oivindi, the R-09's microphone inputs are unbalanced. Since professional microphones have balanced outputs, you either have to provide a way of balancing the inputs of the R-09 (e.g. an in-line input transformer for each channel) or a way of "unbalancing" the signals from the microphones.
Unfortunately there is no standard way to "unbalance" a signal; instead, there are four different methods, each of which is the right one to use for certain microphones. Any one type of adapter, plug or cable that you choose will be wrong for some microphones. And unfortunately, many people who are otherwise fairly knowledgeable about microphones and recording seem to be unaware of this situation, so they can and will give the wrong advice about it.
It's really simplest (by far!) when people use the general type of microphone that a recorder was designed for--unbalanced microphones for recorders with unbalanced microphone inputs, and balanced microphones for recorders with balanced microphone inputs. But if you have professional (i.e. balanced) microphones and you really want to feed their signals to a recorder with unbalanced inputs, often the best solution is to use a mike preamp that has balanced inputs--then feed the preamp's outputs to the recorder's line level inputs.
That approach tends to avoid problems with both noise (unbalanced microphone inputs tend to be noisy) and overload (unbalanced microphones tend not to be as sensitive as professional, balanced microphones, and especially with loud music the latter type of microphone can overload inputs that were designed for consumer-type microphones).
--best regards
Topic: Phantom power mics with Edirol R-09? (Read 5566 times)