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Post by asdfasd on Jun 1, 2016 4:41:07 GMT
Hi guys,
I've just switched to this forum from Ethan's older forum, so good to be here!
Just a quick question: about 18 months - 2 years ago I bought a Shure SM7B for recording vocals at home (primarily heavy metal vocals). I've only tested it out a few times and have only started recording vocals with it recently. I'm running it straight into my Edirol UA-25. I expected to be blown away by the sound (considering the hype surrounding this mic) but was left feeling a bit flat. The vocals sound ok, but not nearly as impressive as I'd expected. Some say that the SM7B sounds average to below average until you pair it with a good preamp which is capable of giving a lot of clean gain. Apparently many preamps can't provide the gain required. The other alternative is a cloudlifter (which Shure recommend if using the mic for voiceover work).
I sing/scream/yell pretty loudly, so I haven't had a problem getting decent sized waveforms into my DAW (loud parts peak at about -3dB.) This is with the preamp sensitivity on the UA-25 turned to about 12:30pm. Admittedly I am very close to the mic and am yelling really loudly. I'm not noticing any preamp hiss (or maybe my ears aren't trained enough to hear small amounts of preamp noise).
The question is, would a cloudlifter or a better preamp (with lots of clean gain) make the SM7B sound better? Everyone seems to suggest this, but I thought this would only be for situations where you're singing quieter. It's strange - people suggest the cloudlifter/preamp thing even for loud vocalists who aren't struggling to get a decent signal. Surely the preamp and cloudlifter don't make the mic 'work' harder, but simply boost what is already there. Can't this just be done in my DAW for the same result? I'd love to be able to make this mic sound better if possible, but I'm pretty confused by the advice that's around.
Thanks in advance.
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 1, 2016 18:45:15 GMT
Nice to see you here. I doubt a different preamp would change anything, unless it has a secret HF boost which I could almost envision someone doing. But I have no experience with the Edirol or the Cloud Lifter. I suppose you could buy one with the understanding that you'll return it if it doesn't help. But really, this is what EQ is for. When a vocal sounds dull, a few dB boost at 5 KHz can help a lot. --Ethan
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Post by asdfasd on Jun 2, 2016 0:57:15 GMT
Good to be here! The preamps that people generally recommend for the SM7B are the Great River ME1-NV, which costs 3x as much as the SM7B itself, or the Neve 1073, which costs around 10x the price of a SM7B. I can imagine forking out a lot of money for these pieces of gear, only to realise that they are glorified volume control knobs. Here are a couple of videos of the SM7B with and without the cloudlifter. The signal is definitely louder - but not sure if the sound is 'better'.
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Post by Hexspa on Jun 2, 2016 14:51:07 GMT
Maybe you don't WANT to be "blown away" by a mic? It's just a mic. The "blowing away" part comes with what you do with it.
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 2, 2016 17:56:03 GMT
That video is nonsense. Yes, it's louder. That's no way to compare stuff. If a preamp is doing its job properly, all it will do is make stuff louder. You can do the same with your current preamp by increasing the gain knob.
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Post by Hexspa on Jun 2, 2016 23:42:26 GMT
That video is nonsense. Yes, it's louder. That's no way to compare stuff. If a preamp is doing its job properly, all it will do is make stuff louder. You can do the same with your current preamp by increasing the gain knob. debunkt
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Post by asdfasd on Jun 3, 2016 2:14:10 GMT
That video is nonsense. Yes, it's louder. That's no way to compare stuff. If a preamp is doing its job properly, all it will do is make stuff louder. You can do the same with your current preamp by increasing the gain knob. Exactly what I thought! People on forums even go as far as saying that different preamps and/or the cloudlifter "bring the SM7B to life" or "give a more forward sound". Sounds like the usual unproven audio-wankery to me. This is why I love this place - there's no bullcrap here. The only way I could imagine a cloudlifter improving the sound would be if I was using a noisy preamp and the cloudlifter allowed me to use less preamp gain and therefore get less hiss/noise. Again, I'm using an Edirol UA25 which isn't an expensive soundcard, and I'm unable to find any info on its preamps other than the company's assertion that they are 'high quality' and made with 'premium analogue components'. Who knows. At the moment I only need to turn the preamps up to about half, but if doing quieter vocals I'd probably need to crank the gain the whole way up. I imagine I'd get a bit of preamp hiss at that point. Would a cloudlifter be a good idea in that scenario? Or is something like preamp hiss irrelevant due to masking or being below the noise floor? In many videos where people demonstrate 'unacceptable' preamp noise, I can't even hear what they're talking about.
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Post by Rock on Jun 3, 2016 11:39:49 GMT
I didn't know anything about the Cloudlifter so I went to the website. From what I read, (I did only quickly scan) they don't seem to say it makes your mic sound different. The thing I did see is they claim that it quietly increases gain +25dB. OK, that might be useful for really low gain preamps or ribbon mics or when you need more gain than your pre will deliver but from what I gather, I don't think they are trying to sell you snake oil. However, I do agree with Ethan, turn up the gain...OR in your DAW, if your recorded signal is weak, "normalize" the track level.
