boojum

No, that mic will not work. It will pick up the noise of the recorder. You will want a mic which will operate on 1.5 volts or one which requires a higher voltage (usually ~9 volts) and is used with a battery box. Sound Professionals and Microphone Madness are two sites which offer inexpensive mics. You will need to decide between an omnidirectional which picks up sound all around it and cardioid which picks up sound in front of it, mostly. Let your wallet be your guide. You can make good recordings with inexpensive mics, but results get better the more you spend. And in the chain the mics are the most important. That said, get some mics and go out and have some fun. Try taperssection.com for additional advice as they are focussed on recording. And ask all you want here. We all started not knowing. Cheers!

Matteo - I am guessing that you have your record levels set too high on your minidisc. If you have a mic sensitivity setting, try it at low. If that is not enough, lower your recording levels. I have a similar mic, ECM-MS957 and it works fine, when the levels and mic sensitivity are set right. Let us know how that works. Cheers

Sheesh! Brain surgery next.

GF - No, I mean AT3031, cardioids. I have omni's and would like to have a good pair of cardioids now. I am also looking at a pair of used CK91's with the SE330B bodies for ~US$400. At that price they would be a good deal, providing they work. ;o) Tape at 11:00

GF - The AT3031's are about US$300 a pair. A DIY phantom box would be good. I can wire and solder. And I can look at a photo and/or schematic and get it done. So, if you know of a source of plans that would be cool. If the 3031's are that much better I would just get them and use them as my cardioids and be done with it. I cannot see myself getting ino the AKG's for around US$1,000 and feeling happy about it. That and I do not have that kind of money to spend. OK, cheers

GF - The expense of the CK91's started going up pretty quickly as I added the stuff to complete the kit. I was over US$1,000 pretty quickly and while I am sure the gear is sweet and all that I just do not want to spend that much money. I like the idea of learning on inexpensive gear. If I ever get the skill set, then I can go out and buy the high-end stuff. Until then I will putt along one the best I can get for little or no money. I liked the U853 because it works fine with just a BB at the sound levels I am going to record. If it does not, I will get the phantom power/pre-amp for it. But I can start with a pair of SP-CMC-4U's for US$200 and build GM's battery box and have a go at it. Generally, how has your experience been with AT and how do they sound? The 2021 looks nice but I need phantom power and that cranks up the cost. With SP's phantom power it is cheap enough, but needs line current. I want to be free from the need for line current. Fast, light and small is what I am looking for in a quality pair of mics. Sheesh, all I want is the impossible. So what's the problem??? ;o) Cheers

I have had a professional recommend that I use AKG CK91's to record with, and have found a pretty good price for a pair. But with the collets (cables) it starts getting real expensive and then there is the BB/pre-amp, too. Now we are talking real money. I cannot afford to buy these and not have them be the best thing since bottled beer and sliced bread. So, who has had experience with these specifically and AKG in general? Help me out here. Thanks!

I am curious how you repaired the cable. Did you order one from SONY and replace the failed one or what??

Well, I just looked at the photos and they are different in size and shape so the source from whence they came may be different. The cores seem to be different. But the best solution is to use the 800 number to call and ask. The folks there are quite nice and very helpful. Happy Trails.

If the patent for use is sold at too high a price the format will die. The patent holder does not want the format use to die. I am going to watch this one play out. I understand that AAC is better, but user listening tests at hydrogenaudio did not show any great differences and in most music most of the time MP3 is very good. YMMV

That's a pretty nice golf course. He is lucky to live there. I used to live pretty close to it.

neither link works. ;o(

Line-in with the battery box, and watch those levels! Better to add the volume in post-processing than to have a recording with clipping.

. . . and what was it you said your addiction was?? ;o)

GF - I put up torrents to boards which are adamant about no post-processing, nada. So, I run ReplayGain to regain the sound I gave up for headroom, tell them how I did it, i.e., with foobar2000 and that is all I do. The files themselves are FLAC 8. For myself, I add some compression. ;o) I don't get it. Do you want it handed you on a platter?? Joke, joke. I was just kidding. I pushed code for 20+ years and it is the same there. I know what you have to contend with.

Simichrompoli, the German fine polish by Happich. Super on brass and silver, it is a very fine paste of jewelers rouge. It can polish a scratch out of a watch crystal. It will polish, not scratch. Toothpaste is pretty coarse so you might want to use this polish after the toothpaste. Found in auto stores and German car dealers at the parts desk. One tube will last you a lifetime as it is used very sparingly for any polishing.

Welcome back.

Yeah, that's why you own an MD, but did you get this guy!? LOL I'm with the Dixie Chicks, sometimes it is embarassing to be an American.

Do you mean that if you stopped the unit five minutes into the track you want it to restart from there???

DoD is out of the question. They are snottier than I am. I finally stumbled on, or was pointed to, thetradersden.org. They are pretty good, my uploads work and they claim to be serious about audio quality. etree did not work so I will hang out a TTD for a while. Check some other boards about DoD. I am relieved to know it isn't just me.

Johann Christian Bach on Swiss Radio Classical over the Internet. The announcer speaks the worst English I have ever heard. I can't understand a word of it. Oh, it's Schweizer-Deutsch. ;o)

Tubes as a subject is an entirely new thread, and we do not want to go there. They are an anethema to me. Bob Carver proved the falacy of tubes to Stereophile and picked up $10,000 those ninnies thought they would never have to part with.

I would do two things after recording it and uploading it to your computer: first, I would use Audacity to apply compression to the file. This will even the disparity between the spoken and played parts. If you are satisfied just export the file and it will have the compression. Then, convert it to FLAC and run ReplayGain on it. This will raise the overall volume to a max without clipping. I would use foobar2000 for this. Use FLAC on SourceForge: http://flac.sourceforge.net/download.html. foobar200 is at foobar2000.org. If you want to cut it into tracks manually use CD Wave Editor. Let us know if you have problems with this or any other thing you want to do. You can use foobar2000 to burn a CD from the FLAC file(s). Cheers

Job well done. Beautiful finishing and photography. Magyars rule. ;o)

GF - Bruce Bartlett would know, for sure. I have one of his books. His other book is ~US$150 and I am not rushing out to buy it. Thanks for the info. ;o)