iriver iHP120 for wedding vows over minidisk
 

I just bought this thing. It costs just a bit less than my wireless but a chunk more than minidisk. The advantage for me is that I can record a high quality wav file with this on the groom or officient or podium and when I get home just plug in the USB cable and cut and paste the wav file instead of waiting for realtime capture with the minidisk. I don't have to fiddle with disks and it has a hold switch like the minidisk to avoid unwanted shutoff. It should work well. Testing a couple of lavs I have lying around since the one that it comes with is a bit of a toy but I'm still looking for a good one that has a miniplug. They are a bit harder to find. I tried the $20 azden that B&H sells but it gets a bit gristly on loud folks despite recording level. The $20 radio shack I use for minidisk is fine but I don't want to fiddle with changing the battery on that one since the iriver provides 2.5v of power for the mic. Any ideas on a fair miniplug lav?

AT...the little ATR 35s. Cheap, terminates in either 1/8 inch or 1/4 connector via adaptor.
http://www.audiotechnica.com/guide/line/atr/ATR35s.html

About 40.00 or so.

The iRiver seems/sounds like a very cool little tool. I've used MD for backup audio on many an occasion, but it's not a dig transfer and takes time. I'm not worried about quality loss over a 6" cable, but do worry about time. iRiver would be much faster, no doubt.

Yeah, I almost messed myself the first time I just pluged it in and draged a wav file over.

Thanks for the lav suggestion. I was hoping to get away from needing a battery though. I sometimes forget to flip the switch off or the switch gets flipped on accidentally and sits for a week.

So... I just picked up an AT MT830 modified to work with the plug in power on the iHP120. That might work.

What was the modification? Are you using the AT
battery box? Specs say that mic needs 9-52V phantom.

Well, I wondered about that too a little bit. You are probably right Dave as the math looks wrong. I don't think the site I bought it from is a sponser so I don't want to commit a faux pax by mentioning where I've ordered it from but... they are pretty reputable and their initials are SP. So they sell their modified version of some AT mics and "the guy" says this will work. He probably doesn't know what the heck he is talking about and I didn't know much either so that combo will probably fail. If it doesnt work out I'm sure they will replace it with somthing that does. They seem to be a good place. Their model # was MT830-SP and on their page for this model it says it will work with units that provide plug in power, though they don't say how much. Now on a another similarly prepared AT their model AT803-SP their page says that one will work with units that have plug in power from 1.5 to 10 volts and the specs for that mic's phantom power requirements shown on the real AT site (for the AT803) show the same 9-52v that the MT830 shows. Also the AT803 shows that the it's power modual uses a 1.5v battery. So perhaps, and this is a big stretch, but going with info on the AT site, if the 1.5v battery provides the power for a mic that says it needs 9-52v of phantom power, perhaps the rewire alows the 2.5v to provide sufficient juice. Probably not but I don't mind trying it out. Perhaps it will work on some level then fail over time because of it being underpowered. We'll see. I'll get a mic solution figured out eventually, but I know I like this iriver thing.

Yeah,
I've seen that other site, too. Some things didn't seem
real clear on that site. Let us know if it works.
But basically as you understand it, the re-wire is
suppose to enable a mic that needs 9+ volts to
work on 2.5V? If I understand you correctly,
there is not a battery in the mic's line.

Right no battery. We'll see next week. There are some mics I can use with no battery that don't need as much juice so I'll experiment.

The AT doesn't use a battery, not sure where that came from?

Well it probably came from my crazy maze of trying to justify the "possibility" that this modified MT830

http://www.soundprofessionals.com/cg...-SP&type=store

may work with the 2.5v mic input on my iriver as I was told by the sales guy.

I was thinking maybe since the AT803b shown on this page

http://www.audiotechnica.com/prodpro/profiles/AT803b.html

indicates it can use a 1.5v battery or phantom power of 9-52v, that their modified MT830

http://www.audiotechnica.com/prodpro/profiles/MT830R.html

might work as they are telling me with my iriver mic input.

Don't pay much attention to what I'm trying to theorize about cause it doesn't make much sense. I'll just wait and see. Live and learn. I learn a little bit every day. And the more "little bits" of knowledge I get, the more dangerous I become.

the MT830 lav I bought works well
 

The modified MT830 works fine with the iriver powered mic input.

And now I have documentation on why. The page posted below is the the wiring diagram from AT for the MT830 or 803 etc. when wired for use with wireless as opposed to when used with their power module. The * next to positive voltage refers to the botom of the page which indicates for DC current 1.1 to 12v is correct. Perhaps it's because of the difference in the 9-52v that is probably AC current phantom power vs DC current battery or "plug in" power?

http://www.audiotechnica.com/prodpro/addinfo/WiringInfo.pdf

Compared to the oft used $20 Azden the 830 is slightly hotter, slightly more open and maybe a bit stronger bass response but not so different that I'd push anyone to spend the extra cash for it.

NOTE: this mic does not seem to work very well with my Sony MZ-707 minidisk. I don't know if the minidisk doesn't put out as much power from the mic input or what but for whatever reason the signal seems to clip easily. It's very hot and even setting the manual recording level very low on the minidisk there is still what sounds like clipping with this mic.

Douglas Spotted Eagle,

That ATR 35 looks like a handy mic. Just want to make sure -- plug in power from a minidisc or camera wouldn't cause any problems with it would it?

Marco, when using my sony MZ-N707 minidisk I use a very similar mic to the ATR35 which uses the same battery as the ATR. It works well. The Sony has a bit of plug in power and I've never had a problem.