Can you really believe the reviews?

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Mr Blues

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Is it easy to be decieved when one reads all the reviews,? .i.e on Sound on sound , music tech etc.

I have read good reviews on the Samson C03 on Sond on sound and I am thinking shal I go and get one or hold on and wait the Audio tech 3035. some would say there is no comparison comparing the samsons with the AT's.

Many here don't rate the Samson's condesner mics its almost a dirty word like the behringer although the samson C02 pair get fairly good reviews.

Dave
 
Since magazines make their money through advertisements, you have to take their reviews lightly. They are not likely to ever bash a piece of gear. As a general rule if they don't like a piece of gear they simply will not write a review.

There is no great way to evaluate a microphone besides hearing it yourself. The next best method is to take the advice of trusted people without an agenda. The key is trusted people. There are people on these types of forums and at music stores that will give you a review without even using it!

Good luck!
 
Thanks Philo its amazing how one can get easily gooped , your right I will try and get a sample from the store and hear for myself.

I know there are some websites where you get a unbiased reviews but as you said its still good to hear for yourself.

Dave
 
I always try to read as many reviews as I can. Sometimes it helps to read between the lines. But you always have to consider the source. For example, a "professional" reviewer would most likely use "pro" standards for testing gear. That means a controlled environment - an acoustically treated room, a good balanced monitoring system, Class "A" mic pres, etc.

If that's the case then you'll get very different results in your own environment. Take the AKG C1000 for example - a mic that got good reviews but I personally thought sounded awful - shrill and bitey. Why? Maybe b/c that mic works well in a big room with high ceilings, running through an API, compressed and EQ'd to tape. When I tried it in other environments and it went to a DAW instead of tape, the results were MUCH different.

Also, with sources such as user reviews, you have to take in account the pride factor as well as the general lower standard. Many users just don't know any better o rmaybe their equipment is So different from yours that yeah it worked for them, but it won't work for you. OR vice versa.

So I say read as much as you can on a product before buying it. You might find info that will lead in you in a different direction. But ultimately you can't just rely on reviews in magazines or from sales people.

Cheers, Rez
 
I've worked for two different magazine publishers.

Believe me ... you never say anything disparaging about an advertiser. Even if it is in the context of a review. Unless, of course, they're not paying their bills. :D

But even then, if another company sees you ripping in to a competing product ... any product, then you risk getting a reputation, and other companies might be a little gun shy about allowing you to review their products.

In theory, a site like this one is the only real hope of getting truly objective reviews. But even that's a little tough to pull off, seeing as how manufactureres and even vendors like to frequent these forums -- some of them incongnito -- and try to blow the winds of favor in their direction.

And if you try to go against the grain and question something ... then you generally find yourself on the receiving end of a bunch of mother hens who try and accuse you of having an agenda. Sometimes people who own a particular piece of gear and like it ... and reading an opinion from someone who doesn't like it somehow turns their world in to a tail spin. :D So either way, it's generally pretty tough-going to find a source for objectivity in terms of gear opinions.

.
 
...

Modern Drummer would trash bad products...now that someone else is in charge of the section you really have to read what they are saying to understand what they mean.

It obviously is not as simple as everything being rainbows and gumdrops.
 
I don't tend to pay much attention to mag reviews.

I've found you have to hang around for a while on a few web forums and after a while you get a feel for who's opinion has value.

One thing I've found is that people like to use forums like these to justify their purchases to themselves. If they've just spent £500 on a mic pre they like to pipe up about what a night and day difference it is over the £450 pre they used to use. :D

And you get a lot of hype (not always a bad thing), and a lot of people saying stuff because they heard someone else say it.

And then of course you get a lot of honest and often educated opinion. Like I said, after a while you get a feel for who you're likely to get that from.
 
Another problem when you don't know the person talking about a mic in a forum:

How many other mics does the person have and how familiar is the person with similar mics? Is this the only mic the person has? Did he just buy it? What's he comparing it to?

Often, phrases like "etched and detailed" are good indicators that this is a new mic to the person and later, that description will change to "bright, edgy, and peaked".

It's not a bad idea to see if the person has reviewed a mic that you already own and does his evaluation of that mic match yours?
 
(1) Take all opinions--reviews or otherwise--no matter who from--with a grain of salt.

(2) Mag reviews are there to sell magazines and advertisement.

(3) In forums like this, a mic can be "the shit" one month and just be "shit" the next month.

(4) Inexperienced recordists are unreliable because they have no frame of reference--they don't have a clue what they are talking about.

(5) Experienced recordists are just as unreliable as the inexperienced ones because their biases are often laced with arrogance--they already know it all.

(6) We are all biased and at least half-full of shit. All of us.
 
Also, other people may talk favorably about mics they own because they actually spent the money to buy them, trying to reassure themselves that they made a good purchase.
Example: "That new Behringer guitar I just bought from Musicians Friend completely blows a Fender American Strat out of the water, and at only $99. It's the best deal going on guitars right now." Even though the person really doesn't believe something like that inside, they may post something like that to make themselves feel that they didn't just waste $100 of their hard-earned money.
 
