Leaving Mic Idle w/ Phantom Power

A

adam79

New member
The other day I forgot to turn off my recording equipment and my mic was idle for a good hour or so with the Phantom Power still engaged. Nothing bad happened, but it got me curious.. is it bad for the mic to be left idle w/ Phantom on?

Thanks.
 
Not usually, in fact I have purposefully left every one of my PP mics powered up for at least 24 hours as sort of a burn in procedure. I don't think it does much really(well maybe to tube mics) but I figure it doesn't hurt and it may show any defects/failures while still under warranty.
 
Do they attract more dust powered? (I don't know.) They ought to be loosely covered regardless..
 
It is standard practice in some professional studios to leave microphones powered up continually. It may not be a great idea with valve microphones but it will do no harm to transistor based microphones. The condenser mics in my studio are often semi-permanently connected and are powered up every time the mixing desk is powered up.
 
jamesperrett said:
It is standard practice in some professional studios to leave microphones powered up continually. It may not be a great idea with valve microphones but it will do no harm to transistor based microphones. The condenser mics in my studio are often semi-permanently connected and are powered up every time the mixing desk is powered up.
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now that you mention it my drum mics are on whenever i'm mixing too(the condensers phantom, dyn not though it doesnt hurt em i have pp turned off for them. as for dust , unless you have an unusually dusty environment i wouldn't consider it an issue. Pollen could be bad if it causes the singer to sneeze into the mic though!
 
The condenser in my living room sometimes spends months powered 24/7, so I sure hope it's not an issue!
 
I think that the SM81 sitting next to me has been phantom powered for about 8 days so far (this time around), so I too hope it's not an issue. This thing has lived for over 30 years so far, so I can only assume that this isn't the worst thing that it's seen in its lifetime.

If anybody sees a barely functional SM81 in the "gear for sale" sub forum, you'll know what happened.
 
It actually may be BETTER to leave them powered up, as what tends to be the most dangerous time for a electronic component is the initial startup and power off, not the time it is running stable. This is especially true for power supplies.
-AsciiRory
 
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