$40 MIC That Kicks A$$

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Paul G
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/02/22 23:33:45 (permalink)
What are you guys running the SP1 into? I tried mine into the Omni pre's and wasn't that impressed with it on acoustic. I sang a few verses into it the other night and it wasn't bad.


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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/02/23 21:09:17 (permalink)
My friends is going into a dbx 376 tube channel strip with an upgrade tube that is flat and smooth, and it sounds like cream

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/02/26 15:20:26 (permalink)
If anyone's interested, here's what my (very-out-of-practice) voice sounds like when recorded on the SP-1. http://soundclick.com/share?songid=6305722

I just ran the SP-1 to my Behringer UB802 mixer, to an E-MU 0404 PCI card. I didn't use any EQ, and just a bit of reverb on the lead vocal. This was recorded standing about 6-8" from the mic. For the harmony in the choruses, I stood about 12-18" away, and used a bit of compression.

I did notice last night that moving the mic/cord around caused static, so there's a short in there somewhere: either on the mic itself or in the very end of the cord. Hopefully it's just the cord, but I'm sure it'll be an easy fix if it's the mic.

I've tried to answer some of the more common SHS questions:

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/02/26 20:58:02 (permalink)
I just ordered a pair, expected shipping date March 10th (and expected delivery date March 11th!, they must be right down the street).

Looks like you all cleared out their stock.
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/01 00:35:47 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Zane


I did notice last night that moving the mic/cord around caused static, so there's a short in there somewhere: either on the mic itself or in the very end of the cord. Hopefully it's just the cord, but I'm sure it'll be an easy fix if it's the mic.


I noticed mine had a considerable ground hum when grabbing the body. I unscrewed the casing, took it apart and just looked it over for anything obvious. Nothing goofy found so I put it back together and the hum was gone. Maybe just a little paint residue wasn't allowing the case parts to connect well enough. Unscrew the bottom fitting nearest the connector and it all slides apart easily. The main body case has a notch that denotes the front of the capsule.

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/01 01:22:20 (permalink)
After getting a pair and having messed around with it a bit, I think it's a great mic, especially for the price.

The pickup pattern seems to be fairly tight, which limits it slightly as a classic "big" vocal mic, but makes it great for focused instrument work. The highs are exceptionally detailed and smooth for a cheap condenser mic, and the sensitivity and transient response are outstanding for stuff like cymbals and plinky close-miked piano. It seems to have a built-in bass/low mids rolloff which could be good or bad depending, but for close-miking applications it seems to work perfectly to balance the proximity effect. It is not a "flattering" mic.

My other favorite mic in the ultra-cheap condenser category is the MXL V67G, and this is a perfect complement to that. Where the V67G is a classic "big" sounding mic with a broad pickup pattern, warm, slightly boxy mids, a rich presence range and huge proximity effect, the SP-1 is almost like a condenser SM57, with a tight focus, clarity, and "punch" except with the sensitivity and detail of a condenser mic. The highs are smooth, present, and natural but not "shimmery" or hyped.

So far, I like the SP-1 on every preamp I have tried and have no reason to think that it requires anything special in the way of signal chain to sound good. It is not the most versatile mic I've ever used, and far from the most flattering mic I've ever used, and it's certainly not the most accurate mic I own, but for the price it is by far the least "cheap" sounding condenser of its type that I can name, and it is an eminently usable mic.

Cheers.

edit:
fixed typo.
post edited by yep - 2008/03/02 15:25:10
Rbh
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 02:25:20 (permalink)
the SM-1 is almost like a condenser SM57, with a tight focus, clarity, and "punch" except with the sensitivity and detail of a condenser mic. The highs are smooth, present, and natural but not "shimmery" or hyped.


That's very apt description Yep. I haven't used it on very intensive high frequency content yet... Just some acoustic guitar and percussion. I think that the attraction sound wise is the smoothness of the transients, almost acts like a dynamic haveing to get the mass of the diaphram and coil in motion...but of course that's not what's going on. I'm not using hi-quality Mic pre's at the moment so I'm wondering if you noticed any self noise with high quality pre's ?

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Lanceindastudio
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 03:48:48 (permalink)
SM-1?

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 11:40:34 (permalink)
SM-1?


I'm sure he meant SP-1.

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 15:24:19 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Lanceindastudio

SM-1?

Fixed, sorry.
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 15:28:04 (permalink)
My other favorite mic in the ultra-cheap condenser category is the MXL V67G, and this is a perfect complement to that.


This mic. must be pretty good to get your recommendation. Maybe I'll give one a try. Do you have any recommendations for a cheap small=diaphragm condenser mic that works well on acoustic guitar. I only have LDC's at this point and am thinking an SDC might be a good addition to my colletcion.

Thanks.

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 21:11:08 (permalink)
K cool no one had corrected the SM-1 thing, so I was thinking maybe it was a different mic, wasnt sure. Thanx

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/02 21:47:53 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Dave King

My other favorite mic in the ultra-cheap condenser category is the MXL V67G, and this is a perfect complement to that.


This mic. must be pretty good to get your recommendation. Maybe I'll give one a try. Do you have any recommendations for a cheap small=diaphragm condenser mic that works well on acoustic guitar. I only have LDC's at this point and am thinking an SDC might be a good addition to my colletcion.

Thanks.

Well, at the price I think you can't go wrong with a V67, but I would encourage anyone to keep in mind that mic preferences tend to be pretty personal, and if you look at the current billboard top 100, there are probably 80 different vocal mics in use on those tracks, and those were recorded by people who could use any mic they wanted.

