Polar wrote:

I am using a mini condenser electret microphone for research that I
would like to connect to the balanced XLR input of a mixer. Ideally, I
would like to power the mic on the mixer's phantom power.

I tried connecting the - and ground of a hacked XLR cable and hooking
up the mic's leads accordingly (as suggested by some websites), but the
noise was too dramatic. So, I'm unsure what the best solution is.
Should I buy an unbalanced to balanced converter? Is there a simple
"hack job" solution? Should I just splurge for some more expensive
balanced mics?

You may well have damaged the mike, too.

If you get the September 2001 issue of Recording Magazine, I had an
article on doing this. It's got three different schematics for circuits
that will do the job with varying degrees of quality. If the school
library can't get you a free copy, you can pay five bucks to the editors for
one. The article details how each of the circuits work and the various
advantages and disadvantages of each.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."