What's the best budget multi-pattern LDC ???

M

Mikey77

Member
What are recommendations for most versatile budget multi-pattern LDC ???

The only ones I know of are the CAD M179, the AKG Perception 400, and the new MXL 2010. Does anyone have any recommendations or warnings regarding these or others.
 
there are several others. however out of them all, my personal favorite after using many is the cad M179.

Depends on what you want though. the m179 is great as a vocal mic on some voices, very useful and versatile on many other sources. or you can get an apex 460 multipattern tube LDC mic, like $260 or so canadian so prob a spec less US, also a very good mic, but probably not as great as the 179 out of the box (but it can and shoudl be modded for improvements, and you can always get more mods done as you have the available cash over time).

many others, studio projects makes nice sounding mics, check theirs out. some people really like SE, I don't think they're any different from the rest as far as sound goes, but whatever.

cheers,
Don
 
dkelley said:
my personal favourite after using many is the cad M179.cheers,
Don
Click to expand...


Thanks Don. You tend to hear mixed opinions about most mics but I read a review from a guy (front end audio I think) who thought they were very good value and had a lot of uses. The MXL mics get very mixed reviews depending on their model, but they have this fairly new multi pattern LCD the 2010 that I can't seem to find any opinions around as yet.

I have a SP-B1 so I would probably go for something other than the B3 which is their multi version, in order to get a different flavour of signal.
 
It depends on application. For classical music I almost instantly rejected the CAD - sounds far too brittle and takes a LOT of power (causes huge problems on normal phantom power rings). But . . . haven't I already said this to you?

The AT4050's hardly a budget choice, but for the same money you're going to get suggestions of the AKG 414, which again I don't rate (it's a very hissy mic, and I find it difficult to get it to give me a predictable sound in unfamiliar environments).

Again, I've said this before, but the ADK TL (MP if you can afford it, $750 without postage) is the best purchase I've made. Perfect for M-S recordings, great for X-Y, and comes with good quality shockmounts (I had to bin one of my M179 shocks straight out of the box). Again, I'm offering samples . . .

MohThoM
 
mohthom said:
It depends on application. For classical music I almost instantly rejected the CAD - sounds far too brittle and takes a LOT of power (causes huge problems on normal phantom power rings).
Click to expand...

I haven't used the CAD, but this comment doesn't make sense to me. DIN 45596 / IEC 268-15 / IEC 61938 require a phantom supply +48V at 10mA per microphone. If the phantom rail drops because a single mic draws 8mA, then it is not a conforming supply and I would not consider it a "normal phantom ring".


More info here:

http://www.microphone-data.com/pdfs/The feeble phantom.pdf
 
mshilarious said:
I haven't used the CAD, but this comment doesn't make sense to me. DIN 45596 / IEC 268-15 / IEC 61938 require a phantom supply +48V at 10mA per microphone. If the phantom rail drops because a single mic draws 8mA, then it is not a conforming supply and I would not consider it a "normal phantom ring".
Click to expand...

Agreed. The number of inadequately built phantom power supplies out there is an embarassment to hardware designers everywhere. The M-Audio AudioBuddy comes immediately to mind, but there are others.

For example, I thought my MSH-4 had died once. Turned out the Peavey power amp just couldn't provide enough power for it to show a signal on the output and/or was doing an overcurrent shutoff. Not sure which. My Peavey unpowered mixer handles it just fine.
 
Mikey77 said:
I've heard good things about the AT4040, is the 4050 pretty much the same but with the multi pattern ???
Click to expand...


not the same mic, the 4050 is the better of the 2
 
dgatwood said:
Agreed. The number of inadequately built phantom power supplies out there is an embarassment to hardware designers everywhere. The M-Audio AudioBuddy comes immediately to mind, but there are others.

