When Did The AT3035 First Appear?

[Mark7]

For want of anything more constructive or interesting to do I was flipping through an old (March 01) copy of Sound On Sound, and I noticed something interesting. Nowhere in any of the store adverts is the Audio Technica AT3035 mentioned. Which is strange as I'd always thought that it was a fairly old mic (at least 10 years), and would therefore have been widely available in 2001 (at least in chains and shops that sold AT mics).

I'm bamboozled

 

[Warhead]

The AT3035 (really the whole 30 series) started around early 2002 (before we became a dealer). I bought one for my studio around June 2002 and it was very much before anyone was talking about it. In fact, I think Mojopie was one of the first places to publish a review of it, which I wrote in Nov. 2002.

http://www.mojopie.com/at3035.html

I love the mic, cannot sing its praises enough. Yeah, it's only $199 but it still finds some work to do around here in my studio (guitar cabs and it's still just the ticket for certain vocalists). I guess it kind of has the look of a mic that's been around?

War

 

[Mark7]

From what I can tell Audio Technica didn't get into the condenser market until the early 90s (there's a review of the 4033 dated April 92 listed in the SOS archives). In fact the 4033 does seem to be the earliest example of a low cost LDC (okay, okay MDC) I can find. Though I suppose you could include the C414 in that, if your criteria includes multi-pattern LDCs for under a grand (or over a drum kit), in which case that's the earliest budget mic (budget being a relative term... i.e. budget in comparison to a U87).

Actually, now I'm curious. What was available, mic-wise, to the intrepid home recordist circa 1990?

 

[Herm]

First LDC I can remember that was cheap (500 bucks) if you want to call it cheap was the AKG c3000 , And I cant believe I bought one for that.

That was about 1995 or 96 I think

 

[Mark7]

Well, cheap is a relative term: depending on the CoL and the price index, for one thing; but also on the cost of similar items at the time. For example: if all cars cost over $30K and someone bought out a car that cost $15k, that car would be "cheap" in relation to all other cars on the market. Likewise, if the only condensers available cost $1K and someone introduces a $0.5K model, then that model is, by definition, cheap. Even if you still take a substantial hit in the wallet to buy it.

Talking of cheap... four years ago Digital Village were selling Neumann M147s for...



Wait for it...




















£699.00 (£799 with shockmount).

They now sell them for £1,499