Topic: Would a dying battery on a pre cause distortion?

[Ballistica]

I taped the Crowes and had everything setup correctly and all looked good for the entire show (except the level leghts on the MT24/95 seemed to be blinking on and off - the lights under the meter setting buttons (opposite of the clip lights).  When I got home the first 13 or so minutes of the show were pristine but then deteriorated rapidly - increasing levels of distortion until the whole recording is basically distorted even though the levels were not high at all).  I was going line-in through a sp-preamp-11.  Here is a screen cap of the first WAV, starts good then goes all to hell.  The subsequent WAVs are all worthless, too.  What would cause the increasing distortion, could it be the battery oin the pre was dying?  I know my MT line-ins have an issue with one channel, but I could deal with that in post, but need to know if the unit is bad or was just a battery issue.  The left channel is less than the right for some strange reason when going line-in ( knew about that) but look at the right channel...the other WAVs are basically flat like the last 1/5th of the image below...but totally distorted.

<edit> dpa4061>pre>mt

[Javier Cinakowski]

a dying battery can cause distortion

[Ballistica]

a dying battery can cause distortion

Thanks for the quick reply.  Bummer...lost 90% of a great show.  I hate having to learn all these lessons the hard way. 

[jeromejello]

i have had the same thing happen when my batteries dropped voltage on my sd mp2.  i now use a 9v lithium instead of the internal aa's for stealthing.

[JoeKiller]

When my battery starts dieing, my wave patterns get more clicky, as in, the preamp keeps trying to get that power up but it just clicks on and off instead and it happens to both channels.

Your wave almost looks like a microphone got wet instead.  YMMV.

[Ballistica]

When my battery starts dieing, my wave patterns get more clicky, as in, the preamp keeps trying to get that power up but it just clicks on and off instead and it happens to both channels.

Your wave almost looks like a microphone got wet instead.  YMMV.

Intreresting that you say it gets clicky because what I started to notice during the show was that the lights on the MT below the level buttons started to flash for both channels...maybe that is the on and off that you are describing.  I don't think they got wet (we were indoors but maybe someone threw beer on the mics but I don't think so).

[JoeKiller]

Here is a compairision of what I see between "clicky" and wet mic for my recordings.

Clicky, where the battery is dieing and my Mini-Me can't power:




and below is when my mic got wet (top is the good mic, bottom is the wet:

[Ballistica]

Here is a compairision of what I see between "clicky" and wet mic for my recordings.

Clicky, where the battery is dieing and my Mini-Me can't power:




and below is when my mic got wet (top is the good mic, bottom is the wet:

Very interesting, thx for the pics.  I'm getting a new battery tomorrow and will do a few tests.  I certainly think my 1/4s on the MT are broken (well, at least the left channel) so I'll go with the R09 for my next show.  Testing should see if my pre is broken.  I don't think the mics got wet, but who knows some jerk might have thrown beer up on them (they were at about 8-10 feet).