Topic: AKG C426B

[vwmule]

I just got one of these and have been searching for info on how to use and gotten some tips from a few of you. But figured it would be a nice resource for this microphone to have its own thread on the site.

The remote control box implies that channel 1 is the bottom cap and channel 2 is the top. Is that correct? (see photo). Also, for XY, you set the bottom cap to 45 degrees and then the top to 45?

And what's the proper way to position ... is the AKG symbol on the bottom of body the "front," i.e. what I would face toward the center of my music source?

Please offer up any other tips, suggestions. Appreciate the help.

[tgakidis]

AKG symbol is the front, silver mesh with Green LED should be forward facing.

Miss mine 

https://archive.org/details/delf2009-04-16.c426b.flac
https://archive.org/details/dtb2009-02-06.c426b.flac
https://archive.org/details/ch2009-03-25.426.m-s.16-44.flac
https://archive.org/details/ab2009-01-21.c426b.flac

[DSatz]

For X/Y recording with cardioids, particularly given that your microphone has dual-diaphragm capsules (whose patterns broaden out significantly at low frequencies), you will almost certainly want the angle between capsules to be greater than 90 degrees. I suggest trying 110-120 degrees to start with, then adjusting from there.

[obaaron]

those samples sound killer! seems like the ideal mic for onstage recording

[cybergaloot]

http://www.akg.com/pro/p/c426-b-comb#downloads-link

[cybergaloot]

Looks to be a really nice mic Alex: http://recordinghacks.com/microphones/AKG-Acoustics/C-426-B

[picklemic]

WOW!!!!! Thats the mic the service guy @ AKG said I should get if I was looking for an upgrade to the 522. I think a significant upgrade at that  . BTW if you have any problems with it send it to AKG in Cali not AKG certified service Land Audio in TN. All ya'll AKG people should take note on that. Lesson learned here.

[vwmule]

Still getting used to this mic and appreciate the tips from several of you. Still a little confused about the channels. The AKG box infers that top mic cap is CH 2 and bottom is CH 1. So which is L and which is R?
Photo below shows the box (on bottom) connected to Tascam DR-70D.

Thanks.

[JimmieC]

Sweet mic.  To match 1, 2, L, and R, can't you just rotate the capsules to the highest degree, snap fingers in front of capsules, and look for the highest amplitude?  I would gues you got it right L = 1 and R = 2

[macdaddy]

Left and right is determined by the way the caps are oriented-the light is on the positive side of the capsule, and these will point left and right...

If you turn the bottom cap to 45  and then the top cap to 90, you will be running x/y with channel one left and channel two right ( the akg emblem will be pointed straight ahead...

If you want to run mid/side, turn the bottom cap to zero, and then spin the top cap all the way around so that the bottom cap (mid) is above the emblem and the top cap is off to 180 degrees with the light pointing to the left. That way channel one will be the mid and channel two will be the side...

You set the pattern for each cap using the box ...

Oh, here is a thread with a lot of information that I refer to all the time when I have a question. Funny, too, because my questions in that thread show that I was confused all about this stuff too...

Hope this helps...

Have fun.

[vwmule]

Thanks for the replies.

[vwmule]

AKG no longer makes the mic and I need a windscreen. Suggestions for replacement. Scanned B&H and can't find one that would be right.

[Gutbucket]

As macdaddy mentions, correct Left/Right channel routing just depends on which direction each capsule is pointing..  If you you were to hang the mic upside down that will of course flip left/right (which is how I often ran a somewhat similar Peluso P-stereo LD mic when using a high stand, mostly because the mount and cable routing just worked better that way for me) .

If you turn the bottom cap to 45  and then the top cap to 90, you will be running x/y with channel one left and channel two right ( the akg emblem will be pointed straight ahead...

If I'm reading you correctly, that produces an angle between caps of 135 degrees (45+90=135), which may be entirely appropriate for X/Y with cardioids, especially on-stage, outdoors or in a good room.  That may seem like an overly wide angle to some folks, but if using the cardioid pattern for X/Y, I'd typically be far more comfortable with 135 than 90 degrees.  Like the good DSatz mentions above, 110-120 degrees is a good general starting point if using cardioids.  I often tend to settle around 120 degrees using supercardioids, so I'd be probably gravitate to somewhat more angle than 120 degrees using cardioids.

For coincident ensemble mic'ing, I prefer using a more directional pattern than cardioid, partly for the wider-sounding playback image and the contribution of the reverse polarity lobes opening up and decorrelating the ambience a bit.  I'd suggest tring super/hyper-ish patterns at 110-120 degrees for X/Y up close or onstage.  Similarly, a supercard Mid will do about the same thing if recording M/S instead of X/Y.

[macdaddy]

Sort of... I am referring to the markings on the mic...

There are two sets...

For the bottom cap it is 0 if it is aligned with the emblem (for mid side) and it is 45 if it is off center (for x/y)

For the top cap, the markings are in relation to the bottom cap, not the emblem, so they read 90 to zero to 90.

To run x/y you have the top cap facing one 90, that will put the top to the right and the bottom to left...

To run mid side, you need to set the top cap to the other 90, so the positive face is pointing left.

Hope this makes it clearer...

Edit to add:

If you want to use different angles, then you have to do the math and play with the caps, and thus the emblem would not be in the center, which would also meant the set screw in the rear would not be in the center. Now if you use thick enough o rings for the mount, the set screw is redundant, and you can simply aim the mic however, positioning the midpoint wherever it might be...

[Gutbucket]

Gotcha.  Odd setup.  Seems a bit tricky to figure at first, but certainly manageable.  Too bad the bottom one doesn't rotate to about 70 degrees or so. 

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I'll just repeat that for the kind of recording we are doing, I almost always get better results with a angle wider than 90 degrees between capsules with X/Y.  If close mic'ing a guitar or some other instrument, then a baseline of 90 degree X/Y would be more appropriate.

For what we do, I'd only use an angle of 90 degrees between capsules if I was running Mid/Side (the only angle applicable for M/S) or if I was running X/Y using hypercardioid patterns verging on fig-8.   90 degree X/Y (or M/S) with fig-8's = Blumlein, and obviously that can work when appropriate for the situation, however it's rarely appropriate, and when it was I found I often prefered a bit less angle than 90 when using crossed 8's to help lock in a more solid center.  In most scenarios, hypers at 90 tend to work better than Blumlein IME, since the array then has a bit of forward-facing bias to it which can help greatly.  Blumlein with 90-degree crossed 8s has equal directional sensitivity in all horizontal directions, so it's fully horizontally omnidirectional and doesn't favor sound arriving from in front over that from the sides or back.