my mics won't work!

  • Thread starter Thread starter dr_dreu
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dr_dreu

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I bought a yamaha emx620 about a month ago and I already had two oktava mk012's

apparently I needed a mic preamp as well so I got a presonus blue tube mic pre amp and I still can't get the mics to work

I hear lot's of humming when I turn it up but no sound that I make or my acoustic guitar will come out of the mics

what am I doing wrong?

Thanks in advance

Dreu
 
After you try Dethska's phantom power noodle:

Do you have another mic (e.g., dynamic a la SM57) to try?

Does the presonus have a direct input? If so, try that.

Troubleshooting works best when you manipulate one variable at a time until you find the one that is dependent.
 
I'm pretty sure I have plenty of phantom power.

The emx has 15v but apparently not enough but the presonus has 48v. Surely that should be enough.

No I do not have another mic to try.

i'm very new to the home recording stuff and the first thing I bought two months ago were the two oktavas because guitar center had such a deal going...I think

(list...499.99 each, sale...2 for 99.99)

I think the problem may be my speaker.

I haven't saved enough yet to get some good monitors. Right now I'm playing through a JBL stereo speaker that I bought at best buy a while back. This very thing may make me a complete idiot, I don't know!

But if this is okay...maybe I just need to get another mic to test out.

Thanks for the advice so far.
 
Maybe a stupid question but do you have the phantom power turned on?
 
Dr Dreu,


1.Do you have Channels/Buss Assigned/On?

2. Have the mics plugged in all the way till they "click" into place?

3. Do you have the Gain/Trim turned up?

4. Have you tried bypassing your monitoring and just used headphones?

Tell us your signal chain and how you have it hooked up, we'll get you sorted out.


:)
 
okay, here it is:

oktava mic->

presonus blue tube
(cords are pushed in all the way, xlr from mic to 'mic/inst' input on front of presonus, 48v phantom power on, first knob is drive and second knob is gain...have both turned up
-two other buttons besides phantom power are 'pad' and a '0' with a slash through it...I know what pad is but not the other one.)->

low z input of channel one on my emx620 powered mixer.


I just tried bypassing the monitors and listening through headphones and I got the same result:

lots of fuzzy humming. and when I turn the gain or the drive up it kinda sounds like the ocean !?*

But there's my layout. Thank you all for your help so far.
 
Without the BlueTube plugged in to your mixer, are the meters reading anything on the BlueTube when you make a noise thru the mic? (This would mean your mic and preamp are capturing a signal and working...)

Then.... the output of the preamp would go to a HI-Z input on the mixer, because the output of the preamp is now at line level, so you don't want to send it to the preamp in the mixer.............
 
Okay! I think I figured out problem number uno.

I decided to not be such a jackass and suddenly remembered that I have two mics...........so I tried the other one......and...............it works.

So I'm assuming the other mic is a dud or is broken.

Blue Bear Sound said:
Without the BlueTube plugged in to your mixer, are the meters reading anything on the BlueTube when you make a noise thru the mic? (This would mean your mic and preamp are capturing a signal and working...)
Click to expand...

Yes. The BlueTube's led meters are flashing now. So I'm getting sound from the mic, HOWEVER....it is very distorted and especially with high sounds, it makes me sound like a robot and there is A LOT of popping and hissing.

Blue Bear Sound said:
Then.... the output of the preamp would go to a HI-Z input on the mixer, because the output of the preamp is now at line level, so you don't want to send it to the preamp in the mixer.............
Click to expand...

On each channel on my mixer there is a low z input for xlr and a high z input for 1/4". Both the male and female ends for both of my mic cords are xlr. Are you saying I need to get an xlr->1/4" for mic->preamp and then use a 1/4" jack for preamp->powered mixer? If so, that would mean I would be using the unbalanced output (1/4") from the BlueTube. Is this okay?

Can you do this? :

mic----> :xlr:-------------:xlr:Preamp:1/4:---------------:1/4:Mixer

????

If so, then I wouldn't need to get a new cord and that would be sweet.

So why do I need to go into the hi z instead of the low z on my powered mixer?
 
dr_dreu said:
mic----> :xlr:-------------:xlr:Preamp:1/4:---------------:1/4:Mixer

Click to expand...
That's exactly what you want to do. You do not want to use an XLR to 1/4 from the mic to the preamp.

The reason that you want to go to the hi-z of the mixer is because the Preamp is doing the job of turning the mic signal into a line level signal. So if you run the pre into the xlr of the mixer....you'll be 1. running a line level signal into an input that's meant for mic level signals and 2. You'll be running the mic thru two mic pre-amps. Also.....you'll want the phantom power of the mixer turned off since the Preamp is providing that.
 
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