For example, I thought my MSH-4 had died once. Turned out the Peavey power amp just couldn't provide enough power for it to show a signal on the output and/or was doing an overcurrent shutoff. Not sure which. My Peavey unpowered mixer handles it just fine.
Click to expand...

Probably there was no shutoff, just inadequate current for the filament.

Anyway. I completely understand if a device doesn't do +48V @ 10mA. It's a tremendously hard task for a battery-powered or USB device that has to use DC converters to generate +48V. Most of them only offer 2-3mA or so. That's fine, it's understandable, but PUT IT IN THE SPECS, please, whether or not the supply conforms to the standard, and if not, then the max current available at rated voltage. Nearly every microphone manufacturer states current in their specs, so the pre manufacturers should too.

Of course, it's a marketing issue, the pre manufacturer wants to make their product sound as good as possible, but they just end up with disappointed customers when they find out certain mics won't work with their shiny new interface.
 
mshilarious said:
Probably there was no shutoff, just inadequate current for the filament.

Anyway. I completely understand if a device doesn't do +48V @ 10mA. It's a tremendously hard task for a battery-powered or USB device that has to use DC converters to generate +48V. Most of them only offer 2-3mA or so. That's fine, it's understandable, but PUT IT IN THE SPECS, please, whether or not the supply conforms to the standard, and if not, then the max current available at rated voltage. Nearly every microphone manufacturer states current in their specs, so the pre manufacturers should too.

Of course, it's a marketing issue, the pre manufacturer wants to make their product sound as good as possible, but they just end up with disappointed customers when they find out certain mics won't work with their shiny new interface.
Click to expand...

Jon, can you look at the specs of the Firepod and tell me how many mA delivers... I don´t understand much about how mA work in relation to Volts...
I´m using you MSH-1 with my Firepod and had no problems, but i would like to know which mics won´t do the trick with FP phantom... ThanKs!

http://www.presonus.com/firepod
 
JuliánFernández said:
Jon, can you look at the specs of the Firepod and tell me how many mA delivers... I don´t understand much about how mA work in relation to Volts...
I´m using you MSH-1 with my Firepod and had no problems, but i would like to know which mics won´t do the trick with FP phantom... ThanKs!

http://www.presonus.com/firepod
Click to expand...

They don't provide any phantom power current specs. That said, FIREPOD has its own power supply, so I can't imagine it being stingy on the phantom power current unless they just did something stupid.
 
This one's still available for $70 (with shockmount). It's a steal.
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/CAD-GXL3000-Microphone?sku=270366

To me, the B3, out of the box, sounds different than the B1. Cardiod-to-cardiod, I'd say brighter and more detailed. I never regretted buying these.

Mohthom's description of the M179 as "brittle" surprises me, but I haven't used it for the apllication he describes. My experiences with it would lead me to describe it as versatile, clean, clear, with an impressively quiet idle. It's also a better looking mic than it's pictures portray. I've had no problems with it regarding Phantom Power, even with Behri* mixer preamps (simultaneously: two M179 and two M177 mics, and four other condensers). The continuously variable patterns add a level of versatility to this mic that you come to appreciate. The frequency response and self-noise specs ain't to shabby either and get really appreciated when sitting it in a mix. I never regretted buying my M179 or M177 mics.

I'm not familiar with the Peception400, but it seems that all the mics mentioned her will probably serve you well.

Paj
8^)

* MX, UB or Xenyx series; or Mackie VLZ/VLZPro, Yamaha MG, SoundCraft M and Compact, Crest, or Allen-Heath. No problem with any external/stand-alone preamps (although I don't own the Audio-Buddy, the "bigger brother" DMP3 seems to work fine with the CAD M179/177 mics).
 
JuliánFernández said:
Jon, can you look at the specs of the Firepod and tell me how many mA delivers... I don´t understand much about how mA work in relation to Volts...
Click to expand...

You would have to ask Presonus a specific question, like "does the Firepod provide +48V phantom power at 10mA per microphone in compliance with IEC 268-15". Whether or not that comment gets forwarded to someone competent enough to give an accurate answer, I can't say.

