Hey, thanks for your input. In the end I was able to pickup a focusrite iTrack One Pre for 17 euros, which (appears) identical in sound quality and noise floor to Scarlet Solo 3rd Gen, but gives me the smaller form factor I desire!

Thanks, also saw the irig pre HD. I have a Focusrite Scarlet Solo 3rd Gen, but here's what I hate about it. - XLR input is on the front - it has two inputs that are routed to the same ADC, and I think this is why in my system, a single channel at full signal is only -0.5 - it has stereo output and ...

... Actually, screw the DIY part. I don't think i can deal with the headache of learning electronics and then also needing to design and build the hardware to put it in.

I simply want one nice mic preamp with phantom power and conversion to USB. I don't need all the extra bells and whistles of an interface. I have my own DAC/amp combo that I'm happy with. Does anything exist and one can recommend me? Tbh if there's some cool circuit design where i could build it ...

Yeah I was umming an aahing about whether to out myself but yeah I'm in Spain, and i think in my city a lot of the older buildings just aren't grounded.

So I happen to know my house is not grounded. My Landlord says this is fine, since it is protected by some other appropriate regulations. I live on the 4th floor, and my terrace has a metal tap. Is there a test I can perform that will tell me if this tap provides ground or not? My audio interface ...

Recording solo voice, for online conferences. So, i really want the kind of big, full, musical and rich sound of something like an AT2035 or NT1 (yes my budget is low). But it will be used exclusively on camera where ideally it will be completely out of shot. And in either case wants to take up less ...

Right, okay, Also, this may be interesting to you, but I may have told a little porky pie, by omission... that recording is heavily processed, and in the signal chain is an ffmpeg highpass filter (set to 65hz) I always thought their highpass added a significant but hard to describe artifact to the ...

Hi guys, I noticed over some recordings that I sometimes experienced some DC shift, and sometimes it was not present. I know that for some reason brass instruments tend to push the waveform off to one side, but that is a static shift, not a constantly changing one. But in my vocal recording it kept ...

it wasn't punchy enough on the transients. Condensers are very capable when it comes to capturing transients. I presume you mean the more damped response of the dynamic diaphragm is what you wanted; I’d use a tape plugin or fast compressor to reduce the transient levels. Oh, maybe I mean this, can y ...

To my ears the EQed M3 voice track sounds fine. It may not be a really wide range sound but it's clean, balanced and listenable speech. I've heard a lot worse. The recording I uploaded in this thread is the M1. Since you're listening, out of interest, here is with windshield: https://soundcloud.com ...

But since condensers are more sensitive, they end up picking up more of the tail-end room reflections than a dynamic would.

You know what though guys... I just took off the windshield and it has made a sizable difference to the upper end. (more than I expected)

Yes. Sometimes we have to make mistakes in order to learn. I'm considering buying it again. Second hand for around €50 I'm not sure what can beat it. I'm also considering the Sennheiser E845, which is a super or hyper cardioid, with a reasonably flat response, from what I can tell, a less harsh u ...

So I'm only recording dialogue, and I previously owned a Rode M3 (condenser), it had that classic airy/open high end, with really good bass extension and clarity (without being boomy). I sold it and bought the Rode M1 (dynamic) because a little too much room leaked in, and it wasn't punchy enough on ...

Interesting. Thanks!

Right. I was hoping for a trick like running a wire from the casing to something like your TV antenna, or perhaps there's a an inexpensive device that can silence the noise? I rent this place and have no desire to modify the mains, I'm afraid. The saftey device is something that is supposed to trip ...

It sounds very much like the case of no solid earth to your system. It would help if you could be more specific as to what equipment you are using as 'mac' could be laptop or desktop, and mac laptops generally have a double insulated PSU with no earth, or a reasonably high resistance signal ground ...

The problem: It seems to go silent right when some kind of event happens (often, but not always), like a play/pause or loop reset. Every application, Pulseaudio and JACK etc still show audio flowing in the meters. Recording INPUT is fine, no problems. Only sound to the output is silent. Hitting ...

Hah! Right, well I've had a reasonably thorough back and forth with Rode support, and while grateful for their response and attempts to help solve my issue, interestingly they evaded confirming or denying whether my noisy results compared to the focusrite were par for the course or abnormal. Thanks ...

So I recently got a hold of the Rode AI-1 thinking it may be a minor upgrade to the Focusrite. Most reviews cite the AI-1 to be low noise, and what I found couldn't be further from the truth. It was by far the noisiest and most amateur sounding interface I had ever encountered. Weak output to ...

Correct! I wonder if it's painfully obvious to you guys in the recordings, but there's a big resonance bump at around 140 - 160hz and then again at its double. This is no doubt because I'm positioned in the corner of a room, mic placed on top of a sturdy large wooden desk... In a small room that is ...

Well I have just bought an M1 after being unsatisfied with the timbre I get from the M3. It's certainly a good quality mic. And the upper frequencies are buttery, and it has a crisp low end, But the ambient noise muddies the sound. And I don't know if it's the lack of ambience picked up or an ...

Having nothing to go buy except prior experience many moons ago with pro level gear, I have to say I have *felt* like these pres were on the noisy end of the spectrum. I know they can vary between device to device, so I thought perhaps I just got a particularly noisy one. But then again, the only ...

So I thought I would just upload recordings and you can hear for yourself.... M3: https://soundcloud.com/arifd/m3-1/s-vPpqLHF5zZM" target="phpbbpopup XM8500: https://soundcloud.com/arifd/xm8500/s-WqWJMh8PF67" target="phpbbpopup It's actually a perfect demo because you hear traffic in the background ...

Interesting stuff!!