Topic: Pre-amp for Sonic Studios DSM Mics

[systemerror]

Hi guys,

Does anyone have any experience with Sonic Studios DSM Mics?

I bought some from eBay recently and I was wondering if anyone had any reccomendations re a Pre-amp.

Sonic Studios say they can only really be powered by their own brand of preamp but is this strictly true?

Yes they can work off plug-in power but i wanna go line in on my Minidisc and JB3.

I would love to buy one of the Sonic Studios pre-amps but cannot aford it at present...

Any suggestions would be cool :-)

PS... I mainly tape natural ambiences/environments so low self noise is a must in any preamp.

Thanks,

Dean

[dklein]

Sonic Studios say they can only really be powered by their own brand of preamp but is this strictly true?

oh would I love to hear why.  Does he specially align the electrons as the flow thru the cable?  That's a load of crap.  The only place for things to be different is in the powering scheme.  If he says standard plugin power is fine then you can use any preamp with the SS battery box.  If you want to use a preamp that also provides plugin power, you might want to find out the limits on bias voltage.  I thought those mics were based on Panasonic capsules - any confirmation?

[Genghis Cougar Mellen Khan]

Sonic Studios say they can only really be powered by their own brand of preamp but is this strictly true?

oh would I love to hear why.  Does he specially align the electrons as the flow thru the cable?  That's a load of crap.  The only place for things to be different is in the powering scheme.  If he says standard plugin power is fine then you can use any preamp with the SS battery box.  If you want to use a preamp that also provides plugin power, you might want to find out the limits on bias voltage.  I thought those mics were based on Panasonic capsules - any confirmation?

They are based on the Panasonic capsules, the wm-61's I believe. The mics aren't modified (rev polarity) to the best of my knowledge IE: Core-Sound CSB. Leonard (SS) designs the mics to run on 1.5v, they sound great, but as for his SPL handling specs I'd say ignore those, I highly doubt they are accurate at all.

He has battery power supplies and his preamp, I'm not sure specifically which we're talking about. The pre looks nifty, but at $1k, hell no. You could get dpa406x with one of their mma units for damn near the same as SS mics and th SS pre.

[systemerror]

Hey thanks for the info guys :-)

And Brian... Sorry I accidently posted in the wrong forum! Glad you could see where I went wrong.

So I guess I just need some advice regarding recommended pre-amps for my ststem... Sonic Studois DSM6-JB3 optical in and poss with a phantom supply for when I'm using my shotgun... mic that is.. That reminds me of a funny story...

I work in  a recording studio mainly doing post production for TV... I supervise our sound effects library as part of my job. One morning last week one of the other engineers told me excitedly " Hey  a huge Cicada flew into my lounge last night.... so I pulled out the shotgun and got him"

I thought wow that's kind of an over-reaction to a little Cicada... imagining John blasting this insect with a 12 guage, but... then I realised he meant he got a nice clean recording of a single Cicada!

It's often hard to isolate a single insect as there are normally hundreds of the things chirping away when we are recording in the field so he was pleased at getting the chance of a single insect in a quiet(ish) location.

Anyway it made me laugh.. but ooops I digress!

So any recommended pre's for my system?

Thanks,

Dean

[heath]

what studio are you at?  I have always wanted to work with effects/sound design, but I'm stuck here doing transfers and remasters 

[dklein]

So any recommended pre's for my system?

do you have a battery box to provide bias?  If not, then you'll need one or you'll have to use a pre that provides it, which really limits your options.
What's your budget?

[systemerror]

Hey again,

Thanks for replies :-)

Ok...

I work for a studio in Auckland New zealand. liquidstudios.co.nz

Second point....

I don't have a budget at present and no I don't have a batt box either.

I have been using a DA-P1 and Sennheiser 416 shotgun but now wanna get these DSM's up and running with the JB3.

Thanks,

Dean

[neutrino]

Dean-

I have owned a pair of DSM's and from my experience you either need to use a Sonic Studio battery box (PA-6XX) -or- you would have to be using a modified plug-in  power connection as found in most Sony DAT portables. These plug-in power connections only put out a minimal voltage which needs to be increased by internal modification in order to run the DSM's to there full potential.
dB-

http://www.sonicstudios.com/pa_x.htm

[poorlyconditioned]

Dean-

I have owned a pair of DSM's and from my experience you either need to use a Sonic Studio battery box (PA-6XX) -or- you would have to be using a modified plug-in  power connection as found in most Sony DAT portables. These plug-in power connections only put out a minimal voltage which needs to be increased by internal modification in order to run the DSM's to there full potential.
dB-

http://www.sonicstudios.com/pa_x.htm

Wow!  I've never seen such a messy or confusing website.  Well, Coresound is second place I guess!

  Richard

[neutrino]

One other thought - if I was running DSM's to a JB3 and wanted to skip the battery box module but still needed to power the mics AND amplify the signal before it hits the JB3 I would look into a used Sony SBM-1. The SBM-1 could easily be modified to feed your JB3 an optical signal and supply the proper voltage to the DSM's.
dB-