"Don Pearce" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 21:22:00 +0100, "Keith G"
wrote:


"Nick Gorham" wrote in message
. ..
Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

In article ,
Keith G wrote:

Judge for yourselves - here are two 'identical' clips (end of one
track,
beginning of another) of extremely complex/crowded music recorded OPEN
MIC with only a peewee little lapel mic (all I got) with digital/SS
everything except the power amp on the EX3 clip, which is 300B SET
valve. No editing whatsoever, other than a Fade In and Out at the ends
to lessen the shock!


Without even listening, Keith, do yourself a favour and get a half
decent
mic for this sort of test.


If its of any use Keith, I can lend you a Behringer ECM8000 and home
made
pre if you wanted to play further. I don't need it until I get a couple
of
inductors wound.


Thanks Nick, if I lived round the corner I'd be delighted to take you up
on
the kind offer, but I guess I gotta get summat sorted out - not for
recording speakers as such (although that is good fun) but there's the
piano
recordings to be done some time in the near(ish) future!


The Behringer would be a good choice. It is part of the armoury of
most recordists because it is just so flat and faultless. Other mics
have "deliberate" limps and bumps that are used to accentuate various
sonic characteristics. The only real failing of the Behringer is that
it is a bit noisy because of the small diaphragm. That only matters on
very quiet sources though. Of course the price doesn't hurt too much
either.

Those other mics you are discussing with Dave aren't suitable for
plugging straight into a PC - they need a pre-amp. If you want to go
that route, Behringer is your friend again. You can get a UB802 mixer
for about £40. I bought one thinking I might use it once a month, but
I find it constantly handy.


This is all new territory for me, but very interesting. I don't have much
need of a mic other than piano recordings which won't be done for a while
yet but I would like to get summat sorted out and (surprise, surprise) I
wouldn't hate it if it had valves in it!!

Otherwise, what does this look like:

http://www.bluearan.co.uk/menu/index.php?id=BEHMIC200

and which of these (if any):

http://www.bluearan.co.uk/menu/index...ew=Microphones

???