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djwayne · Location: USA

This is cool, I found a website that has a demo of the Superlux mic, I just bought. The engineer said after he tried one, he sold all his Neumann and AKG mics and replaced them with Superlux mics. It doesn't sound exactly like his Neumanns, but in the league. hmmmm... The demo mp3 doesn't doesn't sound bad at all. Give it a listen if you want, It's mostly light jazz stuff.

http://www.superlux.us/demo.html

I've also been reading a bunch of other good reviews, one even comparing it to the U-87.... Cool

ozpeter · Location: Australia

Thanks for the advice. SteveG rightly pointed out the other day that cheaper mics can give remarkably good results a lot of the time, but the quality control / consistency of sound can be a problem, that being where (perhaps) corners may have been cut. But of course if you have a serious QC problem even with a cheaper mic, you just have to take it back and do your own QC on another one.
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Having now listened to a bit of the demo, I found the bass a bit forward in the mix (not that the mix is the issue) - perhaps a bit of peakiness in the vocal sound? Hard to tell. But nothing second-best about the overall sound of the mics, IMHO.

How do you choose a mic? Reputation? Reviews? Hearing them in other people's studios? If buying one I haven't heard, I usually take along my own headphones, (HD580's), plus my own familiar reference mic, and get the salesperson to plug the mic of interest into a Mackie (like them or not, they are a common point of reference), also of course with my own mic. Then soloing each in turn I just listen to background shop noise including traffic rumble with the levels well up, and find I can quickly hear significant differences just from that test, including the relative noise floor and sensitivity.

Any other favourite methods of selection?

- Ozpeter

djwayne · Location: USA

What he says is true, QC can be a problem, in a production facility, but who knows, maybe they're just letting them sell cheap to get a name built up. How many people here ever heard of a "Superlux" ?? Until a few days ago, I never did. I can't afford a U-87, an AT 3525, 414, NTI, or a B.L.U.E, so I guess this is the Po'Man's Neumann ?? As long as it sounds better than that Radio Shack mic I bought thirty some years ago for $30.00, I'll be happy. Now that mic sounded awful, and had tons of feedback & noise problems. I threw it out about 25 years ago, and have no regrets about it.

djwayne · Location: USA

Mic selection, I usually go by reviews and recomendations from a trusted music store in this area. The salesmen have always been straight up about certain products, and want repeat business, so they usually give good advice, for the products I'm looking for, the quality I want and the budget I have to work with. They usually don't stock junk, because they don't want the hassles. With the Superlux, they even offered me a 30 money back trial period, if I didn't like the mic. That's impressive. But in this case, I went to E-Bay to research which mics were on the market, and found the Superlux with a high bid of $50. I put in a higher bid, and nobody else bid, so I won the auction.
I sometimes go by what friends have or what I've read about. I've recorded with a 414, and wasn't impressed with the sound at all. The Sennheiser 421 and AKG C-1000 both came highly recommended for general purpose, so I bought them. I originally bought 4 of the Sennheisers for live recordings, but have traded three of them away for other various stuff. I like the C-1000 better, for the acoustic guitar, but am looking for a fuller, deeper, richer sound. I'll see what I can get with the Superlux, and go from there. Maybe just having an assortment of different mics on an instrument will give me the sound I'm looking for. I may also use it for harmonica, flutes, and harps, in the future. Over the years,I've worked with a lot of different musicians, and everybody has their favorite mic, so having an assortment of mics would be beneficial to me for recording, as the situations arise. I'm also finding lots of people praising the Rodes & AT mics, so maybe I'll be getting into those too eventially. If I get back into doing live recordings, the more mics you have, the better.

ozpeter · Location: Australia

SteveG · Location: United Kingdom

ozpeter · Location: Australia

While on the site that djwayne has linked to, http://www.superlux.us/frequency_response.html gives a good guide to reading mic frequency response curves. The quality of the site does give one confidence in these mics, by association.

- Ozpeter

djwayne · Location: USA

Well I'm not an expert on mics, as my experience is limited to what I've actually have used. Even the name Tenlux doesn't ring any bells with me. Most of the musicians I've worked with used Shure mics, and are highly impressed with the Sennheiser 421. So the need to explore mics hasn't been a main priority. The $2,000-3,000 mics are out of my budget. At one studio I was at, they had a big old vintage mic, they said was worth about $30,000. I don't recall the name of it though. I wouldn't even touch that mic, for fear of dropping it !! At the college course I took, the teacher used a AKG 440 and got a good sound from it. He had also bought, I think it was a CAD for $300, that he was impressed with, because of the $300 price tag and sound quality. He had plenty of higher quality mics available to him, but they didn't keep them at the college, for fear somebody would walk out with them. A friend of mine swears by the 440, but after listening to sound tests between the 440, the C-1000, and the 421, there were some minor differences, but I didn't hear anything that would cause me to spend an extra $6-700 for the 440.

djwayne · Location: USA

Woops, I mean the AKG 414 not the AKG 440 !! I need some more coffee.

VoodooRadio · Location: USA

FWIW, I love the Sennheiser 421's. I have 2 and a handful of SM57's, and usually will use the 421's over the 57's for micing my guitar amps. As for the QC thing... I recently saw it first hand when a forum member went and purchased a couple of Oktava's and had a problem with noise. I have 6 of the Oktava's (2-019's, 2-219's and 2-319's) and (luckily) haven't experienced ANY problems. Again FWIW, the 219's and 319's don't work pair up very well, while the 019's work just fine (and they weren't sold as a matched pair). I have a Rode NT1 that made some strange noises while using the (provided) factory mounting device, however tossing that and using a "web style" shock absorber remedied the problem altogether. Shy

SteveG · Location: United Kingdom

djwayne · Location: USA

I've been reading a lot of good recomendations on the Rode NT1.

The shock mount option is a good thing. It helps to eliminate any noise generated or picked up by your mic stand, that could potentialy ruin and otherwise good recording. The older Sennheiser I have doesn't have the shock mount option, but the newer models do. The Superlux does have the shock mount option available, but I'm not sure it the one I bought comes with it or not, if it doesn't have one, I'll have to go buy one, as that is a feature I want.