Topic: Comp - KM184>V2 vs. MK22>Riotbox

[Thelonious]

Had a chance to run both of the above in a very similar footprint last night. It's not a perfect comp of any one component because I used the V2 for the KM184s and Riotbox (phantom only)>SD MixPre6ii for the MK22s. I also set up the KM184s DIN and MK22s modified NOS, as that's how I typically like to run each set. That said, they were set up very close to each other (see pic on the kickdown page for context).

I thought it was pretty interesting how different they sounded. There seems to be some compression with the MK22s in this case, relative to the KM184s, which affects the perceived volume among other things. The stereo image is quite different as well which I largely attribute to the different mic configurations.

Anyhow, posting as I rarely have two separate recordings of the same show and thought others may find the contrast interesting.

https://taperssection.com/index.php?topic=209033.msg2437130#msg2437130

[beroti_music]

Thanks! Both sound great! I prefer the mk22 sound.
Sounds more full and rich to my ears.

[Billy Mumphrey]

Thanks for the comp. I really enjoy the mk22 source, both are pleasant recordings. I think the type of capsule (open-cardioid) plays a huge factor. I also think stagelip recordings of (mostly) unamplified musicians that pay attention to dynamics (!) can make for some super fun recordings.

[Thelonious]

Hey, thanks to you both. The mk22 recording is the one I sent
to the band. I think it came down to soundstage where the open pattern, and the NOS, sounded a bit more blended.

I think the 184s may have had a more accurate soundstage but, as the layout on stage was unbalanced, I agree that the mk22 presentation works better in this case.

Stage lip, largely acoustic, shows with big dynamics are really satisfying to record. Thank god for 32bit recorders…

[unclehoolio]

mk22 for me, this time around.

[fanofjam]

.... Thank god for 32bit recorders…

Agreed.  My Zoom F3 is a game changer for my needs.  Just this weekend I recorded the second stage of a 3-day festival...connected my F3 to a talent cell battery via the USB port, hit record/hold then never had to look at it again until the next morning setting it up again.  Also, like you, I use the F3 for stage lip recordings.  Sometimes I'll hit record an hour before the music starts just so I don't have to worry about elbowing my way through the rail crowd five minutes before the band goes on.  Absolutely LOVE 32-bit recorders.

[Gutbucket]

Good stuff here. Great band, room, recording position, setups and recordings. I'd be pleased with either. The km184 excels in transient detail and clarity, especially nice on the drum kit and sax, the mk22's in openess and midrange warmth. Not having been there I cant say which is more accurate in terms of image, but the mk22's in NOS works best for me subjectively - I'm left thinking of the band as a whole rather than the exact position of the piano for instance.. I think the more open pattern generally makes for a more a more well-balanced and forgiving sound and image.

More directional patterns sort of "zoom in" on and emphasize the sound in front, and I think that along with the slight differences in response is responsible for the apparent differences in level and dynamics.  Subjectively omnis would sound even softer, less dynamic, and somewhat farther away.

[Gutbucket]

I dont agree that 32bit necessarily changes anything for concert recording though. It just forces one to operate in the way you could also be doing  with a quality 24 bit recorder. 

I let Zoom F8 run in 24bit the same way. Set and forget, let it run all day at a fest / no worries on stage.  Just need to determine at which gain the loudest stuff I'm ever going to record clips, and then resist the urge to increase gain for quieter stuff. It's then a set and forget deal the same as a 32bit recorder, with the noise floor determined by the mics or the room, not the recorder or the file format.

Granted, it's sometimes very difficult to resist the urge to "gain up" when quieter acts peak low, but if you can force yourself to do that you get the same the benefits of 32bit in a quality 24bit machine.. for live concert recording at least.  Long running habits can be tough to ditch.

[beroti_music]

I never increase gain during a show.
I just set my roland r-05 to 40 (out of 80) and forget about it.
This has worked every 450+ shows I've taped so far.

[fanofjam]

I dont agree that 32bit necessarily changes anything for concert recording though. It just forces one to operate in the way you could also be doing with a quality 24 bit recorder. 

Well, the true set-it-and-forget-it rig means you have 100 percent confidence that, NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS when you aren't there to monitor your gear.