Seeker of Rock said:
Also, other people may talk favorably about mics they own because they actually spent the money to buy them, trying to reassure themselves that they made a good purchase.
Example: "That new Behringer guitar I just bought from Musicians Friend completely blows a Fender American Strat out of the water, and at only $99. It's the best deal going on guitars right now." Even though the person really doesn't believe something like that inside, they may post something like that to make themselves feel that they didn't just waste $100 of their hard-earned money.
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but that new Behri guitar really does blow the American strat out of the water right??? your not just using that as an example...right?? I mean it was only $99....and the tone....it just has to be better than a strat....I have never played a strat but I have had a squire or two and they are made by fender...and the Behri guitar sounds better than those so....you see what Im getting at....





:p
 
chessrock said:
But even that's a little tough to pull off, seeing as how manufactureres and even vendors like to frequent these forums -- some of them incongnito -- and try to blow the winds of favor in their direction.
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No shit? Talk about supplementing my income! Sign me up! I'll have QQ buying behringer in less than a week!
 
NO! Can't believe salesmen either! And it seems that most reviewers are salesmen of one form or another. Even reviews by consumers may be biased, depending on lots of things. Ever heard someone say, "Wow, my new car stinks, I really made a sorry choice!" There are Ford, Chevy, Toyota....etc owners who are loyal to their product even when they get a lemon. Some reviews may be negative just because the consumer didn't know how to use the product and didn't get the results he wanted. This isn't to say all are biased or inaccurate. One thing you can count on...if the reviewer says a $69 microphone or preamp sounds as good as a u47 or a $1000 pre, red flags should go up.
 
Sound on Sound are capable of giving less than favourable reviews ... for example, the MXL 990 mic distributed by Yamaha (big advertisers in SOS):

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/aug05/articles/mxl.htm

"the technical spec is generally respectable with a 20dBA equivalent noise level. This isn't exactly low by today's standards"

"Being ruthlessly honest, I'd say that a lot of similarly priced Chinese mics offer similar characteristics"

"In terms of UK pricing, the MXL 990 and 992 aren't any cheaper than most of their competition"

They said some good things as well, but these bits were enough to put me off trying one of these mics. And for the more expensive V6 mic, they said "The standard of construction raises no concerns as regards reliability, but perhaps a little more could have been done to damp ringing in the metalwork" ... not exactly a ringing endorsement for a vocal mic, in the first section of a review.
 
Something that really sucks is being a consumer home recordist without convenient access to a lot of mics. I remember going into GC a year or two ago to test some condensor vocal mics. There is a guy there I always purchase from, when I purchase from them, that was really cool about bringing out the mics and setting them up in one of their booths. The manager got mad at him for doing it, though, and told him "it was not their policy" to test mics, and of course it is not their policy to have them returned after purchase either. We continued despite the manager's discontent, and I ended up not purchasing because the only mic I really liked was a GT. Tim let me bring in my JM47 to a/band they sounded almost identical, so no need for a purchase. Not very encouraging to do this again, though, given the attitude of the manager. I probably still will next time I want to hear mics, but it's just not a very friendly experience and their in-store selection is somewhat limited.

So regarding getting reviews to go by, some of the people on this forum who DO have access to and use a lot of mics and share their thoughts on them are valuable as a general guide. It is still the matter of personal taste one person's ears to another, but when one of these guys states that a particular mic is "harsh" or has low SPL, I think this is great information to consider when mic shopping.
 
Seeker of Rock said:
Something that really sucks is being a consumer home recordist without convenient access to a lot of mics. I remember going into GC a year or two ago to test some condensor vocal mics. There is a guy there I always purchase from, when I purchase from them, that was really cool about bringing out the mics and setting them up in one of their booths. The manager got mad at him for doing it, though, and told him "it was not their policy" to test mics, and of course it is not their policy to have them returned after purchase either. We continued despite the manager's discontent, and I ended up not purchasing because the only mic I really liked was a GT. Tim let me bring in my JM47 to a/band they sounded almost identical, so no need for a purchase. Not very encouraging to do this again, though, given the attitude of the manager. I probably still will next time I want to hear mics, but it's just not a very friendly experience and their in-store selection is somewhat limited.

So regarding getting reviews to go by, some of the people on this forum who DO have access to and use a lot of mics and share their thoughts on them are valuable as a general guide. It is still the matter of personal taste one person's ears to another, but when one of these guys states that a particular mic is "harsh" or has low SPL, I think this is great information to consider when mic shopping.
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I've gotten some very good advice on this forum, the best usally from someone who has experience without an axe to grind. Harvey Gerst comes to mind...among others. His very long thread on microphones is extremely helpful....and doesn't try to sell a specific mic, in fact he uses some rather inexpensive gear in his long list.
 
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