About this phantom, or external power, for the mics. That means what, exactly - external to the recorder, i.e. the microphone has its own battery? Or external to the microphone, i.e. you have the mic plugged into the recorder and a separate battery unit plugged into the mic?
phantom means that you run your mics and they are powered from anything but the mic
my chain would look like this
akg 480's(mics) >> v3 (phantom ON)(preamp/ad) >> jb3(recorder)
or a batt bow would werk
that would look like this if my preamp/ad didnt have phatom power on it
480's >> batt box >> v3 >> jb3
Phantom power is external to the microphones, provided by a source outside the microphones themselves. Usually, the preamp provides phantom power. But there are also devices that provide just phantom power and do not act as a preamp (Denecke PS-2, for example). Phantom power is usually 48v and follows a specific standard for how the power is routed through XLR connectors.
To further complicate things, there are also battery boxes - like those used with the Sound Professionals, Audio Technica, or other types of mini-microphones - which are external to the microphone and provide power to the mics, but do not provide *phantom* power. For our type of recording, the recorders do not provide power to the microphones.
So, there are a bunch of potential setups depending on the microphones and other gear you have:
Mics (with internal power) > recorder
Mics > battery box (external power, but not *phantom* power) > recorder
Mics > phantom power box > recorder
Mics > preamp (with phantom power) > recorder
Mics > preamp / ADC (with phantom power) > recorder