Category: gear

Apple’s Mac announcement rumors

The last minute rumors floating about regarding today’s Apple announcement… brand new iMacs (including a price drop on the high end 24″)… new Mac Minis… a revamped iLife 08 and .Mac. All of these are great news for podcasters who are ready to upgrade their equipment. I’m not anti-Windows at all, but I’ve been using Macs at Nineball for the majority of my work. Depending on what gets announced today, there just might be some new gear on the way.

The announcements begin at 11 AM PDT… I’m not sure if there is any liveblogging of the event, but MacWorld is liveblogging the announcements… I’ll post the scoop as soon as I find out.

UPDATE: New iMacs… iLife 08… it’s a party. Details here.

KISS on technology

I present to you, your Friday ridiculousness. Cisco hired KISS to come and speak to their khaki clad crowd. Unfortunately, they also thought it would be prudent to get the band’s take on technology.

Memo to Cisco: Script… the… aging… rock… stars. I’m with Paul Stanley… we need mini projectors on handhelds.

Huh? Wha? Enjoy the weekend everyone…

Apple announces something non-iPhone related

Red alert! Looks like Apple is announcing long-awaited upgrades to some part of their hardware line. The rumor mill has been jamming the system with thoughts on new iMacs. If you believe Fake Steve Jobs (and who wouldn’t for fake Mac news?) then you know what’s coming. My venerable PowerBook has put in to go from full-time to part-time… 3 years and it wants a pension and a gold watch! Still, with the amount of audio and video it’s processed, it deserves to let some new beastie to come along and handle the processing load…

The future of high speed internet?

A Swedish woman has a pretty decent broadband connection. It’s so fast, she can reportedly download a full-length movie in less than 2 seconds. If this is for real, and broadband speeds keep ratcheting up (and are made available to the general public for a reasonable price), the variety of on-demand media will be staggering. On top of that, consider all current forms of communication… TV, radio, telephone, etc. … will pretty much get swamped by a data-driven replacement.

I’m still waiting for those flying cars though…

Shocking news: iPod + thunderstorm = bad

The New England Journal of Medicine published a report this week from three Vancouver, BC doctors concluding that being struck by lightning with an iPod on is extra bad because the current travels through the wires and into your ears. Read the medicial mumbojumbo here.

Here’s my thought… if you’re struck by lightning, the more immediate problem is that you’ve been struck by friggin’ lightning. I’m guessing the 3rd degree burns are going to happen no matter what, right? Word to the wise… if you’re the tallest thing in an area hit by a big thunderstorm, stop being the tallest thing in the area. USA Today has this tip… and I publish it here because it seems utterly implausible to help, and is therefore very funny:

If you begin to feel your hair stand on end, this indicates lightning is about to strike. You should drop to your knees and bend forward placing your hands on your knees and crouch down. Do not lie flat on the ground, this will only make you a larger target.

I’m wondering if Microsoft will take advantage of all of this and make the Zune out of totally nonconductive material. Hmm. Someone get Redmond on the phone!

Photo credit: gurneyh on Flickr

Mixer tip

For those of you with a slightly more advanced set-up (i.e. a mixer and a condenser mic, perhaps), sound checks are a must before you record. When I bought my first mixer, I was totally perplexed by the multiple buttons and knobs and what they did… I just played with them until the levels sounded right. It took me a while before I discovered how wrong that was… for you newbies, here’s a tip:

On most mixers, you have two knobs or sliders that control the levels on the channel… the gain, and the fader. In almost all circumstances, you should set the fader to zero or U (depending on the brand of mixer… it’s usually smack in the middle) and adjust the sound levels with the gain. Why? The fader at zero or U is optimized for that channel…in other words, your mic will sound a LOT better if you keep it there. Many new podcasters will treat the gain and the fader to serve the same function. In some ways they do, but if you value a better sounding signal, keep the fader firmly on zero, and use the gain for the leveling… you’ll notice the difference!

WiFi is now everywhere

A perfect story for a Friday…

Researchers in Massachusetts are now studying endangered snapping turtles by hooking them up with wifi… on their backs. Apparently, they collect data while they swim about and interract with each other. Once a turtle with the wifi backpack gets close enough to a data center (presumably on a beach), the whole set is amassed by tech savvy researchers who are probably sitting in a Hyanisport bar tossing back some coldies all in the name of science. Genius.

Off to NYC this afternoon… west coast people, check out the new contact info for Nineball Media Portland!

Making the microphone upgrade

You’ve started to podcast, and you were smart… you used the built-in microphone in your computer or you bought an inexpensive USB mic. You like it… it’s not a fad. Let’s make your show sound better with a microphone upgrade!

The best mics for recording your voice are condenser microphones. The sound is simply warmer and more professional. I could go all geeky and explain how and why these sound better, but quite frankly that’s some other guy’s blog…

A couple of suggestions:

The Samson C01U… this mic sounds great and it has the added advantage of plugging right into your computer directly with USB. It has great sound, and it’s relatively inexpensive for what you get… usually around $90.

The Samson is great if you only have one person. If you have a multi-person podcast where everyone is in the same room, it’s time to go to a multi-mic setup. The problem with the Samson for this is really a problem with USB… you can only have one sound input for the vast majority of computers, so even if you have multiple USB ports, the computer can only handle one mic at a time.

The solution? A mixer… this is a device that sits outside of your computer that takes in multiple audio devices (i.e. more than one mic!) and mixes it all together into one signal that goes into your computer. I use a Behringer mixer and Behringer condenser microphones for the bulk of my multi-mic setups. The microphones need what is called “phantom power” from the mixer to work properly, and my mixer has phantom power for two mics. That’s a good starting point for most podcasters, unless you have some zany morning zoo crew kind of show with 74 people in the room. Good luck to you on that… but I digress.

For beginners, I suggest a mixer that connects to the USB port of your computer. There are several good ones, but I like the Alesis best. That will run you about $100-150. Next, you’ll need some mics… I like the Behringer‘s I use (<$50), but there are some other good inexpensive ones by Samson as well (about $70). You’ll need to get some XLR cables for the mics… they connect to the mixer and power the mics… they’ll run $10-15 apiece (and you can get them from your local Radio Shack or online).

As Steve Jobs would say…. boom! You’ve got an upgraded mic setup for pretty cheap. You’ll be amazed how much better your show sounds with better mics!

WWDC keytnote a yawner?

Maybe Apple is getting too good at building excitement… the reviews on the Steve Jobs keynote yesterday are a bit mixed. I think there were a few interesting things (the iPhone info and the fact that Apple is releasing a version of its Safari web browser in Windows) but overall it was a little flat.

With that ringing endorsement… check it out here.