Microphone preamps

If you use a dynamic mic into anything else than a mixer, which preamp do you use?

My daughter sings. She has a Shure PG58, and wants to plug it into the line input of a guitar amp. When she does so, however, you can't hear it. It needs a preamp. I've been looking at the Behringer MIC200.

Does anyone have any recommendations?

(If there is a better forum to post this, admins, then please move the thread.)

I am using an ART Tube MP Project Series USB pre-amp and a Behringer XM8500 dynamic mic. It can be found for about $70. ART has some non USB capable versions for less.

I can send you some links to sound samples if you would like.

There is a lot of debate about the quality of various mic pre-amps. A lot of people feel you can't find a decent pre-amp for under a couple hundred.

The ART has met my needs for non-professional home recording.

spots said:

I am using an ART Tube MP Project Series USB pre-amp and a Behringer XM8500 dynamic mic. It can be found for about $70. ART has some non USB capable versions for less.

I can send you some links to sound samples if you would like.

There is a lot of debate about the quality of various mic pre-amps. A lot of people feel you can't find a decent pre-amp for under a couple hundred.

The ART has met my needs for non-professional home recording.

Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply. There is no way I am spending more than necessary for a preamp. I'm just a home hobbyist, after all.

It looks as if Behringer has copied ART (they're known for doing that kind of thing), since the premap you mentioned looks more or less identical to Behringer's. Prices are comparable, too. I'll take a look at a few videos before making up my mind.

Skrik,

The Behringer MIC100 compares most equally to the ART Tube MP Studio sold for $30 at places like Musician's Friend.

The Behringer MIC200 compares most equally to the ART Tube MP Studio V3 sold for about $75.

The biggest difference between the Behringer and ART appears to be how the dB pad button works.

ART Tube MP has a knob controlled gain that goes up to +40 dB. You can then press a "+20 dB" pad button and boost the gain to a total of +60 dB (XLR in to XLR out).

Behringer works opposite. They provide the full gain at the gain control knob. Then you press a "-20 dB" to reduce the gain if you need to reduce sensitivity.

ART has several different lines of mic pre-amps with slightly different features and different prices. Their new "Project Series" line has a version that with a USB output.

I've been very pleased with the Tube MP Project Series USB I purchased, and it's meet my needs very well. The Tube MP Studio would have meet my needs too, but I wanted to have the USB output (16-bit, 48kHz output) option for the future.

Good luck.

Hi

I'm wondering if you really need a preamp. Sounds to me, you can use an impedance matching transformer like

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.co...tle-IMP-Lo-to-Hi-Impedance-Matcher?sku=427600

A Shure PG58 is, I believe, a low impedance microphone. Your guitar amp - is it really a line-level input? Or, is it a 1/4" input? Or, you're using a RCA-type line input? If your amp expects a line-level input, yes, you will need a pre-amp. On the other hand, if you are going to plug into the place where a guitar is usually plugged in, the above transformer should do (I think).

How did she connect the mic to the guitar amp? She used such a transformer, or just a plain XLR to 1/4" adaptor (without transformer).

With 14.99, it's worth looking into. YOu can probably borrow one from your local music store. Or, bring in the amp and the mic into the store and test.

Cheers
Chief

I've been using a Groove Tubes The Brick preamp with an EV Cardinal mic and I love it!

chiefnoda said:

Hi

I'm wondering if you really need a preamp. Sounds to me, you can use an impedance matching transformer like

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.co...tle-IMP-Lo-to-Hi-Impedance-Matcher?sku=427600

Click to expand...

Got one of those with the mic. Doesn't work. I suppose it could just be an XLR to 1/4" converter, though it is longer than necessary, if that is all it is.

chiefnoda said:

A Shure PG58 is, I believe, a low impedance microphone. Your guitar amp - is it really a line-level input? Or, is it a 1/4" input? Or, you're using a RCA-type line input? If your amp expects a line-level input, yes, you will need a pre-amp. On the other hand, if you are going to plug into the place where a guitar is usually plugged in, the above transformer should do (I think).

Click to expand...

If I put the mic into the instrument socket, there's no problem (vocal experiments with guitar effects ensue). The input I want to use is a 1/8" line input that is labelled for a CD player. I guess it is a hign load input since it expects an amplified CD player into it. The mic by itself doesn't drive it; you can hear it if you are very quiet.

Thinking about it, perhaps the CD input bypasses the amp altogether, and drives the speaker directly. I'm not opening the amp to investigate.

I want to use this input for the mic so that my daughter can mix guitar and vocals through the same output.

chiefnoda said:

How did she connect the mic to the guitar amp? She used such a transformer, or just a plain XLR to 1/4" adaptor (without transformer).

With 14.99, it's worth looking into. YOu can probably borrow one from your local music store. Or, bring in the amp and the mic into the store and test.

Cheers
Chief

Click to expand...

sebi said:

I've been using a Groove Tubes The Brick preamp with an EV Cardinal mic and I love it!

Click to expand...

Wow, that is way out of my price range! I'm not surprised that you like it. ;-)

Nobody wants to spend more than necessary however....

My wife and I recently bought a Mackie 402-VLZ3 mixer (around $99.00) when our Behringer MX802A developed a hum after a number of years of service.

The Mackie has XDR2 preamps on the XLR inputs of channels 1 and 2. These preamps are very quiet (in the bad noise sense). We normally keep the mixer plugged into the computer downstairs for recording ideas. For scratch recordings we use a Shure SM-58 or SM-57. The recordings are very clean with this mixer.

When we do more serious recording we bring the mixer upstairs where there is less noise (kids and pets) and we use a condenser mic. The Mackie has phantom power (48VDC).

I know your original post said "other than mixers", but I had to stick in my opinion because I am very happy with this mixer.

The SM58 is a very nice-sounding, quiet, stable mic.It's more-or-less a staple for live performances. When we started out our show, we used SM-58s for the same reason as mediocre.A microphone preamp is used to increase the gain of a microphone. The mic preamp is really only the input section of mixer,usually called an ‘input channel’.There are some preamps that use a solid state preamp stage and then pass the signal through a tube.The tube circuit has a drive knob that allows you to add more or less of the tube sound.