Need a mic preamp.....

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warlock110

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i have a super crappy mixer... and as crappy mixer goes, it's amp for the mic is crappy too. i've been getting hiss and i was wondering if it's the sound card or the mixer. turns out i crank the volume control on the mixer up and the hiss got louder... so i'm gonna pinpoint and say my mic preamp on the mixer is the cuprid... i was looking at these... are they any god?
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/prod...s-Tube-MicrophoneInstrument-Preamp?sku=180643
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Behringer-MIC200-Tube-Ultra-Gain-Preamp?sku=182491

i also have a amp on my sound card (audigy 4 pro)... and again, i'm hearing more hiss as i crank the volume on the mic knob... so i'm thinking i shouldn't be using it... further more, the dang preamp isn't good enough, if i crank it up so that it's loud enough, there's too much hiss. if it's doesn't have hiss then the volume is too small.. so you all think a mic preamp will fix this?
 
both those are probably not much better than most budget mixer pres.

Take a look at the maudio DMP3 or SP VTB-1 a bit more, but well respected for the money pres.

daav
 
warlock110 said:
i have a super crappy mixer... and as crappy mixer goes, it's amp for the mic is crappy too. i've been getting hiss and i was wondering if it's the sound card or the mixer. turns out i crank the volume control on the mixer up and the hiss got louder... so i'm gonna pinpoint and say my mic preamp on the mixer is the cuprid... i was looking at these... are they any god?
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/prod...s-Tube-MicrophoneInstrument-Preamp?sku=180643
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Behringer-MIC200-Tube-Ultra-Gain-Preamp?sku=182491

i also have a amp on my sound card (audigy 4 pro)... and again, i'm hearing more hiss as i crank the volume on the mic knob... so i'm thinking i shouldn't be using it... further more, the dang preamp isn't good enough, if i crank it up so that it's loud enough, there's too much hiss. if it's doesn't have hiss then the volume is too small.. so you all think a mic preamp will fix this?
Click to expand...

First of all, you shouldn't be using the preamp on your audigy card. You should have it hooked into the LINE IN. Not the microphone jack.

And I wouldn't even bother with either of those pres. If you're going to spend money, get something worth spending money on. :rolleyes:

If your budget is $50 then forget it.

At the very least, get a DMP3, which happens to be a great preamp in my opinion.
 
When I baught my studio projects VTB-1 at fullcompass it was $88 (call in and I bet they give you the same price), but if you need more then one channel the M-Audio DMP3 might be the better buy.
 
Also

you crank anything enough you get some hiss.

You'll get hiss without anything connected.

Unplug everyhing from your amp and crank it. What do you hear?

My bet is hiss.

Everything has a signal-to-noise ratio. Now matter how good that ratio is, there's still noise, it's just that usually, the accompanying sounds are so much louder that you don't notice it, hence the ratio of signal to noise.

Which is not to say you don't have a problem, but the way you're describing it doesn't necessarily indicate that.
 
SRR said:
When I baught my studio projects VTB-1 at fullcompass it was $88 (call in and I bet they give you the same price), but if you need more then one channel the M-Audio DMP3 might be the better buy.
Click to expand...
i only need 1 channel. i'm gonna look into the DMP3... actually i'll look into both. thanks


danny.guitar said:
First of all, you shouldn't be using the preamp on your audigy card. You should have it hooked into the LINE IN. Not the microphone jack.

And I wouldn't even bother with either of those pres. If you're going to spend money, get something worth spending money on. :rolleyes:

If your budget is $50 then forget it.

At the very least, get a DMP3, which happens to be a great preamp in my opinion.
Click to expand...

the mic in for this card is just another line in with gain, i tried the other line in without gain and it was too soft, can barely hear anything, i think the signal comming in was measure like -9db max. that was rediculously soft.
 
warlock110 said:
i think the signal comming in was measure like -9db max. that was rediculously soft.
Click to expand...

If you are recording digitalally you should be recording at about -15 db so that you have headroom for mixing. If you record too hot all you're going to be doign while mixing is pulling down the faders which lessens the quality of the recording.
 
ya know i would be looking at a better soundcard as well....

just a thought though....

the more money spent on soundcards the better.
 
I've gotta throw a vote towards the DMP3.

I did some vocal tracks recently where the rest of the tracks had been done in a professional Protools studio. Because the singer wanted to save some money, he came to me for the vocals.

I used a Rode NTK->DMP3->Alesis HD24XR at 96/24 to do the vocal tracks. The engineer at the "real" studio liked the tracks we did that he used almost every single one on the final album. And he liked them enough he wanted to know what my signal chain was.

Not a bad endorsement for the DMP3.
 
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