Upgrading a low-end mic

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GreenDank

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Has anyone here upgraded a cheap mic by dropping in a halfway decent element? I'm thinking of doing it to my rad crap mic, but I'm not sure what element to get. There's got to be a cheap one out there that is pretty good.

I'm looking for ideas between $5-$20, or else I'd just drop $80 on a new Shure SM57. But like most folks there's like 50 other things that cost about a 100 bucks I need to get too (music and otherwise), so I'll pinch my pennies when I can and where I choose...
 
then you can take the one from your cheap mic and put it in the U-47 and have 2 AWESOME mic's...
 
GreenDank said:
Has anyone here upgraded a cheap mic by dropping in a halfway decent element? I'm thinking of doing it to my rad crap mic, but I'm not sure what element to get. There's got to be a cheap one out there that is pretty good.

I'm looking for ideas between $5-$20, or else I'd just drop $80 on a new Shure SM57. But like most folks there's like 50 other things that cost about a 100 bucks I need to get too (music and otherwise), so I'll pinch my pennies when I can and where I choose...
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Mic modding is usually done the other way around; start with a mic that has a decent capsule, and swap out the stock electronics. Search this board for MXL mods, for example.

If you just want to buy, there are a lot of usable mics in the $50 range if you buy used. Shure 545 and EV 635a would be close to the top of the list.
 
GreenDank said:
thanks yall. I'm likely going to do this though. Looks like a piece of cake:

DIY Condenser Mic-
http://prosoundweb.com/recording/tapeop/buildmic/buildmic_16_1.shtml
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Do a search here, others have built that. I'm pretty sure there is a schematic to mod the mic to use phantom power.

Or if you can save your pennies, the Behringer ECM8000/Apex 220 is basically the same mic, in a nicer body, run off phantom power, for about $50. It goes by a couple other brand names too, I think.
 
mshilarious said:
Do a search here, others have built that. I'm pretty sure there is a schematic to mod the mic to use phantom power.

Or if you can save your pennies, the Behringer ECM8000/Apex 220 is basically the same mic, in a nicer body, run off phantom power, for about $50. It goes by a couple other brand names too, I think.
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I've made those. They cost about $30 each. They sound good too. As mshilarious states, though, you could buy a Behringer ECM8000 and be money ahead. The first time you plug the tape-op mics in and forget you have phantom power on, you lose the money you've spent and will have to build another. The Beri is like insurance and is better built.
 
Money Well Spent

I enjoyed building these.... Take apart a trashed VCR or anything laying around the house and you'll find all of the parts to build it.

Cost me:

$.50 - WM60ay capsule
$1.00 XLR Connector
$1.00 9V battery terminals

I scrounged up the components from an old uMatic tape deck I had laying around, and put the battery right on/in the mic housing. Used the 'boot' of the XLR connector hot-glued into a section of a metal broomstick tube ($1.50 at Walmart) to hold the mic capsule. Never used a perfboard, just soldered the components point-contact. Mounted the XLR at the other end of the tube. Never came up with a good way to mount the battery on the case, so I just tape 'em or they hang there. No big deal, they sound fine.

Cost me about $4-5 for the pair. Well worth it for me.
 
From the How to:

"I was shocked to find out how amazing they sound. In fact, these little buggers have become my first choice for capturing unhyped, totally natural stereo images, beating-out pairs of choice small and large-diaphragm condensers, and some nice ribbons too!

There are several good points worth a quick mention regarding this microphone:
Firstly, it uses an extremely simple circuit with very few components. As such there’s not much stuff in it to screw up the sound. In audio design simple is generally better, and this is the epitome of simplicity."

Someone should call the folks over at Neuman and clue them in about how they've been over-engineering their mics. :D

-RD
 
northsiderap said:
Never came up with a good way to mount the battery on the case, so I just tape 'em or they hang there. No big deal, they sound fine.
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I doubt that one FET draws very much current, so there are a number of smaller batteries that might fit inside the plug.

Looking at my catalog, WM60AY will run off 3V and draws 0.5mA. A 3V lithium camera battery should run for 400 hours. I think you could duplicate the switching mechanism in the original somehow, but stuff like that makes my brain hurt :(

Also it might be worth putting capacitors on pins 2 and 3 to block phantom, if that is a worry.

Also WM60AY is $2.64, and Digikey doesn't have 'em in stock :(
 
Robert D said:
Someone should call the folks over at Neuman and clue them in about how they've been over-engineering their mics. :D

-RD
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:D The on-capsule FET is noisy. In fact there is a thread somewhere here, or maybe the Lab, on modding the capsule to take the stock FET out of the circuit and replace with something else. Sounds better, but the circuit is much more complicated ;)

Looking around I see that WM61A is the preferred capsule, and it's cheaper & in stock!
 
...

ah screw it - I found the cheap mic thread here, and I'm getting the SM-57 clone. Looks cheap and fine for my hacking around.
 
GreenDank said:
ah screw it - I found the cheap mic thread here, and I'm getting the SM-57 clone. Looks cheap and fine for my hacking around.
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Now we know the truth. You ARE a musician. :D
 
Newbie-Doo said:
Now we know the truth. You ARE a musician. :D
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between that and his screen name, it seems obvious to me that he's saving money on mics for "other" expenditures. :D


cheers,
wade
 
mrface2112 said:
between that and his screen name, it seems obvious to me that he's saving money on mics for "other" expenditures. :D

cheers,
wade
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You've gotta be creative before you can capture your creativity. Seems like prudent allocation of resources to me. :D
 
Robert D said:
Seems like prudent allocation of resources to me. :D
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yeah, until you get so "creative" that you forget what it is you're trying to capture. :D

.....or until you enable a bunch of tracks on the multitrack to accomodate a bunch of mics for that killer acoustic guitar track......and after the perfect take you realise that you routed the same mic to all of the tracks.....

personally, i prefer pretzels with my creativity. :p


cheers,
wade
 
mrface2112 said:
personally, i prefer pretzels with my creativity. :p

cheers,
wade
Click to expand...

Hey, that puts a whole new twist on twisting up a fattie.
 
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