Bambi Busboom
New member
Mates,
NOTE: Those with little time and no interest in my microphone history may wish to pop down this post to the section beginning "FINALLY- TO THE POINT:"
Today, I dropped round a friend's house to look in on the kit he's planning to use next week for a solo paino CD recording. He will be taking his stuff to the local Steinway Hall and for three day be recording various classical "miniatures" on a Steinway B.
His other four albums have all been professionally engineered, but this time he wants to manage the whole thing with his own stuff.
His stuff: 2- Neumann KM184 small diaphram condensers > MOTU 828 > firewire> to Powerbook G4 1.35GhZ /200GB HD> Digital Performer editing> CD master
My friend was not sure though if he was getting the best results from using the internal microphone preamps in the MOTU, so I took over my Peavey VMP-2 microphone preamp. The Peavey is a two channel all- tube preamp with tube EQ- which I think was incredible value at $650. Mine is stock except for a long evolution of tube choices. I find it to very impressive sounding and has the best characteristics of real tube amplification as compared to the many mic pres with a "tube warmth" control working off a single 12AX7. [VMP-2 tubes: 2- sylvania black plate square getter 12AX7s, 2- Sylvania black plate, sqaure getter triple mica 5751s, 2- GE grey plate two mica 5751s and 2- Valvo (Philips,Holland) gold pin 6201s (12AT7)]
Well, I shouldn't go on about the Peavey as it didn't turn out to be the star of the afternoon.
For fun, I took along my pair of Oktava MC012s. When I was shopping for microphones four or five years ago an engineer friend lent me some nice ones including Schoeps CMC6/MK4, AKG 391, and Neumann KM84. The Schoeps were absolutely superb, but at over $1200 each- untouchable for my home recording. The next in line were the KM84's and these were just wonderfully refined- smooth, balanced through the range, detailed wihtout fuss, and quite open sounding. These seemed very easy to place for good results as compared to the AKG C414 B/ULSs which were trying hard, but I could never get right.
Very nice the KM84s wre, they were no longer made and expensive used, so the alternative was the modernized verision in the KM184. My engineer friend thught told me he thought the KM184s were not as refined as the KM84 and a little hard on the top.
Well, the KM184 were also then over $500 each and I still bristled at that amount for recording practice sessions at home and my ocassional voice tracks for my radio programme- for which I could borrow an EV RE-20 which works really well for me- better for me than Neumnn U89 and AT 4050.
But then FLASH- the Oktava MC012 popped into view- a supposed copy of the KM84 - and then only $160 each. I went to Guitar Center and went into theior mic preamp room with 14 MC102s and found two that sounded alike and wwere similar output. Gosh, were these all over the map! But I could hear the relationship to the KM84s- the smoothness and balance- perhaps a but darker.
FINALLY-TO THE POINT: At my friends' house we set up the Neumann KM184s , to the Peavey VMP-2 into the MOTU 828, and onto the G4 and Digital performer. after a couple of changed of cable- these thinner Mogamis were found to be a bu it bass shy compared to hicker Monsters- we tried the Neumanns with more fussing with position. This ended up halfway between the hammers and lid about 12" about 8" behind the hammers.
The KM184 were just as expected, but as compared (and as my enginner friend mentioned four years ago) to the KM84's the treble seemed a bit harder. overall the sound was excellent. we did everything without EQ anf then pplayed with some reverb form his ecxellent Lexicon reverb unit (sorry don;t know the model) and avoided his DBz compressor limiter.
But, after awhile I asked if I could just plug in my Oktava MC012s > as I bought them to stand in for KM84s -and th KM194 are the successors to that one, I wondered if the Oktavas would be an embarssment. I thought the Oktavas were be muddy and rooled off but, my friend actually prefferred the Oktavas slightly darker quality on a couple of recordings. The detail and openness was about the same.
I think we did not have the optimum placement, but in this comparison I would judge the Oktavas to have such a substantial portion of the sound quality of the Neumanns, that I am completely dropping my ambition for the KM184s- and will just save up for the Schoeps- for 2020!
My friend was quite perturbed at the similarity between his $650 and- now- $100 microphones, so much so I bought him a calming lunch.
Bargain hunting pays off!
Cheers
Bambi B
-sorry this is so long!