As for SD condensers in the very cheap price range, MXL 603 and 604 are great. They are basically the same mic, and they have a very broad pickup pattern and excellent accuracy. I would also encourage anyone who doesn't have an Earthworks mic to look into the Behringer ECM8000. The accuracy of that mic is eerie. The sound of the mic through the monitors is indistinguishable from the sound in the room.

In the $100-$400 price range there are tons of great mics out there these days. The sub-$100 mics I referenced above are mostly noteworthy just for the fact that are genuinely usable studio mics at ridiculously cheap prices.

It used to be that the difference between inexpensive mics and professional studio mics was REALLY obvious in terms of sound quality, like, REALLY. These days the differences are much more subtle, but most really cheap condenser mics still tend to suffer from a certain amount of hiss, a tendency to overload too easily, weird and unpredictable proximity effect, and worst of all, that grainy, harsh, "Chinese capsule" high end. The MXL 2001, a trailblazer of the current wave of cheap condensers, is a classic example of these problems.

cheers.
Alaster
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/06 18:46:03 (permalink)
I finally got around to ordering one.

I'll report when it comes! (which is hopefully soon, it was last week I filled the order... and perhaps I'll post my first song with it up as well.)

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Dave King
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/06 21:36:17 (permalink)
FYI: I contacted their sales support and they wrote back saying the mic. was backordered until March 10th. We'll see...

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/06 22:49:31 (permalink)
To my surprise, I received an email today (3/6) saying that my order for 2 SP-1s from pssl had shipped... I am looking forward to giving these a try.

If I'm remembering what the sales rep told me at the time I ordered (a month or more ago), pssl had gotten the last batch of 250 or so, and about 160 of them were already sold. So if you're thinking of ordering, probably should move quickly.

Cheers,

Russ




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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/06 23:18:07 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Russell.Whaley

To my surprise, I received an email today (3/6) saying that my order for 2 SP-1s from pssl had shipped... I am looking forward to giving these a try.

If I'm remembering what the sales rep told me at the time I ordered (a month or more ago), pssl had gotten the last batch of 250 or so, and about 160 of them were already sold. So if you're thinking of ordering, probably should move quickly.

Cheers,

Russ

FWIW, I think MCA was the house brand of the now-defunct Mars Music, so this may be the last batch in existence. Definitely get your orders in.

Cheers.
jayson
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/06 23:21:17 (permalink)
I also got an e-mail that my 2 SP-1 mics have shipped from PSSL. The have one letter off on my postal code but hopefully, that won't be a problem.

Cheers,

jayson
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 00:11:20 (permalink)
I just logged into my account with PSSL.......they were shipped out 3.6.08 Cool...........!!!

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 00:29:57 (permalink)
Yep, same here.

Not you, Yep.

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 04:22:33 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Zane

If anyone's interested, here's what my (very-out-of-practice) voice sounds like when recorded on the SP-1. http://soundclick.com/share?songid=6305722

I just ran the SP-1 to my Behringer UB802 mixer, to an E-MU 0404 PCI card. I didn't use any EQ, and just a bit of reverb on the lead vocal. This was recorded standing about 6-8" from the mic. For the harmony in the choruses, I stood about 12-18" away, and used a bit of compression.

I did notice last night that moving the mic/cord around caused static, so there's a short in there somewhere: either on the mic itself or in the very end of the cord. Hopefully it's just the cord, but I'm sure it'll be an easy fix if it's the mic.


wow - that is dang impressive.

It's clear as all get out for that price range...
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 09:42:35 (permalink)

ORIGINAL: Zane
If anyone's interested, here's what my (very-out-of-practice) voice sounds like when recorded on the SP-1.


Nice! By comparison, I have MXL's 2001P, and the mids & highs are not quite so clean or smooth. When my order gets here, I'll have to see what some gently-added eq and compression will do for this mic.

Russ




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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 16:23:30 (permalink)
ORIGINAL: Russell.Whaley
ORIGINAL: Zane
If anyone's interested, here's what my (very-out-of-practice) voice sounds like when recorded on the SP-1.


Nice! By comparison, I have MXL's 2001P, and the mids & highs are not quite so clean or smooth. When my order gets here, I'll have to see what some gently-added eq and compression will do for this mic.

Just ordered mine! I'll be looking forward to trying out how it compares to my MXL 200X mic (I forgot if X=1 or X=3 ).

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Rbh
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/07 22:48:59 (permalink)
As a general note to Lixisoft...Thanks for the heads up on this Mic! I think a lot of us got some nice bang for the buck on this one.

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Dave King
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/08 11:40:04 (permalink)
Woo Hoo! Mine has been shipped and is on the way. Lookiing forward to trying it out!

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/08 15:15:49 (permalink)
Got mine shipped yesterday! Looks like they got the order earlier than March 10th

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/08 17:52:48 (permalink)
I must say I think I like this mic for my voice better than my tube replaced Rode NTK. What a secret pot of gold!
post edited by Lanceindastudio - 2008/03/08 17:54:26

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/10 23:28:56 (permalink)
All right, now where can we get two good & cheap mic stands and XLR cables?
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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/11 15:41:42 (permalink)
lol yeah I need a stand for this mic to haha

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RE: $40 MIC That Kicks A$$ 2008/03/11 17:10:08 (permalink)
ORIGINAL: Lanceindastudio
lol yeah I need a stand for this mic to haha

If you aren't kidding, then that's pretty funny!

IDK, it's either gotta be a super-cheap but awesome stand and cord, or it's just gotta be like the most primo $1000+ spider shock-mount. Either way, it's a perfect match.

EDIT: OH YEAH, stay away from Monster cables, They'll ruin the sound of this mic.
post edited by losguy - 2008/03/11 17:22:30

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