Help! Never used a mic before and finally in the market....

D

deemic

New member
I am in the market to purchase a microphone to record both my acoustic/electric guitar and my electric guitar into the Mic input of a Terratec DMX 6 fire. I can't seem to find much information on the specs of the input for this card and don't know enough about impedance matching and phantom power vs non phantom powered mics to make an educated decision....

Any help steering me in a particular direction is appreciated.

Low budget (under $75.00 for the mic) and I'm not looking for anything fancy or professional. Just sick of DI recording my instruments and think mic-ing them should help the sound quality.

Any thoughts, ideas, input?
 
Ok, the quick low-down on phantom power is that most condenser mics require it and most dynamic mics don't. Phantom power is simply a voltage placed on the mic cable, generally by a mic preamp. Your Terratec, while an excellent soundcard and much better than the Audigys, does not supply phantom power, so unless you get an external preamp or a small mixer you are pretty much limited to dynamic mics.

maskedman's recommendation of the SM57 would be a good place to start. While there are definitely better mics out there, the SM57 has a reputation of being a "jack of all trades." It can generally do a reasonable job on just about anything, and it's right in your price range.

I just looked at the specs on the Terratec and its mic input is unbalanced (uses 2 conductors) while most mics are balanced (use 3 conductors). You may want to see about getting one of the small Yamaha MG series mixers to run the mic into, and then run the main out from the mixer to the line-in on your soundcard.
 
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