guitardog247


My LDC mic's were acting up again. After reading on some forums about humidity having negative affects. I turned on the AC overnight (it was 93% humidity), then in the morning I put a mic under an incandescent bulb for 15 minutes.
 
Plugged the mic in, cranked the gain, and voila! No strange ghost noise, perfectly quiet, except for expected ambient noise.
 
I don't know if because they are "cheap" mics, that they are more susceptible to this or what. But I need to find a way to keep the things away from humidity, storing in a dessicant chamber or something.
 
I realize I need another test to really confirm this, and it's not just coincidental, but I'm pretty confident I found the cause of my problems.

Hmm...very interesting, indeed.

skullsession

guitardog247


My LDC mic's were acting up again. After reading on some forums about humidity having negative affects. I turned on the AC overnight (it was 93% humidity), then in the morning I put a mic under an incandescent bulb for 15 minutes.
 
Plugged the mic in, cranked the gain, and voila! No strange ghost noise, perfectly quiet, except for expected ambient noise.
 
I don't know if because they are "cheap" mics, that they are more susceptible to this or what. But I need to find a way to keep the things away from humidity, storing in a dessicant chamber or something.
 
I realize I need another test to really confirm this, and it's not just coincidental, but I'm pretty confident I found the cause of my problems.

Hmm...very interesting, indeed.

Humid air can completely change the values at the business end of a circuit with that high of impedance.  With an input impedance of 500meg to 1 or 2 gigaohm ! it doesn't take much. Hell you can't even leave flux on the board when you solder the wires in place.

Hi folks,
I've been having the same problem for months with condenser microphones and this is the first forum where I see the problem put clearly. The reason really seems to be the humidity. I live in Paraty, Brazil, and it's one of the most humid spots in the country (more than Amazonia, some might say). I'm trying to keep the mics in the AC for a while and see what happens. I might also try to move the studio from the most humid room in the house, but from the extreme climate issue I reckon it's likely that I should get some better dynamic mics and forget about using condensers. Sad but true. Cheers!

www.bonifrate.com

Not cheap, but you could look into an RF condenser mic, which are pretty much immune to dust and humidity.  (Sennheiser MKH series)  Luckily they are some of the best sounding pencil condenser microphones out there.