Of course, I concur that, if you know your gear and the venue well enough 32bit format can be moot.  That's how I've been doing it for 15 years or however long we've had 24-bit technology.  But 24-bit level setting is not foolproof (case in point is my recent experience described below).  Now and then shit happens and nobody likes losing a recording when the shit hits the fan.

This past October, I used my new Deity PR-2 for the first time.  I set it and forget it at one of the Hulaween stages, but used the PR2 instead of the F3 because I didn't have a Talent Cell to dedicate to the F3 for that entire weekend and didn't want to worry about changing AAs in the F3 half-way through the day.  The PR-2 is supposed to get over 20-hours, but that weekend, I discovered that it ran for around 16 on two AAs...still good enough for a full day of festival recording. 

Anyway, I set the gain on the PR-2 nice-and-low so levels were peaking around -15db or so for the first band of the day and let her run.  Came back many hours later after the last act and was pleased that everything was still running fine.  Got home after the festival and found that 2 (or maybe three) out of the i think six acts from that stage on that day were LOUD...the FOB dudes for those bands obviously ran the volume up.  Recordings were distorted and ruined.  Obviously, if I'd been in 32bit, those would have been saved.  Happily, even though I ran the same set-up the other days of the fest at the same stage, the bands weren't as loud as those two, but I was still pissed that I didn't use my F3 on AAs instead of the PR2.  (The Dirigible Planets and Anderson Paak's hip hop act were the two I missed...grrrr)

32-bit TRUE set-it-and forget it is also perfect for the way I stealth record.  I rig myself up in the car and hit record/hold while I'm in the car.  Just before I stash my F3, I put a piece of tape over that goddam red light that you can't cut off via the menu.  That's the last time I have to think about my gear until 5 hours later when I get back to my car after the show is over.  As long as the recorder is still rolling, I'm 100% sure my recordings are fine.  In 24-bit, I don't have the same confidence level setting my levels in the car beforehand.

[Gutbucket]

Sorry didn''t mean to take this OT.

Easy for me with F8.  I just turn the input gain all the way down to minimum (+10dB) and engage the advanced limiter that inserts a -10dB pad.  Done.  Of course that was determined via a few test runs, and only applies to the particular mics I'm using, but those are the mics I use all the time with it.  Yes, need to figure it out first.. but only once.. then just do the same thing every time.

Careful with that Deity PR-2.  It has rather low input stage headroom.. and a higher noise floor. 32bit mode does not prevent overload with PR-2, it depends on the sensitivity of the mics used.   I found out the hard way that DPA 4060 (20 mV/Pa) causes over-load on high SPL sources regardless if set to 24 or 32bit recording mode.  Works fine after switching to 4061 (6 mV/Pa).

In the end, proper gain staging always remains necessary, even in cases where the manufacturer is taking that control out of your hands and "doing it for you".

[DSatz]

That's what I've been trying to say for a couple of years here, and have been roundly ignored and treated as a party pooper. A 32-bit recording system can't help you if your input stage is overloaded, or (conversely) if the gain of your input stage is set so low that the noise floor of that stage is high relative to the signals coming in. If the signals coming from your mikes exceed the headroom limit of the first circuit stage, you'll get a glorious, 32-bit float recording of a clipped signal. If the gain of the first stage is set so low that you have, whatever, say 20+ dB headroom that you're not using, then that's 20+ dB of dynamic range that you're discarding in order to preserve that headroom--and you'll get a glorious, 32-bit float recording of the noisy signal coming out of your first stage and going into your glorious, 32-bit A/D converters.

A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. 32-bit recording strengthens ONLY what was already the strongest link in the recording "chain", the (formerly) 24-bit recording channels themselves. There's no high-tech substitute for a sensible gain structure. Your first-stage gain should be whatever it takes to utilize that stage as close to optimally as you can. If you can't tell in advance what your input signal levels are going to be, then sure, you have to leave headroom enough for the hottest they can get. But a 32-bit recorder won't and can't keep you from paying the potential noise penalty inherent in that situation: If the actual signal peaks never come anywhere near the worst-case limit that you chose, then the recording will be noisy.

If you find a recorder that offers mike inputs that have 32-bit-float dynamic range in and of themselves, that would be another story--but it can't happen in this universe, so that recorder is likely to be quite expensive, counting the ticket to another universe that its price would need to include.

[goodcooker]

^ What did you think of the microphone comparison?

