A new Earthworks product..

[Consul]

http://www.earthworksaudio.com/

They are now advertising a new kit for micing drum sets, involving either 1 cardioid and two omnis, or all three cardioids. Nothing new under the sun there, but part of this kit is something called the KickPad, which you just plug in between your board and the kick mic and BAM! Instant perfect kick sound.

I don't know about you, but I am skeptical of magical little black boxes.

Anyone want to take guesses as to what's in it? I say it's just a cap and/or inductor designed to peak around 80-100hz or so. There may be a pad as well.

I do bring this topic up so I can have an excuse for another question, though. Does anyone have any idea what capsule is used for these Earthworks mics? My understanding is that they are small electret elements that are selected for quality. I was thinking about building a set of electret mics like these for various uses.

Or maybe modding a Behringer ECM8000 would be a better path, considering their cost, and you get a body to boot.

Thanks all for letting me pick the collective brain again!

 

[Test Point]

I have an Earthworks SR68 (I wish I had another one for stereo recording) and that mic rocks! It is one of the cleanest mic's I've ever used. Absolutely amazing stuff. If their other stuff is of the same quality, you won't go wrong. This one definitely is a small capsule electret condensor but not sure whose it is. I haven't opened it either to find out. Maybe someday....
TP

 

[Marik]

As far as I know, Earthworks (at least early ones) used Panasonic capsules with Linkwitz mod. Hopefully, if Michael Jolly sees this thread, he could chime in with more details.

 

[Michael_Joly]

my ears were buzzing...

You're right Marik. I worked for dbx / Kintek / Earthworks founder David Blackmer from 1980-1994 and know a little bit of the history.

In 1992 or '93 David spent most of his time starting Earthworks and used to visit us in the engineering department at Kintek once a week. These were wonderful visits where David would expound about some detail of analog circuit design and use one of the four or five colored pens that always lived in his pocket to illustrate circuit ideas.

One day, he showed up with a bag of Panasonic capules. I'm guessing this would be around the time the Linkwitz mod was published in Journal of the AES. David was hot to try the mod and his own variations on it. I can assure readers here that the first small diaphragm mics David made where built from Panasonic capsules.

During his dbx years, David made many contacts at IC fabrication houses in Japan. It wouldn't surprise me that he eventually had some custom electret capsules with internal FETs made to his own specs. But I don't know for sure as Earthworks didn't became succesful until some time after I left David's employ.

Its funny to think of this scene now - David dumping bags of Panasonic capsules on my desk and then going on to pontificate about the phase and transient accuracy of small diaphragm capsules. I tried like hell to get him to design a large diaphragm mic because there really was nothing affordable in LDCs back in '92. But he was on a mission of accuracy, not color or size.

I would say it was having David as a mentor - a mentor with hearing finally tuned to phase and transient accuracy - that instilled in me a particular mode of listening that has driven my own experiments in microphone modifications.

best, MJ

 

[Michael_Joly]

Considering Earthworks foundation as a company dedicated to time domain performance, I'm pretty sure the KickPad is not as simple and time-sloppy as an RC filter.

David had many ideas about time domain modifiers - circuits that could alter the time distribution of signals as a function frequency. Move the "whump" frequencies in relationship to the "click" frequencies for example.

If I had to venture a guess without even reading about the KickPad on the website, I'd say it is a frequency dependent time modifier.

 

[rlaury]

Seems like I heard they impulse modeled an sm57 on a kick
drum and then derived an EQ network to replicate the sound.

So... ANY high dollar mic can sound just like an SM57.

RonL

http://www.nashaudio.com

 

[Consul]

Wow, thanks for all the information guys!

I think I'm going to try my hand at making my own electret microphones at some point here. Seeing the guts of the early ECM8000 mics has given me a few ideas.

I should apologize for my rather brash tone concerning the KickPad, but I am still leery of magic boxes when it comes to audio. I like to know exactly what a device is doing.

