pesky buzzzz

  • Thread starter Thread starter Eric Altizer
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Eric Altizer

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Just got a preamp for my mic and wow what a difference? Problem is I can still here a low buzzing sound in the background when I bring the levels up to where I like them and I don't really know how to get rid of it. Any ideas? Will a good condensor mic help with this?
 
Is your RS mic unbalanced? (1/4" tip-sleeve connector) If so, then you are hearing interference. Any balanced mic (practically all of them you get at a pro audio store) would fix that.
 
My first initial thoughts -

Potential ground loop. Guitar amps are notorious for this.

Preamp or mic may have a lot of self noise. Perhaps this pre or mic is inexpensive? Even several of the expensive stuff can be noisy.

Not all mics output the same strength output... For example, ribbon mics really need a strong preamp. Depending on mic's output, you could be potentially turning the gain of the preamp much higher than you would need to for a different microphone model.

Could be your monitoring system, and not the mic or pre. Without the mic and pre powered on, when you bring up the levels to where to like them, that could be the problem child.

Or maybe its the room - A/C, bleed from a computer fan,...

Tainted electricity - an outlet on the A/C or refigerator circuit.

...Unbalanced signal chain, as mshilarious stated.

Tinnitus is always probable cause.

(More adjectives and nouns would've been helpful - equipment used, description of the buzz...)
 
list of equipment

Here is a list of the equipment:

Single-Channel TubePre Preamp by Presonis

Sennheiser E835 Mic

SoundBlaster 24 bit Advanced HD

Additional note: I have to hook up my mic thru the instrument input (1/4") on the back of the chassis of the TubePre rather than the XLR mic input in order to get a strong signal. What's up with that?

My next move is to get the Audiophile 2496 soundcard and see if that helps.

Another thing I will try is to hook into the computor thru the stereo input jacks from my preamp rather than into the mic input jack.
 
Eric Altizer said:
stereo input jacks from my preamp rather than into the mic input jack.

Try that first, and don't use the instrument in on your preamp :)
 
problem solved

I had the PAD function set to on which was why I wasn't getting anything thru the mic input on the preamp. Now I have a strong signal thru the mic input and just marginal background noise. Sounds good.
 
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