[DSatz]

if you mean me, I don't mean to be rude but I never make or listen to such things. I might have a preference one way or the other, but what if anything would that really indicate under the circumstances? Hard to tell.

Both microphone types are of very high quality and I have a considerable history with both types (well, I used KM 84s decades ago for several years, and the KM 184 is a somewhat brighter variant of that, though unnecessarily in my view). I can't imagine any real-world recording situation in which I would consider them equally viable alternatives to each other. MK 22s are for when the sound of the space is distinctly pleasant, and you don't want to add any harshness or false brightness, but you need some directivity for the sake of a good stereo image, more than what MK 21s would give you. I almost never use front-facing cardioids for music recording (too much false off-axis brightness); I prefer side-facing cardioids if that pattern is called for, though for use as main mikes (not spot or soloist mikes) I more often prefer patterns that are a step to one side or the other of cardioid. In the early 1980s I went for a number of years without using any cardioid microphones for live music recording whatsoever; it was hardly a loss.

So depending on the sound in the hall and what impression the recording was intending to convey, I might either use one or the other of those two types, or something else, but I truly can't imagine an acoustic space in which any similar placement of the two types would be optimal for its given type. And once you start placing microphones differently within the space AND the microphones have different pickup patterns and frequency response characteristics (or conversely, if you put the mikes all in the same place for the sake of the comparison, thus guaranteeing that at least one pair isn't in as good a place as it could be), I'm not clear on what a comparison would really offer, if anything.

[Gutbucket]

My bolding and snip edits below >

[snip..] A 32-bit recording system can't help you if your input stage is overloaded, or (conversely) if the gain of your input stage is set so low that the noise floor of that stage is high relative to the signals coming in. If the signals coming from your mikes exceed the headroom limit of the first circuit stage, you'll get a glorious, 32-bit float recording of a clipped signal. If the gain of the first stage is set so low that you have, whatever, say 20+ dB headroom that you're not using, then that's 20+ dB of dynamic range that you're discarding in order to preserve that headroom--and you'll get a glorious, 32-bit float recording of the noisy signal coming out of your first stage and going into your glorious, 32-bit A/D converters.[..snip]

That's all true of course.  Regarding the bolded part, the thing is that the acoustic noise floor of the venues in which most folks here at Taperssection are recording is almost always quite high.. significantly higher than the electrical noise floor of the entire signal chain, even in what are perceived to be the most quiet moments.  Yes, running input gain low enough such that the loudest peaks overload something else in the signal chain first other than the ADC (the mics themselves, or in my case the input stage of the F8 when its gain has been set to minimum and the limiter has not yet been engaged) is going to increase the electrical noise floor of the recording system. But if that electrical noise floor is buried well beneath the acoustic noise floor it just won't matter.

When run that way a 24bit fixed-point recording is the same as a 32bit floating-point recording in the practical sense - everything fits with extra dynamic range left at both the top and bottom of the available range.. except the resulting 24bit fixed-point wav files are smaller and more universally usable. Either way one needs to normalize the recording.. which s the significant behavioral change forced onto folks when switching to 32bit recording, as I see it.

I'd guess the maximum possible dynamic range in the situations in which most "tapers" are recording likely does not exceed 60dB or so, maybe 70 at most- determined by the acoustic noise-floor of the venue at the bottom and the highest peak at the top.  Its not difficult to set input gain to easily accommodate that, then simply not revisit it it again.. at least not until switching to microphones with significantly different sensitivity or low frequency response.  The significant break is not the new file format, but in no longer "operating the recorder the old way".

The "old way" was manually setting input gain so that there is just enough headroom up top to avoid overs.  That makes/made sense when:

• Avoiding the need to normalize the level of the resulting recording.
• Recording analog to tape.
• The dynamic range through the signal chain of of some small and inexpensive digital recorders digital recorders was not really large enough, nowhere near the total range available to 24bits.
• For some folks wrangling "the sound" of certain preamps by "running hot".

Now things have evolved to the point where even cheap recorders seem to achieve sufficient dynamic range to allow setting input gain once and then leaving it alone (for what most are recording here at TS).  After that, the results end up the same as recording to 32bit.  32bit removes the ability to set gain, but you still need to check it the first time to insure the recorder is not being overloaded! My initial experience with the Diety PR-2 is a cautionary example.