Microphone vs Interface

R

Robert27191

New member
Hi All,

First post on here - great forum find! Apologies if this is in the wrong section - I'm just getting to grips.

I've been recording at home for a number of years and have worked my up from a total newbie to only a partial newbie. I play piano, sing lead for a band and always enjoy the technical side of the recording part.
I began with a Se2000 mic, with an alesis i02 interface. More recently, I have upgraded to the Rode NT1-A mic with a Scarlett 2i2 interface.

My question is as follows, and I appreciate it's a very subjective one. Is it better to spend (very) high end on a mic, and use an average interface / better to use an average mic with a high end interface / better to have equally good mic and interface?

My budget is around £250-300 for a mic or so. My original alesis interface worked brilliantly, and I can't actually see much difference in the scarlett. The Rode NT1-A is a step-up from the Se2000, but is it better to save on upgrading the interface and spend the extra £100 on a higher-end mic? I record mainly vocals through those mics.

Thanks in advance!

Robert
 
There will be all kinds of opinions for this, but I'm gonna say you can never go wrong with an equally balanced mic/interface equation. It's tempting to drop a lot more on the mic, but honestly if one takes the time to really get good at mic positioning and recording techniques, any old $100 mic can sound really good. Not like blow-your-mind amazing, but really good. Not saying you should get a $100 mic either of course. A balance is very nice though.
 
As I said in the first line, this was my first post and I was unsure as to where to post it. I apologize for the huge discomfort that has clearly been caused by posting a question in different places. The time it could have taken to answer the question was spent hunting out the rogue posts - not really the helpful responses I was really hoping I would get.
My apologies.
 
Double post or not, you'd have to spend a LOT of money to better the 2i2 interface and, even then the differences would be subtle.

However, just to confuse you, similar applies to microphones (though I'm not sure how much of an upgrade an NT1A is over the sE2000 which is fairly okay in my book). Differences between your NT1A and a £250 mic will be pretty subtle.

Now the boring part of the answer. You'd probably hear a bigger difference spending your £250 on acoustic treatment than you will on any mic or interface in those price ranges. Once you room sounds good, then you can consider more expensive (or even just different) mics...but, until your room sounds good any improvement from the mic will be largely lost in the room atmosphere. I'd also suggest money spent on monitors but your budget won't do both!

My opinion anyhow...
 
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