USB vs XLR?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Calluma11
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Calluma11

New member
With the ongoing progression and ease with usb nowadays, i've never had the opportunity to use a condensor mic with XLR output (however i'll soon be getting a pencil mic for acoustic guitar with xlr)

For my vocals i'm currently using Editors Keys SL1500, and theres a little bit of white noise / fuzz. Hard to explain, but i've eliminated computer fan, outside car noise etc - and figured out it comes part and parcel. I'm aware you cant get a perfectly silent response without noise gates.

My question is, do you get more of this 'fuzz' with USB? Or do they both received simlilar fuzziness.

Thanks,

Callum
 
A USB mic in theory will have less than desirable tone than using a 'real' mic with a viable interface. Your description of 'FUZZ' would be difficult to give judgement without your posting a sample of the fuzzzzzz........
 
It's known for lower quality preamps to have a higher noise floor, and in essence a usb mic is a cheap mic with the cheapest of cheap preamps and converters built in.

There's a good chance that a 'decent' preamp coupled with a higher quality mic will fix things, but like jimmy said, post a clip of the noise just incase it's something else.
 
Calluma11 said:
I'm aware you cant get a perfectly silent response without noise gates.
Click to expand...

Maybe you can't get "perfectly" silent audio, but you can get it down to practically inaudible levels with good gear operated properly. Noise gates are band-aid fixes that can cause as much trouble as they solve. USB mics are for podcasting and simple one-pass recording, not for serious music recording.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Maybe you can't get "perfectly" silent audio, but you can get it down to practically inaudible levels with good gear operated properly. Noise gates are band-aid fixes that can cause as much trouble as they solve. USB mics are for podcasting and simple one-pass recording, not for serious music recording.
Click to expand...

Amen.

But don't let it get you down. We all had to learn somewhere.
 
I'm getting an M Audio Fast Track Pro for Christmas, apparently thats a good preamp..? For now i can use midi stage piano and my dynamic mic- then start looking at XLR mics.

Thanks everyone, once again the community has helped me out!
 
Cool.

You know dynamic mics need preamps too? Often they 'need' better ones cos some dynamics need a lot of gain to really shine.
Generally speaking, pro mics whether dynamic or condenser (or ribbon) will have xlr connectors.

Just checkin' ;)
 
while it's true that you can never get total silence ..... basically any decent mic shouldn't have a noise that I'd describe as 'fuzz' so I think there's a problem somewhere.
 
Can't wait for the fire wire microphones to show up. :D
 
Steenamaroo said:
Cool.

You know dynamic mics need preamps too? Often they 'need' better ones cos some dynamics need a lot of gain to really shine.
Generally speaking, pro mics whether dynamic or condenser (or ribbon) will have xlr connectors.

Just checkin' ;)
Click to expand...

Haha yeah dont worry, i know.

The M Audio box facilitates this nicely :)
Thanks
 
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