niftydog

Hey dex, While you probably didn't intend for that to come across kind of aggressive, it did. If you must know it was an error on my part. Normally I would use the low setting but as I discovered to my horror it was not set properly first time around. As I said I will be trying the low setting at the next possible opportunity. The important part about what I was saying is that my stupid mistake has lead me to have a better understanding of how my HiMD works and I wanted to share that with the forum. Um, thanks for that, that is the same conclusion I had already come to - but I guess it's reassuring that others think the same thing as me. AllanH, more great stuff, thanks again!

I totally agree with everything you're saying, I just got the impression you thought that I had said that removing the pad resistors somehow adds noise. If you do go down the path that I followed (making a stereo transformer unbalancing box) you'll find that you'll probably have TOO MUCH level! This is the problem I'm encountering. Using my MZ-NH900 set to a high mic sensitivity to record my bands rehearsals, even a record level of 1/30 results in distortion. It also results in a very low level signal leading me to the conclusion that it's actually the microphone preamp stage that is being over-driven - prior to the record level control stage! So, it seems that the record level adjustment doesn't set the microphone preamp gain at all, but in fact it sets the level being fed to the analogue to digital converter. Conveniently my band is on a short break and I haven't had a chance to try the low mic sensitivity setting as yet! Well, that's not balancing the signal, but it is a better way than just shorting the unused leg directly to ground. This is what I initially thought the Rode cables mystery resistors did, but as you showed me they are in fact attenuators. Baffling! BTW, still no word from Rode which is pretty disappointing.

That's not what I was saying - the noise was due to the extra gain required because of the unbalancing technique used. In fact, I had the same trouble even without the pad resistors. I can't seem to get a response out of Rode on this. I asked them directly to provide me with a schematic so I could see for myself what the resistors do but they have not come to the party. (I do not own the factory supplied cable so I can't inspect the PCB.) I must say I'm still surprised that they are indeed attenuators, but you can't argue with the facts! Obviously the bipolar output stage is happy to have one phase shorted to ground... seems odd to me though that Rode would subject their design to such treatment, but without seeing a schematic of the mic I can't understand their reasoning on that either. Thanks for the info, very interesting stuff. Still experimenting with my new toy though, getting some odd results too, I will update the thread if I find some answers.

That's something to add to the tips, remember that a mic running from batterys is never going to have as much headroom as one running off full 48V phantom power. I guess I overload mics more because I'm a bass player and lots of moving air really upsets condensers! That is to say it doesn't have to be loud to distort. For instance, take a condenser and gently blow on it to see the effect.

This brings up another tip: Condenser mics are notoriously sensitive. I wouldn't place the Rode NT4 or similar mic within a meter of an acoustic guitar let alone a drum or a good vocalist. Distortion can be generated within the mic itself. So, if you get distorted results, don't automatically blame too much gain, it could be that the sound source is too close to the mic(s). Naturally, it's all relative to your equipment (YMMV!) My MZ-NH900 is set to low sensitivity and runs quite low mic gain (around 7-9) with good results.

