MXL R144 Multi-Purpose Ribbon Microphone

don't get the warranty as it does not cover the ribbon element, I told the person who put the order in for me I wanted the warranty for that purpose and they sold it to me knowing this anyway acting as if it did cover it, so mabey don't trust information from sales

Well made, solid mic. Used with a UA Solo 610 pre-amp resulted in a very warm & "live" sounding vocal track. This is a keeper!

The sound is great, well above my expectations. Some people have mentioned that they didn't think it had enough gain but I had no problem at all with the gain when connected to a Crate Limo amp. It actually is louder with much lower feedback then my other microphones. The sound it reproduced was clean, balanced, crisp, clear and very natural sounding. Highly recommended!!

I was looking for a new mic to add a new flavor to my arsenal. I've had good experiences with MXL in the past, and I've wanted a ribbon mic for quite some time now to use on vocals and guitar cabs. I wasn't expecting Royer quality or anything when dropping $100 on the R144 -- but I was still disappointed. The R144 sounded incredibly muddy regardless what I was recording. I tried it on vocals, acoustic guitar, my fender deluxe -- I just couldn't get anything usable. At first I thought it was because of the figure 8 polar pattern, but even guarding the rear of the mic I couldn't get a remotely clean sound. Next, I thought my interface or my outboard pre's maybe weren't driving it hard enough, so I bought a Cloudlifter for some extra boost, but even with the cloudlifter the R144 just sounded terrible. Bottom line: if you're looking for a budget microphone, you'd be better off with one of MXL's other offerings, like the 990 condenser. If you're looking for a mic with some color -- save a couple more bucks and pick up a tube condenser.

This mic just exactly what I wanted it to do ? 1. For singing with a voice that is not windy and powerful - in a small room through a large PA system; 2. Recording the same type voice. Here?s some things you may want to think about. The instruction say to use a pop filter to keep breath moisture off the ribbon inside. If you blow on a ribbon mic, or drop it, you can damage the ribbon. My personal observation is that the mic doesn?t like effects and sounds its best 100% clean. It?s very sensitive. Once I reached its loudest setting without feedback, I set it in the middle of the room. 6 inches back it picked up voice & acoustic guitar well, even clearer (voice only) at 3 inches. I used it with a cheap Ballari MP 105 tube mic preamp. The highest settings I could obtain was only one or one and a half marks on the gain and level knobs. Low settings on the master and channel on the Carvin 800W PA system too. Guitar Center said these are very popular and they are real workhorses ? excellent quality for a 100 dollar mic! It?s like the SM58 of the ribbon mic world.

Never used a ribbon before but I wanted to try to capture the natural sound of a singer that came intot the studio and boy did this mic do it. I compared it to my other mics which are not ribbon mics and the sound sounds more natural with the ribbon. You best believe that when ever singers are coming into the studio the ribbon mic will be used.