Disclaimer: This post is aimed at the recording engineer nerd.
Testing out a 4038 ribbon microphone with the GML mic pre
I tried a GML 8300 mic pre and a coles4038. I was thinking I didn’t want the bow noise to stack up in the 8-10khz range. They didn’t have the coles 4040. It’ didn’t work out well at all because I had to turn up the GML input to about 50 to get a usable gain and that raised the noise floor way too high especially when stacking as many tracks as I am.
I have been really fortunate to get to record over the past three days in the symphony’s concert hall so I scrapped using the 4038 and just used my AT4047 so I could turn the input gain down to 30 on the GML reduce the noise floor and record a decent signal.
After listening back to the work I’ve done over the three days with the GML and AT4047 I’ve noticed all the fizz that builds up with stacking all the tracks with a condenser.
I like the sound of the ribbon but not the strange noise that accompany turned the gain up to 50? Maybe a ribbon that has a higher output would be more beneficial to my situation?
Todd Matthews
Ribbons all are notorious for having very low output. You need a mic pre with a lot of “clean” gain. Though the GML is a clean mic pre by many standards. AEA actually designed their own pre that works great with their stereo ribbon the R88.
If you’re interested in more gain on a ribbon you can try the Royer R122. It’s a ribbon with active electronics that requires 48volts. To my ear it doesn’t give you quite the plush/cushy ribbon sound of a Coles or AEA. It’s a little tighter sounding.
I love the Coles 4038 on drums mainly. They can sound good on electric guitar as well but they can’t take too much sound pressure so you need to be careful with how close to the cabinet they’re placed.
Also if you mean 50 on a GML knob, that doesn’t sound to loud to me. I just used the GML channelstrip pre for vocals and had it at 40 using a Sound Delux ELUX 251 mic. Tube mics generally has less output level than condensers as well, especially the vintage tube mics. A condenser will generally give the highest output, tube next, dynamic mics, then ribbons…. for a very crude ordering.
Many ribbons will force you into the 65-75 range which can be noisy no matter what pre. The AEA Ribbon Pre has a lot of clean gain though. I think the mic side goes to +63db and then there is +21db more available at the output of the pre.
Thanks for all the help Greg! I think I am going to pickup a AEA ribbon pre soon as it would probably be nice for my re20 too.
Hey Greg, So I think I narrowed the problem down to the power source. The ribbon mic and mic pre were fine and sounded great at home. It’s when I went to these other locations to record that I had the problems. I guess maybe I need a rack mount power conditioner?