a microphone that meets these strange requirements...

R

royal liberty

New member
For my recordings I use my U87, it does the job well, this might sound silly but I find that if I record an idea with the built-in microphone of my imac (this is also the case with my macbook pro) that my voice sounds really good here. The frequencies suit my voice. Are there pro mics that also combine similar results with high quality? If that makes sense to anybody.
 
You're struggling with the word 'quality'. Your Mac mic is not a bad microphone at all, it's just characterless - and probably if you test it, quite flat in it's frequency response. The 87 has, er 'character'. If you have something that can play back full range sound from say, 50 to 20K, play some pink noise and record it on the Mac and Neumann. Then analyse the frequency response. You will see differences, and you've decided you like those differences - so you could EQ the Neumann to sound like the iMac. Quality is usually the absence of noise, the range it can hear and perhaps accuracy and sensitivity. Your Mac would probably pass most of those criteria - maybe noise could be a little higher due to the noise of a spinning drive, if it's not SSD?

Most expensive mics are bought for character - which means deviations from flat. EQ - careful, gentle and subtle EQ could move the 87 to nearer what you fancy - but so could a budget condenser?
 
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Tanks Rob, for this clarifying explanation. But a microphone in the frequency, EQ range of the lets say the current macbook pro's (without noise and with position options) doesn't exist?
 
rob aylestone said:
If you have something that can play back full range sound from say, 50 to 20K, play some pink noise and record it on the Mac and Neumann. Then analyse the frequency response. You will see differences,
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This works well to identify what is going on. I do this same white noise trick with the guitar amp sims. I focus the amps middle knobs as the change 'scoop', and watch it on Fabfilter graphically. Every guitar amp scoops different. It is a major trait.

Because of the origin source at the time of recording and how it is inducted, there are dynamics that are not producible. One amp sim cannot sound like them all with a little EQ. It has limits.

Some of the microphone simulators work similar to what Rob describes, and get mixed results.

There is more in the U87, learn to use it.
 
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That's what disappoints me about my U87 - it is NOT the go to mic for everything, which I mistakenly believed it would be. It's like my favourite shirt that I had made to fit me - it flatters and shapes, is comfy and always looks good. However - my son borrowed it and hated it - it was baggy around the middle, the sleeves were too long and the only thing that fitted properly was the collar size - we are both the same. The U87 seems the same kind of mic - does some things amazingly well, and on some instruments, it sounds worse than the cheap Samson I use to record my flute!
 
A microphone with the same qualities as your Mac may exist, but it is a strange ask, so very few people have tried different mics looking for that sound.

It is probably best to test the two to find out what the difference is and either use eq to adjust the mic you have, or start looking for mics that have that same sort of frequency response.
 
How smart are you? Are you able to remove the microphone from your laptop or a replacement part for ebay. Find the hot wires. Make an XLR connector for it..see where im going with this. Put it in a LDC body so it looks nice.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Part of the sound of the built-in mic might be its position, getting reflections off the desk or keyboard.
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I'd be looking into this ^.
The position of the mic in the laptop and, crucially, the distance that you are from it, are you going to play a huge part in how any recording sounds.

It's entirely possible you just like the sound of your room but aren't giving the u87 enough space to capture that.
 
They are right. I'll bet if you positioned the mac mic the same way you do the U87, it wouldn't sound the way you like.
 
Buy a small cheap SDC mic and mount it where the mac mic is on a sheet of MDF the same area as the mac base. Make sure the mic's diaphragm is flush with the top surface of the MDF...

Yeah, pointless ^ probably would not work, pulling plonker a bit. Buy instead a neutral sounding mic and then play with EQ. The Sontronics STC-2 is pretty neutral.

Dave.
 
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