NOTE: Those with little time and no interest in my microphone history may wish to pop down this post to the section beginning "FINALLY- TO THE POINT:"
Today, I dropped round a friend's house to look in on the kit he's planning to use next week for a solo paino CD recording. He will be taking his stuff to the local Steinway Hall and for three day be recording various classical "miniatures" on a Steinway B.
His other four albums have all been professionally engineered, but this time he wants to manage the whole thing with his own stuff.
His stuff: 2- Neumann KM184 small diaphram condensers > MOTU 828 > firewire> to Powerbook G4 1.35GhZ /200GB HD> Digital Performer editing> CD master
My friend was not sure though if he was getting the best results from using the internal microphone preamps in the MOTU, so I took over my Peavey VMP-2 microphone preamp. The Peavey is a two channel all- tube preamp with tube EQ- which I think was incredible value at $650. Mine is stock except for a long evolution of tube choices. I find it to very impressive sounding and has the best characteristics of real tube amplification as compared to the many mic pres with a "tube warmth" control working off a single 12AX7. [VMP-2 tubes: 2- sylvania black plate square getter 12AX7s, 2- Sylvania black plate, sqaure getter triple mica 5751s, 2- GE grey plate two mica 5751s and 2- Valvo (Philips,Holland) gold pin 6201s (12AT7)]
Well, I shouldn't go on about the Peavey as it didn't turn out to be the star of the afternoon.
For fun, I took along my pair of Oktava MC012s. When I was shopping for microphones four or five years ago an engineer friend lent me some nice ones including Schoeps CMC6/MK4, AKG 391, and Neumann KM84. The Schoeps were absolutely superb, but at over $1200 each- untouchable for my home recording. The next in line were the KM84's and these were just wonderfully refined- smooth, balanced through the range, detailed wihtout fuss, and quite open sounding. These seemed very easy to place for good results as compared to the AKG C414 B/ULSs which were trying hard, but I could never get right.
Very nice the KM84s wre, they were no longer made and expensive used, so the alternative was the modernized verision in the KM184. My engineer friend thught told me he thought the KM184s were not as refined as the KM84 and a little hard on the top.
Well, the KM184 were also then over $500 each and I still bristled at that amount for recording practice sessions at home and my ocassional voice tracks for my radio programme- for which I could borrow an EV RE-20 which works really well for me- better for me than Neumnn U89 and AT 4050.
But then FLASH- the Oktava MC012 popped into view- a supposed copy of the KM84 - and then only $160 each. I went to Guitar Center and went into theior mic preamp room with 14 MC102s and found two that sounded alike and wwere similar output. Gosh, were these all over the map! But I could hear the relationship to the KM84s- the smoothness and balance- perhaps a but darker.
FINALLY-TO THE POINT: At my friends' house we set up the Neumann KM184s , to the Peavey VMP-2 into the MOTU 828, and onto the G4 and Digital performer. after a couple of changed of cable- these thinner Mogamis were found to be a bu it bass shy compared to hicker Monsters- we tried the Neumanns with more fussing with position. This ended up halfway between the hammers and lid about 12" about 8" behind the hammers.
The KM184 were just as expected, but as compared (and as my enginner friend mentioned four years ago) to the KM84's the treble seemed a bit harder. overall the sound was excellent. we did everything without EQ anf then pplayed with some reverb form his ecxellent Lexicon reverb unit (sorry don;t know the model) and avoided his DBz compressor limiter.
But, after awhile I asked if I could just plug in my Oktava MC012s > as I bought them to stand in for KM84s -and th KM194 are the successors to that one, I wondered if the Oktavas would be an embarssment. I thought the Oktavas were be muddy and rooled off but, my friend actually prefferred the Oktavas slightly darker quality on a couple of recordings. The detail and openness was about the same.
I think we did not have the optimum placement, but in this comparison I would judge the Oktavas to have such a substantial portion of the sound quality of the Neumanns, that I am completely dropping my ambition for the KM184s- and will just save up for the Schoeps- for 2020!
My friend was quite perturbed at the similarity between his $650 and- now- $100 microphones, so much so I bought him a calming lunch.
Bargain hunting pays off!
Cheers
Bambi B
-sorry this is so long!