Two mics. No mixer. Two person interview.

Hello folks!

Hope everyone is enjoying their Christmas! Love the software! Easy to use. Using for almost a yr. I’m about to do my first live event interviewing. I have an extra mic. No mixer. Running Windows 7. My mic I use all the time is a CAD u37 (non bi-directional). Neewer Studio Mic… not bad, but the u37 is superior. And the Neewer is not usb. Still sounds fine with audio adjustments. Soooooo… thats my problem. Can’t run both mics. Any answers? I suppose I can just go out and buy yet another mic that is bi-directional OR I do have another laptop. Could just use both laptops running Audacity and hit record on both…wait a few seconds and then start the interview. Then hit stop and import the MP3 onto the other laptop. Should sync up with little effort. What yea think or is it too much of a hassle and just fork over some cash for a new mic? Thoughts? Thanks, guys!

CAD u37 (non bi-directional).

A little scrambled there. The U37 is cardioid. Receives best from the front (speak into the logo). It’s side-fire instead of end-fire, but the illustration is the pattern. Anybody speaking from the back is going to vanish.

The shift from a single voice to two has a lot of problems because natural computers don’t “do” two, and nobody does three.

You can investigate Voicemeeter as a way to record two different things (assuming you’re on Windows).

VoiceMeeter
http://vb-audio.pagesperso-orange.fr/Voicemeeter/


Flesh out the interview. Take me there. Are you chasing someone down the street? Coffee shop? Vising your home?

I personally would be double-recording it with the two computers—at least for this one. That’s awkward, but the least likely to run into computer processor sharing and other oddball problems. You may still have timing problems. No two computers run at exactly the same speed and you may discover when you combine the two sides from a long show, one interview is longer than the other (!!). That’s normal and fixable with Effect > Change Speed.

Do a rehearsal before the real thing. Pretend your drinking buddy is the guest and do a completely fake, sloppy interview, but with the real equipment. I did that with a friend of mine and a Skype interview and I turned up problems I thought I had fixed.

I predict [pressing fingers to forehead] the room is going to kill you. Echoes, reverb, room noises, and neighborhood noises are just poison to good recording quality, and most problems like that are permanent.


Never do production in MP3. Do everything in uncompressed, perfect WAV (Microsoft) quality and produce a final, mixed show like that. After you have a perfect show, then burn a lower quality MP3 for publication. The WAV version becomes your archive.

Koz

Thanks Koz! Yea, I was leaning towards the two laptops. I’ll do a test run like you suggested! Sorry about the U37 comment. I thought I was clear. Yes, it only records from the front as you mentioned, but I think I can buy a mic the is bi-directional. Records from front and rear.

I think I’m going to try this…

http://www.amazon.com/CM-1000-Conference-Meeting-Microphone-Omni-Directional/dp/B004E1VIPC/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1451180758&sr=8-3&keywords=omnidirectional+microphone

Ever use a conferencing microphone? First, you need to make sure to plug it into the Mic-In of a computer. It uses the computer five volts to run the electronics. It gets the echo cancellation and noise reduction by gating and filtering which can sound a lot like a bad face-on cellphone call if you have a very noisy, bare room. Do you?

http://kozco.com/tech/audacity/clips/EchoSample.mp3

This is all going to come back to the room. If you have a good, quiet, well-behaved room, you can use any microphone you want, but microphones with broad reception angles make a live room much worse. It’s possible that doesn’t bother you, but we get posters all the time complaining about that recording-in-the-bathroom sound.

Do you have a podcast or clip with the existing microphone posted somewhere?

Koz

I know I am a little late to the party here, but I would just invest in a little Alesis 4 channel USB mixer. You can do a lot with this mixer and it goes for around $79.00. It is cheaper then most entry level mics.

Alesis MultiMix 4 USB

Which one? Model numbers?

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MultiMix4FX

That’s going to put you into XLR microphone territory almost immediately. Probably why you weren’t all that excited about using a mixer right at the top.

Bottom-Feeding microphone systems is rough. You perform in an environment with degree of room difficulty having a direct bearing on which microphone, number of microphones, how you use them and how you get them into the computer.

Let us know how your conferencing microphone works out.

Koz

As far as I know, Alesis only makes one model of their 4 channel USB Mixer. Guitar Center is much cheaper then Sweetwater. $83.10. http://www.guitarcenter.com/Alesis/MultiMix-4-USB-FX-4-Channel-Mixer-with-Effects-USB-Audio-Interface-1401720419999.gc?country=us&currency=usd&source=4WWRWXGP&gclid=CL7gjOKT0MoCFcgXHwodXkMCtQ&kwid=productads-plaid^143951359962-sku^1401720419999@ADL4GC-adType^PLA-device^c-adid^57619015002

It goes into the PC via USB, which is the better option then going in through the mic jack. Yes it is XLR, but if you are going to get into podcasting, you need to pack your usb mics in the drawer. At this time, there is no mixer that allows a usb mic hookup. As far as a conference mic goes, they are great if you want to drop $700 - $1200 for a good one. As far as room treatment goes for using a conference mic, drop another $1200 and you may, but I highly doubt it, get the same results as you would with the 4 channel usb, two xlr mics like the AT 2100. It is a lot cheaper then another lap top.

It is a lot cheaper then another lap top.

Unless you already have the other laptop.

There’s something wrong with that link.

Koz

OK, I figured out the link problem. Don’t use the URL BB Code link in the word processor.

[moderator note: Used Google URL shortener to make short, valid link that works on the forum]

As far as buying another laptop, my bad. I misread the fact that the OP stated they owned two. I mistook the “or” for the “and” or something like that. :unamused:

There are at least four different small Alesis USB mixers. The first one is usually referred to as the Alesis MultiMix USB 1.1. It has 2 I/O. The second one is the MultiMix USB 2.0. I think it shares the interface design with the MultiMix 8 USB.

The one in your link is newer and I’ve never seen it up close.

The mixers are fine, but it’s a bit hard to know what exactly you’re buying since they all share the same name. There’s one model that is on the Audacity problem list, but I don’t know which one. I’m guessing it is the second one because that was the first capable of recording more than 2 channels.

Sorry about that, I will try to be more detailed as it can be very confusing. The Alesis Multimix 4 USB FX 4-Channel Mixer with Effects Plus USB Audio Interface works great with Audacity. I own three of them. I use one for my PC interface, one for remote recording and one for a spare. Thanks for the info about the Google Short Link. I have it book marked.

It’s not your fault, Dana.

It’s Alesis’ fault. Even Alesis support gets confused about their small mixers. And it’s strange, as their (older) range of interfaces (io2 to io26) do not have the name problem. :unamused: