Posted by Gary Rosenzweig on 6/3/09.
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The line-in input on your Mac isn’t meant for a microphone. Instead, you’ll need a USB audio interface. Learn about them and what type of microphone is used to make MacMost Now.
Video Transcript (Click to Expand)
Gary Rosenzweig: Hi this is Gary with MacMost Now. On today’s episode, let’s take a look at how to use a standard analog microphone with your Mac.
So, one of the differences between the Macs and the PCs is the audio inputs. Now on PCs you very often get both a line in input and a microphone in input. But on Macs, you only get a line in input. Now what’s the difference? Well a line in input expects a standard audio signal that usually comes from a powered source. A microphone in input will actually provide power to a microphone and a microphone without any sort of power, without a battery or without an independent power source can be plugged into one. It will then convert this audio into a digital format which then can be used by programs in the computer.
So if you don’t have a microphone in input and you try to plug your microphone into the line in jack on a Mac, usually you’re going to get extremely low volumes and very poor quality because there’s not enough power coming from the microphone to give a good audio signal. So the bottom line is you can’t use a microphone with a line in input on your Mac.
So how do you get around this? How do you use a microphone like this one, a standard analog Lavalier microphone with your Mac? Well you need an audio USB interface. Now one example is the iMic USB audio interface. This is similar to what I use; I just use an older version. It’s from Griffin Technology and it’s basically usually around 30 or 40 bucks. You can plug in a microphone into this device and it could be a standard analog microphone like this Lavalier microphone that I use for the show. And this will work for just about any program you use including things like Garage Band, Audacity; any recording medium that you want to use. And it will also work as a microphone if you’re doing web chats.
The microphone I use by the way is the Audio-Technica ATR-35S right here and it costs about $30 also and you can plug it right into this Griffin device and they work great as a pair.
Now of course you can go even higher end than that. Spending over $100 will usually get you a small mixing board capable of perhaps having even more than even one microphone input and maybe adjusting the volume and quality of that input as well.
Or you could actually just skip the two device method and go with a USB microphone. As far as I know there aren’t any Lavalier USB microphones, which is why I use this setup. But you can get standard desktop microphones or headsets that go directly into USB. Quality varies greatly and usually you get what you pay for so buying a cheap USB microphone usually gets you bad quality.
You can also of course try to find a powered microphone or an amplifier to take your microphone into the line in jack on your Mac. However in my experience, quality isn’t that great using a line in port and you probably want to use one of these audio interfaces anyway. They usually focus a lot on the quality of the audio signal whereas the line in input on your Mac is usually just basically a standard quality device.
Hope you found this useful. Til next time this is Gary Rosenzweig with MacMost Now.
Gary Rosenzweig: Hi this is Gary with MacMost Now. On today’s episode, let’s take a look at how to use a standard analog microphone with your Mac.
So, one of the differences between the Macs and the PCs is the audio inputs. Now on PCs you very often get both a line in input and a microphone in input. But on Macs, you only get a line in input. Now what’s the difference? Well a line in input expects a standard audio signal that usually comes from a powered source. A microphone in input will actually provide power to a microphone and a microphone without any sort of power, without a battery or without an independent power source can be plugged into one. It will then convert this audio into a digital format which then can be used by programs in the computer.
So if you don’t have a microphone in input and you try to plug your microphone into the line in jack on a Mac, usually you’re going to get extremely low volumes and very poor quality because there’s not enough power coming from the microphone to give a good audio signal. So the bottom line is you can’t use a microphone with a line in input on your Mac.
So how do you get around this? How do you use a microphone like this one, a standard analog Lavalier microphone with your Mac? Well you need an audio USB interface. Now one example is the iMic USB audio interface. This is similar to what I use; I just use an older version. It’s from Griffin Technology and it’s basically usually around 30 or 40 bucks. You can plug in a microphone into this device and it could be a standard analog microphone like this Lavalier microphone that I use for the show. And this will work for just about any program you use including things like Garage Band, Audacity; any recording medium that you want to use. And it will also work as a microphone if you’re doing web chats.
The microphone I use by the way is the Audio-Technica ATR-35S right here and it costs about $30 also and you can plug it right into this Griffin device and they work great as a pair.
Now of course you can go even higher end than that. Spending over $100 will usually get you a small mixing board capable of perhaps having even more than even one microphone input and maybe adjusting the volume and quality of that input as well.
Or you could actually just skip the two device method and go with a USB microphone. As far as I know there aren’t any Lavalier USB microphones, which is why I use this setup. But you can get standard desktop microphones or headsets that go directly into USB. Quality varies greatly and usually you get what you pay for so buying a cheap USB microphone usually gets you bad quality.
You can also of course try to find a powered microphone or an amplifier to take your microphone into the line in jack on your Mac. However in my experience, quality isn’t that great using a line in port and you probably want to use one of these audio interfaces anyway. They usually focus a lot on the quality of the audio signal whereas the line in input on your Mac is usually just basically a standard quality device.
Hope you found this useful. Til next time this is Gary Rosenzweig with MacMost Now.
Check out the equipment mentioned in this episode:
iMic USB Audio Interface from Griffin Technology
Audio Technica ATR35S Microphone
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Yes ive come accross this issue as well, what would be great is that if you could explain how to use the iphone (mine is a 3gs) as an USB webcam and/or microphone.
Around the internet they even say that this is possible without even connecting your iphone to your mac. I don’t really know however if you have any info on how to get a microphone+webcam OR just simply a microphone by using an iPhone 3gs that would be greatly appreciated.
Great show btw.
-s