Recently, whilst considering a 2nd hand Rode NT4 I came here in search of some answers to questions regarding the microphone input on my HiMD (MZ-NH900). What I found was some useful information, some well-meaning misinformation and a whole lot of confusion! Here's a few things that I learned along the way that will hopefully help someone in future, and in the meantime it should clear up some confusion. First cab off the rank, microphone power. MD units with microphone inputs supply some DC (1.5V or thereabouts) power at the socket to power small microphones. The only units I have tested that use this feature are the usual suspects from Sony. This DC voltage will not hinder the operation of "conventional" condenser microphones, however, nor will it suffice to power them properly either. The most ideal condenser microphones for use with MD units are self-powered by a 9V battery or similar. Most microphones utilise balanced signals. Balanced signals are less susceptible to EMI and are therefore ideal for low-power signals such as microphones. The problem with balanced signals is, they need a balanced input. Portable MD devices do NOT have balanced inputs. Therefore you need to convert from balanced to unbalanced before inputting the signal to your MD device. There are two common methods; 1. make a cable that shorts one phase to ground and connects the other phase to the signal input. 2. make a balanced to unbalanced converter using a transformer or some electronics. The problem with solution 1 is that you end up with a signal that is half the amplitude of the full balanced signal. The MD preamp has to be run with a lot of gain to get a decent signal, but more gain equals more noise. (Folks, this is THE problem with the factory Rode 5 pin XLR to minijack cable!) I found that it was far too much noise to be acceptable, so I had to go with solution 2. Solution 2 preserves the full amplitude of the signal thus reducing the gain required, thus reducing the noise recorded! You can buy balanced to unbalanced converters of the passive (transformer) and active (electronics) variety. Passive converters are preffered in this case as you don't need a power source for them. You can make passive converters quite easily - if you can get a hold of some old condenser microphones. I salvaged two transformers from broken microphones and made my own stereo passive converter housed inside one of the salvaged microphone cases. Regarding the Rode NT4: I am awaiting information direct from Rode, but it is my understanding that the factory 5 pin XLR to minijack cable does NOT convert from balanced to unbalanced. For this reason, many people have been disappointed with the results. The resistors in the minijack housing seem unlikely to be attenuators although I cannot confirm or deny that at this stage. They are more likely some kind of load resistors that are an attempt to provide good conditions for the microphone output stage. This microphone has a solid state output stage (not a transformer) and it's not ideal to just short one of the phases to ground. Thus, the unused phase might be tied to ground via some load resistance. As I said, awaiting information from Rode on this one. If you are going to make your own version of this cable, don't waste your time mucking around with two cables into one connector! Use a standard two core mic cable and put the load resistors (or shorting links) in the XLR housing. The minijack only requires three connections, left, right and ground - save your sanity by only putting three wires inside it! Wiring the "factory" XLR splitter is somewhat more tricky, but if you can get a hold of quad core cable that makes it much easier. There was a question about the "49 mV" spec in the manual. This is the minimum voltage for line inputs. Given even a high-output microphone would be lucky to generate even half of this voltage you shouldn't be trying to put microphones into line inputs. Always put microphones into the microphone input and run with as little gain as possible to get a decent signal. Anyone else got some tips?

Aren't they all messed up!? It's not a vanilla installation at all (modified by Microsoft specifically for this network) - this is a large part of my problem. However, it's frustrating to discover that of all the non-sanctioned software I'm running, the only one that's causing me grief is SonicStage. I've managed to disable my PC on a couple of occasions in the past, so I'm trying to stick to the rules this time!

That doesn't help me (see original post), but thanks anyway. I have already read about the SP2 fixes on this forum.

This is not my personal PC and I have no authority to install updates, hotfixes or service packs. The best I can do is get temporary admin access to install software - and even that is stretching the relationship! Sorry, I know that SP2 seems like it would be the silver bullet. This is why I thought that the best solution would be to roll back the version until I found one that worked - somewhere in between 2.1 and 3.3 might do the trick, but I'm loosing hope fairly quickly. Another problem discovered: I tried "recording a CD" (terminology doesn't make sence to me, but that's a whole other thread!) and I perpetually get "An error occured while preparing to record the CD. Please try again." Anyway, the details of the original error are here: Shortly after plugging in the MD I get "Omgjbox.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close..." etc. Clicking for more info I get: Error signature AppName: omgjbox.exe AppVer: 2.8.0.6040 ModName: unknown ModVer: 0.0.0.0 Offset: 7fffffff and clicking further I get: Exception Information Code: 0xc0000005 Flags: 0x00000000 Record: 0x0000000000000000 Address: 0x000000007fffffff ...and the rest is a lot of typing! So I have saved the accompanying text file which might be useful. I have uploaded it to here. Thanks again Steve

Hi gang, Let me first say thanks to all here for providing me with enough information to at least get to this point. This is truly a wealth of information for those attempting to deal with SonicStage. Thanks to all contributors! Huzzah! Here's my dilemma; My work PC is running XP service pack 1, with no hope of upgrading to SP2 I cannot use the latest (3.3) version of SonicStage. At least, that's what I have read here. (I have tried [following the clean install instructions in the FAQ] believe me, but the program simply crashes upon launch.) Details: XP Pro 2002 SP1 Intel P4 1.6GHz 512Mb RAM USB 2 (I think, how do I check?) Mindisc model: MZ-NH900 So, I am stuck with the version that came with my MZ-NH900, which is 2.1. This CD works fine on my vanilla 98SE PC at home (albeit a little sluggish!) It also installs without protest on my work PC, and it even launches properly and everything appears to be fine... until I plug the USB cable into my minidisc at which point it crashes. So, is this something people have encountered before? Any suggestions? Does anyone know the latest SonicStage version that doesn't require SP2? Where might I find it? Thanks in advance Steve

2.1 also requires administrative access.