phantom power

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BEATLESFAN

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Hello everyone, im new to this forum thing so please bare with me. Im 17 years old and have just recently set up a home recording studio. I keep reading about "phantom power". What exactly is phantom power? thanks alot!
 
Welcome to the forum.

Phantom power is typically 48volts sent from the mixer through your mcrophone cable and into certain microphones called condenser (or capacitor) mics. These microphones must have this power run to them to electornically charge the capacitors is the microphone or the mic will not work.

Phantom power can also be used to power other things like active direct boxes, but the most common use is for the mics.

If you run search on google, there should be tons of info on different mics, phantom power etc. You may want to read up as you will definitely need to know this stuff if you do much recording.

Good luck.
 
Just remeber that phantom power should come from a mixingconsole or a preamp...some condensormics have batterie options to power them.....believe me.....never use batteries in a mic unless you really have no other option....Just the other day I saw a rental company with batteries in their mics....they were in there for several years, and after they stopped working the engineer used the consoles phantom.....you should have seen what an internal mess those mics were...

keep off the batteries!
 
Good point!

Almost all mixing consoles have some form of phantom power, whether it's universal (one button powers all mic channels) or selective (per channel), even budget consoles. The key is knowing your mics. Also beware that there are certain mics, like ribbons for instance, that can be ruined by running phantom power to them. So this might be a good subject to do a little study on as you are certain to need to understand this if you are going to be recording.
 
one more thing that i learned the hard way. never use phantom power with dynamic mics. boom bam there goes ur mixer.
 
HHmmm...seems like you didn't learn from that accident...

it's not the combination of dynamic mic and phantompower that's the problem...thats a perfectly normal situation.

It could be a very stupid soldered wire, a shortcircuit in the mixingboard...truck out, on stage, off stage, truck in, repeat, repaet.....things can get defect....

So you might still be working with a defect device or cable.....just a matter of time till you make the right combination again and boooommm..:D

Or if it was the mixer itself...you learned the hard way :eek:
 
I've accidently left phantom power on when I plugged in a dynamic microphone and nothing bad ever happened. In fact as I recall, I had to have had the switch on for a good week before I noticed it because this was just after I got my first external tube mic pre-amp. Yup, it was definitely a week later before I realized I had forgotten to turn the phantom power switch off.
 
i watched in a local venue when the gormless sound guy who'd been DIYing his own cables turned on phantom power and the mics stands on stage went live with 48V. he was convinced it was to do with his 'live mics' being 'poor quality' (i think he meant dynamics ...) and as such has ever since powered his DIs and condensers ('studio mics cos they're the wrong shape for live') with batteries. what a joke.
 
dunno, maybe it WAS a faulty mixer, but it had never left my room.
 
downside studio is right. Dynamic mics should not be affected by using phantom power. I still don't like to plug them in while there is power running to the mic. I think it's just a habbit I've gotten into with condensers. I'd say get it checked if otherwise.
 
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