mic for my mom?

camn

camn

Active member
OK, fellas.. check this.

My mom is also a professional musician, like myself... she however, plays Old-Time music. If you dont know what it is, it is pre-bluegrass bluegrass. She plays guitar and sings... and knows ZERO about electronics.


SO, she has this laptop.. and I hereby stipulate it as a fine machine.

She wants to record. Nothing to serious.. just rough copies of tunes to email to her out-of-town buddies to learn so they can rip them for the first time in front of teeming crowds of hippies. HOWEVER, she is not getting the gain she would like out of the mic she has..
http://www.woodwardok.com/shafercomputer/images/webcam-mic.jpg
...shown here. Heh heh.

So I want to get her something. it MUST:

a) use her 1/8" input OR usb
b) not be too hard for her to understand and
c) have high output

It SHOULD:
a) be pretty omnidirectional
b) not require external power (battery power is...so-so)

what will do? I have no experience with this application!

My initial thoughts:

somthing like this?
http://www.minidiscaccess.com/item.html?PRID=1155276

or this:
http://www.minidiscaccess.com/item.html?PRID=757013
??

my questions:

a) does a laptop mic jack supply a voltage of 1.5 to 10 volts D.C.??
b) is it stereo?
c) what is the best mic for this application??

thank you, and goodnight.

xoxo
 
The mics you mention are specifically for minidisc recorders, The laptop mic jack does not have the plug-in-power that they need. Plus of course you have the crappy preamps and A-D converters on the laptop sound card. Most are so bad as to make Sound Blasters look good.

She could use the line-in on the laptoop, if it has one, but most laptops have only mic-in and headphones-out...and you still have the laptop sond card.

Still, I record fine music on my laptop. How? I use an Edirol UA-5 attached to the USB port and skip the laptop sound interface entirely.

However for your mom I would suggest something else, a Foxtex MR-8
 
The fostex is a good bet. It has an onboard built in mic, (if you can live with that sound) or get an inexpensive dynamic mic to pair up with it. Then send the file to the computer via usb and burn the cd. My drummer friend just got a Fostex MR8 , and I was pleasantly surprised by its sound.
 
the fostex is absolutely not the right solution.


She plays OLD TIME MUSIC... and doesnt need or want a NEW machine... she just wants to record new versions of tunes to email to people in different towns...so that they can rock them without rehearsal to crowds bigger than you and I will ever play in front of!!

Be advised.. her buddy has a laptop with a BUILT IN MICROPHONE. . .and she is pleased as punch with the recordings she gets there. So if we can match or improve that quality , she'll be happy.

so .. . any suggestions?

xoxo
 
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