NotebookForums.com › Forums › General Notebook Discussions › Notebook Audio & Video  › USB mic vs. dedicated mic + external sound card
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

USB mic vs. dedicated mic + external sound card

post #1 of 10
12/14/05 at 11:57am
Thread Starter 
I would like to record speech samples for a research project and have been loooking for external sound cards. I've already received a lot of great help in this thread:

http://www.notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=121517

Now I'm wondering if a USB mic would be able to give me high quality recordings, or AT LEAST comparable to, say, the Audigy 2 ZS card? Does anyone have any experience recording using a USB mic? Thanks.

Thanks.
Reply
Reply
post #2 of 10
12/14/05 at 2:09pm
I dont have personal experience with them, however from what I have HEARD, they should be decent for what you need. It is an idea I didnt even think about.

I think the ones I have seen are by Blue and Samson, personally I would go for the Blue myself, I trust them more, but I havent heard to much about them other than they work. Sorry about that.

Seablade

They wont give High Quality, but will probably give better quality than your SM58 into your Audigy.
Reply
Reply
post #3 of 10
12/14/05 at 6:26pm
I have this one:

http://www.soundprofessionals.com/cg...source=froogle


It's ok, but the truth is, I have a logitech audio mic (10 bucks?) that I plug into the native audio jack of my Dell. As far as simple voice recordings go, there's not much difference in sound quality. I get about the same amount of noise (which isn't that much considering my studio room (being quiet).
Reply
Reply
post #4 of 10
12/14/05 at 6:43pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the input, seablade and fachiro1. Since I posted, I read some comments/reviews on the Samson mic, and it seems that most people find it a bit noisy. seablade, I'm sure the Blue Snowball mic is better, but given its price I've decided to stick with an external sound card to get more features (i.e., input and output) for around the same price range. fachiro1, I found that mic in my search too, but it seems awfully pricey for a tiny little adapter!
Reply
Reply
post #5 of 10
12/14/05 at 8:04pm
GCCH,The truth is, it was such a waste of money. If you are just going to record voice, an analog mic will do just fine. The important thing would be the sound card, and eventhe latest SB's are pretty good. I use the Echo Indigo, and my intention for the usb mic was so that I could record sound effects wiout having to have the echo plugged in, but the results are about the same. One item that I've had good results with is the Sony stereo mic that can be had at Fry's, the small one.

Most of my recording are for making samples, so I do a lot of post recording effects applications, but the raw records, say for voice, are pretty good. You really just need to have a quiet room, no contruction workers working in the back ground. Don't waste your money on stuff that might only give you a small increae in quality!
Reply
Reply
post #6 of 10
12/14/05 at 9:33pm
Thread Starter 
That's kind of what I figured, fachiro1. I ended up getting an Echo Indigo off Ebay today. I realize that the recording volume will be very low, but that may not matter that much to the study since the sound will just be analyzed and not necessarily listened to, if that makes any sense.
Reply
Reply
post #7 of 10
12/14/05 at 9:57pm
Did you get the IO? I've been using mine for more than a year now, mostly for monitoring purpose. Now this is an excellent product.

You can get decent levels, but I recommend using a mixer with good preamps, or getting a small preamp, if you don't have one already. I have a Presonus Tubepre, the inexpensive tube preamp....it's not as clean as others, but I can get good gain with it without having to do extra processing.

Best part of the IO, besides the small form factor, is that it sounds pretty darn good and with the drivers, you canget super low latency. Congrats!
Reply
Reply
post #8 of 10
12/14/05 at 10:07pm
Thread Starter 
Yes, I did get the IO. From everything I had read, it's an excellent card so I figured I couldn't go wrong there. This whole preamp business is still pretty foreign to me (I really know very little except for the fact that it boosts volume!), so I will definitely have to play around with the software and settings to see if I can get the results I'm looking for. I'm sure I will be posting back for help when I receive it.

BTW, probably a silly question, but the IO is also great for just headphone or speaker output too, right?
Reply
Reply
post #9 of 10
12/14/05 at 11:58pm
dont forget the topoftheline plantronics, which have integrated sound cards(pretty much) their mics sound pretty nice.
Reply
Reply
post #10 of 10
12/15/05 at 11:02pm
Heh Plantronics is FAR from top of the line for recording.

>This whole preamp business is still pretty foreign to me (I really know very little except for the fact that it boosts volume!),

Ok Professional mics work by the air pressure moving a disphragm in a magnetic field. These creates electricity via basic physics. The thing is the diaphragm, as you can imagine, doesnt move much, and as a result very TINY amount of electricity are created. This is why you get low levels.

A Preamp is a specially designed device takes that tiny amount of signal and boosts it to a useable level(Line Level) and do it while inducing as little noise into the system as possible.

A preamp really is required to get a decent sound out of a professional mic, like the SM58 I believe you are using.

Seablade
Reply
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: Notebook Audio & Video
NotebookForums.com › Forums › General Notebook Discussions › Notebook Audio & Video  › USB mic vs. dedicated mic + external sound card