Customer Reviews

MXL 550/551R Microphone Ensemble

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm a singer/songwriter "Spot of Blue" and recently purchased this condenser mike combo to work with my mbox 2 and pro tools at my home studio. I got a great deal through a dealer on Amazon vs. some other top music supply sites about half the cost! I use an ART tube pre-amp and get some great warm sound with this cardioid patterned mike. Sure you can always spend thousands more but, I find it gets the job done for song ideas and works great on mixes for vocals. The instrument mike is a bonus the way I see it and has proven to have a more than substantial characteristics for some recording acoustical guitar. This is a great combo for any mike locker at a super price. It doesn't come with a shock mount and I picked up a nice Nady universal that works great. All in all a well made product for the money.

Okay so this isn't your Neumann U87. But it also doesn't cost three grand. I needed a decent mic to record music and do voice overs. This works. I've used the small capacitor mic to record my music and musicians for a documentary I did. I've used the large capacitor mic for voice overs and narrations for news stories that I have done. It works, plain and simple.

Usually in post, I'll add a little bit on the bottom to warm it up, but not much. I find it pretty quite too as long as I am paying attention to the room tone and noise floor.

If you don't have a lot of money and want something under $100 bucks, this is a good bet.

Also note, that if you are doing podcasting, you probably should not get this set. It's XLR so you will need to have a mixer with phantom power to use these babies. For the same price you could get an USB mic without having to fork out the extra cash for the mixer.

I've also used these while recording sound on location with my Zoom h4n and it works great for that too.

I'm building my own home studio for music mainly for an acoustic sound but this ensemble is great how ever the 550 you have to be quite close to to get a good bass and being a guy good bass is important for my vocals but other then that (witch is EQ-able) there great for the price

These will do nicely in your home studio. I got these two mics for 75 bucks. Cant beat the quality for the price. I think I actually like the instrument microphone better than the bigger guy but both sound decent. Nice guitar sounds from my 4 x 12 cab with the 550. Nice acoustic sounds with the 551. I would recommend these mics for anyone just starting out or on a budget.

Imma rapper and tha 550 soundz perfect. I don't really use tha 551 so i cant say anything bout it, but if u need a good mic for vocals i totally recommend tha 550