 

[pucho812]

I have been a fan of earthworks mics since I first used a now no longer available tc-40. I just got my free cd demo of the earthworks new Druim mic kit. All I can say is it's good. Earthworks mics, pres, speakers have always been good quality and no gimic. whatever Eq is exaclty going on with the kick pad sounds good. seems to me that it shouldn't be too hard to DIY. What I want to try to do is use the same mic config of 2 omnis and a cardiod but with all high end tube mics.

 

[Svart]

hmm i have a pair of the ECM8000 B*hringer mics.. haven't really used them yet. Marik mentioned a "linkwitz" mod. what is that? I have yet to open one of these things up. how much different are they from the earthworks circuitry? heck if panasonic made the capsules for both then they ought to be a heck of a starting point for modding..

 

[Carl_Huff]

Anybody ever see the circuit that they use in their mic preamps?? I had a chance to use one of their mic preamps once and was quite impressed.

 

[asm]

http://www.groupdiy.com/index.php?topic=4271

 

[Emperor-TK]

I jut got the Demo CD from Earthworks and think that these recordings sound pretty bad. I would definitely take the traditionally miced kit over the Earthworks kit. I was actually interested in these mics until I heard this CD. Granted, demo CD's often are mysteriously inept. The Royer demo underwhelmed me, but the R-122 is a pretty amazing mic in real life. The kick pad sounded pretty decent on the Earthworks CD though.

 

[Bauman]

Marik mentioned a "linkwitz" mod. what is that? I have yet to open one of these things up.

Also curious about it...

 

[danielle]

Meet Mr Linkwitzs' binaural glasses___ :shock:
http://www.linkwitzlab.com/images/photos/stereo-mic2.JPG
Check out the site. Linkwitz mod inside!
Regards,
Danielle

 

[Svart]

sweet, i'll be tearing apart these ecm8000s very shortly to see what's inside..

 

[Svart]

now since i haven't taken my ecm8000's apart yet, how would you incorporate phantom powering instead of 9v power?

EDIT: and I assume that the FET that they are referring to is inside the capsule??

 

[Bear]

Weird, my ECM-8000's are phantom powered.

My understanding: The Behringer mics use a pretty decent, pretty close clone of the Panasonic WM-61(?) electret capsule, and Earthworks has their capsules special made by Panasonic. The Linkwitz mod is basically a way to eliminate the internal FET so you can use better circuitry with the capsule. There is an extensive thread of Marik's mods to the Behringer mics over here: http://homerecording.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=111051&highlight=marik+ecm%2A

I'm gonna open mine up and look at doing them. For $40 a pop, the Behringer's are worth it just for the housing for a scratch build, though Marik tweaked it so you can use the stock board.

Bear

 

[Bauman]

The linkwitz mod:

http://www.linkwitzlab.com/images/graphics/microph1.gif

http://www.linkwitzlab.com/images/graphics/microph2.gif

:sam:

 

[Svart]

found a really interesting thread over at homerecording.com that Marik and a few others were engaged in. it covers modding the ecm8000 in various ways.

http://homerecording.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=111051&page=1&pp=25

found another interesting link:
http://www.mp3forkidz.com/mic/phantxy.html

this person started with only the capsule but the circuit looks a lot like the ecm800 circuit without the bc118 and associated parts.

:thumb:

 

[Svart]

in case anyone in the United States of JesusLand is looking for 2sk170 or 2sk389(matched 7 pin) you can get them from MCM, kind of pricey but they actually HAVE them.. I bought a bunch so you might want to hurry.. :green:

I started a layout of marik's circuit on a new pcb with these parts, I should be getting another guinea pig ecm8000 in the post today so I'll gut that and take measurements for the PCB.


digikey just HAS to be up north because 2 orders of parts are now stuck somwhere in illinois because of the snow. est date of delivery.. jan 3-6?!? i ordered these BEFORE christmas!! damn them..

:guinness: