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On Oct 3, 10:18 am, (Don Pearce) wrote:
On Wed, 03 Oct 2007 08:30:52 -0700,
wrote:

I designed them back in 1995. The NT-2 and 1 used the same circuits
and parts until Rode cut costs on them. They later went to surface
mount which IMO degraded the sound significantly by also lowering
manufacturing costs.

Are you serious? You degrade sound significantly by lowering
manufacturing costs? Suppose you asked Sting to cut out the circuit
boards for you at, say $10,000 a time. The mic would now sound much
better on account of the increased manufacturing cost, yes?

But you did at least add IMO there, which I suppose is something. No,
you don't degrade sound with surface mount components either - that is
just a crock of religion. If anything you might improve things because
of the lower susceptibility to interference.

d

--
Pearce Consultinghttp://www.pearce.uk.com

Lets not get silly here. I wouldn't let stink anywhere near my gear.
He doesn't like to bath and he smells enough to stink up an entire
control room.

It's common for the bean counters that really run things to demand
manufacturing cost be cut. Surface mount parts are cheaper than the
discrete TO-92 transistors and Wima film and foil polypropylene caps
originally used. You can't even buy the transistors I use in surface
mount. I suppose I could "sub" some surface mount transistors, but the
noise floor would rise. Of course, higher noise is not in the realm
of quality of sound but is it important to you? The Wimas ran about 30
cents compared to the 3 cents for the mono ceramic caps now used.
That's a 10 to 1 reduction in costs for just those parts. Greed trumps
quality as it always has.

Interference in a screened metal mic body is not a factor here. It's
not rf circuits with impedance controlled traces, etc. Surface mount
parts offer no benefit other than cost reduction.

Any audio designer with any hearing left can hear the difference
between a monolythic ceramic cap and a precision polypropylene or
polystyrene film cap, you may not think it matters but many would
disagree with you. All my designs use through hole precision metal
film resistors and big ass film caps. I design for quality of sound, I
leave the rest to Behringer and friends.

Try this experiment if you don't believe me. Replace the quality film
cap off one of your nice German mics with a ceramic cap. Listen. Now
replace it with a very good film cap. That's a great test for a cap as
the signal levels are very low and the entire sound has to pass
through it.

Jim Williams
Audio Upgrades