Cheers, Rock
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 3, 2016 20:08:20 GMT
The theoretical noise floor of a hypothetically perfect preamp is something like -131 dBu. Most preamps should be able to get within 2-3 dB of that. A friend of mine who designs preamps told me it's the last dB or two that makes the price 20 times higher. So unless your Edirol is lousy, which is unlikely, a better preamp might reduce the hiss by 1-2 dB. That's about all you get when spending $1,000 per channel versus $50 per channel! Well that, and maybe some toob distortion. I think the Cloud Lifter is meant mostly for ribbon mics whose output is so low you can't even get a decent record level without extra help. Here's a little story: Years ago I exported a mix to a Wave file and it sounded fine, just like what I heard while mixing it in my DAW. Then I burned a CD and played that, and it sounded horrible. No highs, no lows, just totally meh. It turned out the CD sounded exactly like the Wave file! But my sound card's playback mixer settings were off, so the CD played 10 dB softer than the Wave file in Windows Media Player. (Of course I noticed it was softer, but I didn't attribute that to the quality difference.) Once I raised the volume the CD sounded the same as the Wave file. I tell this story to dispel the claims "bring the SM7B to life" or "give a more forward sound." Simply raising the volume can easily do that. Which is why that demo video seems impressive. --Ethan
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Post by Hexspa on Jun 3, 2016 23:37:53 GMT
I cn haz tuub distorshun?
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 4, 2016 18:41:41 GMT
I believe the correct spelling is toob.
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Post by asdfasd on Jun 5, 2016 8:16:05 GMT
The theoretical noise floor of a hypothetically perfect preamp is something like -131 dBu. Most preamps should be able to get within 2-3 dB of that. A friend of mine who designs preamps told me it's the last dB or two that makes the price 20 times higher. So unless your Edirol is lousy, which is unlikely, a better preamp might reduce the hiss by 1-2 dB. That's about all you get when spending $1,000 per channel versus $50 per channel! Well that, and maybe some toob distortion. I think the Cloud Lifter is meant mostly for ribbon mics whose output is so low you can't even get a decent record level without extra help. Here's a little story: Years ago I exported a mix to a Wave file and it sounded fine, just like what I heard while mixing it in my DAW. Then I burned a CD and played that, and it sounded horrible. No highs, no lows, just totally meh. It turned out the CD sounded exactly like the Wave file! But my sound card's playback mixer settings were off, so the CD played 10 dB softer than the Wave file in Windows Media Player. (Of course I noticed it was softer, but I didn't attribute that to the quality difference.) Once I raised the volume the CD sounded the same as the Wave file. I tell this story to dispel the claims "bring the SM7B to life" or "give a more forward sound." Simply raising the volume can easily do that. Which is why that demo video seems impressive. This is exactly why I love this forum! Great stuff. I've never used a ribbon mic so am unaware of how low their output is compared to the SM7B. The SM7B is considered 'low output', so the cloudlifter gets talked about a lot. Even Shure customer help talks about possibly needing a Cloudlifter for the SM7B: shure.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3115/~/sm7-output-level-and-preamp-gain-specificationsAccording to that link for speech level vocals my preamp needs a minimum of 60dB of gain: I can't find any info on how much gain the UA25 preamps provide, although I guess as suggested earlier, if the sound isn't loud enough I can just 'normalize' the track level in my DAW.
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 5, 2016 19:40:19 GMT
You can figure this out once and for all, and I hope you do. All you need is a controlled test:
My favorite method is to use re-amping. Take a full range source, such as a recording of a pop tune you like, or whatever, and play it in mono (or play only one channel) through the best loudspeaker you have. Put your SM7 microphone about 1 foot in front of the tweeter, directly on-axis, then record 10 seconds of music and note the peak level. Now without moving anything send the mic through the Cloud Lifter and play the music again. I guess you'll drop the preamp's gain 20 dB or so, then raise the Cloud Lifter's gain to be as close as possible to the previous record level.
--Ethan
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Post by asdfasd on Jun 6, 2016 13:56:36 GMT
You can figure this out once and for all, and I hope you do. All you need is a controlled test: My favorite method is to use re-amping. Take a full range source, such as a recording of a pop tune you like, or whatever, and play it in mono (or play only one channel) through the best loudspeaker you have. Put your SM7 microphone about 1 foot in front of the tweeter, directly on-axis, then record 10 seconds of music and note the peak level. Now without moving anything send the mic through the Cloud Lifter and play the music again. I guess you'll drop the preamp's gain 20 dB or so, then raise the Cloud Lifter's gain to be as close as possible to the previous record level. --Ethan I'm convinced that the cloudlifter wouldn't make the mic 'sound better', as you guys have explained this doesn't make sense. The only thing I wonder is whether my preamp might need more gain in certain situations. I guess I'll worry about that when (or if) I run into that problem. By the way, tried a bit of an eq boost at 5k as you suggested - sounds nice!
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Post by Ethan Winer on Jun 6, 2016 17:56:31 GMT
I never owned an SM7B so I don't know how soft it is. But it's usually used on voices, yes? So even if it's not suitable for capturing a quiet acoustic guitar from five feet away, it doesn't matter.
--Ethan
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