[Nate Najar]

I know no one has seen it yet, but I'm sure some of you have seen the announcement..... Watcha think?

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 9/13/2013 11:05 PM, Nate Najar wrote:
I know no one has seen it yet, but I'm sure some of you have seen the announcement..... Watcha think?

I think you're trying to show that you're more clever than anyone else
here. What is it and why do you care what someone else might think who's
never seen it?



--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Nate Najar]

Come on mike you know me better than that. Most "forum type" audio folks don't talk much about schoeps, but you guys know them real well- this is where I learned about them, so I presumed that some of you guys might have seen the announcement and had some comment. Microphones to me are a worthwhile investment (if they're of this caliber and value) because when I work in other studios, especially these days, mic lockers are looking very different so it's useful for me to carry a handful of mics to a session.

That said, the new schoeps mic is their take on a large diaphragm condenser for studio use- marketing it as a studio vocal mic. It is a small diaphragm capsule with some modifications to give it the advantages of a large diaphragm microphone without the off axis disadvantages. At least with my limited knowledge of microphone design that is how I am able to interpret it.

Here's the product page that went up yesterday.

http://www.schoeps.de/en/products/v4u

I see no immediate use for me of a mic like this, but based on how they describe their intent with the design, I am interested in learning more about its implementation and effectiveness. And this group is where I've learned those sorts of things!

N

[Don Pearce[_3_]]

On Sat, 14 Sep 2013 09:08:24 -0700 (PDT), Nate Najar
wrote:

Come on mike you know me better than that. Most "forum type" audio folks don't talk much about schoeps, but you guys know them real well- this is where I learned about them, so I presumed that some of you guys might have seen the announcement and had some comment. Microphones to me are a worthwhile investment (if they're of this caliber and value) because when I work in other studios, especially these days, mic lockers are looking very different so it's useful for me to carry a handful of mics to a session.

That said, the new schoeps mic is their take on a large diaphragm condenser for studio use- marketing it as a studio vocal mic. It is a small diaphragm capsule with some modifications to give it the advantages of a large diaphragm microphone without the off axis disadvantages. At least with my limited knowledge of microphone design that is how I am able to interpret it.

Here's the product page that went up yesterday.

http://www.schoeps.de/en/products/v4u

I see no immediate use for me of a mic like this, but based on how they describe their intent with the design, I am interested in learning more about its implementation and effectiveness. And this group is where I've learned those sorts of things!

N

That circuit board has one of the weirdest layouts I've ever seen.
Tracks all over the place are crossing underneath components
needlessly. It looks like it was laid out by a drunk snail.

And no star point for the input ground. That is unforgivable in small
signal circuitry.

d

[Scott Dorsey]

Nate Najar wrote:
I know no one has seen it yet, but I'm sure some of you have seen the announcement..... Watcha think?

I think that a lot of people say they want a neutral vocal mike, but when
they actually use a neutral vocal mike, they discover that that isn't really
what they want at all.

That said, maybe this isn't really a neutral mike. It's true that when it
comes to off-axis rejection, Schoeps are the kings.

It will be interesting to see!
--scott

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

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 9/14/2013 12:08 PM, Nate Najar wrote:
Come on mike you know me better than that.

Sure, I do. I just didn't notice that it was you who asked. Sorry for
being a smartass.

But really, I've never heard of it. There are too many new mics to keep
up with, but I'm sure that Schoeps has something interesting there even
if I don't need it.

--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Nate Najar]

I've been working on a record lately with a singer songwriter who plays uke and I almost used the mk41 on her voice. It was really great, but the coles 4038 was better so I went with that. I did use the mk41 on the uke though and it was perfect.

[Scott Dorsey]

Nate Najar wrote:
I've been working on a record lately with a singer songwriter who plays uke and I almost used the mk41 on her voice. It was really great, but the coles 4038 was better so I went with that. I did use the mk41 on the uke though and it was perfect.

Okay, I did get a chance to listen to it at the AES show. It's a small and
shallow cardioid capsule with some back venting, but with a big baffle around
the capsule in order to make it more directional and make the off-axis response
a little wonky like a large-diaphragm mike. Sort of like a higher tech
version of what CAD did with some of their microphones in the eighties.

It's hard to tell a lot on the show floor, but it seemed clean and it had
excellent off-axis rejection, and the off-axis stuff sounded okay. I'm
not saying it's got the off-axis rejection of a 441 or something, but it
has something of the top end "air" of a U87 while having a lot better
rejection than a U87.

I'm really curious why Schoeps decided to introduce the thing, and I am
especially curious why they decided to model the case after the old 201.
I think it's a gimmick mike, but it might not be a bad gimmick mike.

On the other hand if you want that kind of sound and that kind of rejection
you could try the KMS105 which I think is very underrated as a studio mike.

I do think they are going more for a pop vocal sound than a clean and
flat sound, but that's okay because they already have clean and flat mikes
in their line.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Nate Najar]

Thanks Scott, that's interesting. I was wondering why they decided to enter that particular market in the first place. I expect it to be a good sounding and useful mic anyway, but still....

[Scott Dorsey]

Nate Najar wrote:
Thanks Scott, that's interesting. I was wondering why they decided to enter that particular market in the first place. I expect it to be a good sounding and useful mic anyway, but still....

I don't know. But I know that in the past decade, Dr. Schoeps and
Dr. Sennheiser have died and the control of their companies have moved on
to people who were not engineers. This is going to change things, and this
is actually happening throughout the industry as many of the people who
founded major audio companies in the huge postwar explosion of the audio
industry are dying.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Nate Najar]

Scott, that's a good point. I noticed since tannoy and dynaudio are both now of the same parent company, tannoy no longer offers high end studio products, just live sound and consumer, or entry level.

N

[Scott Dorsey]

Nate Najar wrote:
Scott, that's a good point. I noticed since tannoy and dynaudio are both now of the same parent company, tannoy no longer offers high end studio products, just live sound and consumer, or entry level.

Which is interesting because some of the drivers out of their high end studio
products are now appearing in their live sound rigs. And they sound great!

But yes, the same thing happens when there is consolidation. When Orban got
joined into the huge empire that also owns dbx, they dropped their really
marvelous line of standalone processing gear because they competed too much
with the (inferior to my mind) dbx line.

And that huge empire, Harman International, is an odd example of the sort of
thing I mentioned in my first post. Sydney Harman resigned in 2007 and died
a few years later. He wasn't really an engineer, but he was a hi-fi enthusiast
who cared about sound. What's different, though, is that he was replaced by
a fellow, Dinesh Paliwal, who actually has an engineering background. This
is not happening in most cases.

So far National Semi and Burr-Brown product lines have not been completely
mutilated with their absorption by TI, but time will still tell on that.
--scott

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

[Nate Najar]

On Tuesday, October 29, 2013 10:12:51 AM UTC-4, Scott Dorsey wrote:


Which is interesting because some of the drivers out of their high end studio

products are now appearing in their live sound rigs. And they sound great!



Yeah I have a small portable live rig with the tannoy dual concentrics and they're really wonderful. I try to take care of them because I don't want to have to try to replace them!