If you have a multimeter, you can test it yourself. First, measure the voltage between pins 2 or 3 and pin 1. It should be between 44 and 52 volts. Next, set the meter to current, connected as above, it should show 7mA (the total current available is 14mA, but you are only testing one of two pins).

Finally, there is the issue of the total supply to all mic inputs. For this, connect two 2.2K ohm resistors, one between pins 2 and 1 and one between pin 3 and 1 of one channel, and measure the voltage at another mic input (pin 2 or 3 to pin 1). If the phantom rail has dropped below 44V, it is not a compliant supply.
 
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Sorry ... couldn't resist. :eek:
 
mohthom said:
It depends on application. For classical music I almost instantly rejected the CAD - sounds far too brittle and takes a LOT of power (causes huge problems on normal phantom power rings). But . . . haven't I already said this to you?
Click to expand...

I have to say that I completely disagree with you on every account.

The m179 is very smooth and quite flat compared with much of the low budget competition.

It requires a perfectly acceptible power supply standard, any decent gear will work fine with it, but you should pretty much never use usb powered phantom power for any condensor mic, it's garbage and isn't either 48 volts or a high enough current (at least on most motherboards).

I have used two m179s in chamber music recording with phenomenal success, and it's wonderful on female and male intimate vocals.

The m179 does not have in the slightest way a harsh high end, it is the exact opposite of that, and is closest in high end sound to my neumann tlm 103 AFTER I've equed down high end of the neumann with a 5khz HF shelving eq by a couple of db (I don't like to make the tlm 103 totally flat because it's high frequencies are part of what makes it such a good sounding mic on certain sources). No matter what you think of the tlm 103 (And I think it's an extremely under rated mic) you could never say it's high end is harsh or brittle, just maybe a speck more present than you might want depending on your use of the mic.

The m179 shares much of the same tonal qualites but without quite as much high end presence. Very velveting sounding high end.

I personally feel that the m179 is a fully professional product.
 
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mshilarious said:
You would have to ask Presonus a specific question, like "does the Firepod provide +48V phantom power at 10mA per microphone in compliance with IEC 268-15". Whether or not that comment gets forwarded to someone competent enough to give an accurate answer, I can't say.
Click to expand...

Well, i thought everyone may be interested in knowing the answer...
I emailed Presonus and they told me that the Firepod provides +48V phantom power at 10mA per microphone... :D
 
dkelley said:
there are several others. however out of them all, my personal favorite after using many is the cad M179.

Depends on what you want though. the m179 is great as a vocal mic on some voices, very useful and versatile on many other sources. or you can get an apex 460 multipattern tube LDC mic, like $260 or so canadian so prob a spec less US, also a very good mic, but probably not as great as the 179 out of the box (but it can and shoudl be modded for improvements, and you can always get more mods done as you have the available cash over time).

many others, studio projects makes nice sounding mics, check theirs out. some people really like SE, I don't think they're any different from the rest as far as sound goes, but whatever.

cheers,
Don
Click to expand...

It amazes me that someone would anonymously give me bad rep points for the above post. Makes one wonder why people ask for help if they don't want someone to put some time and effort into helping them figure out a solution...

Cheers all (Except the anonymous negative rep person LoL),
Don
 
dkelley said:
It amazes me that someone would anonymously give me bad rep points for the above post. Makes one wonder why people ask for help if they don't want someone to put some time and effort into helping them figure out a solution..Don
Click to expand...

Well I found your feedback very helpful Don, and the M179 is now on my shortlist. Cheers Mike

By the way, what is this abbreviation... LOL
 
LoL = Laugh out Loud... I'm a pretty happy guy :-)

Cheers, and thanks for the pos. feedback! Wish I knew who the guy who neg. repped me was, anonymous coward, must be having his period.

:p

Don
 
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