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Welcome to Help Me podcast, a show designed to help

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you launch and grow your podcast. I am your host, Gino. And twice

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a week, I will release a new episode with different tips and

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trick for launching and growing your podcast. From audio engineering

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to planning intentionally to growth tactics, each episode will be a bite

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sized tip to help you podcast.

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Welcome back to Help Me podcast. This is episode

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73. And today, I wanna talk about a new piece of gear that just came

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out last week from Shure. Shore is

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the microphone company. They also make, you know, a bunch of other

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audio related equipment. But they're best known in the

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podcasting space anyways for the Shure SM seven

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b. And if you've ever watched a podcast on

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YouTube or, you know, seen a video podcast somewhere. You're probably

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familiar with what the Shure SM seven b looks like. It's the

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industry standard or one of the industry standard podcast

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microphones and broadcast microphones. And it's actually the microphone that

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I'm using right here today to record this podcast.

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So Shure, who makes that microphone, came out with a new microphone last

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week called the Shure s m seven d

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b, and, we're gonna go into, you know, what

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the differences are and that sort of thing. But, really, what Shure did

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is they kinda fixed an issue that the Shure SM

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seven b has had for years and kinda made everything

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built in and in house. And I think it's really cool idea. And when I

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first saw it last week, I saw, like, some article on my phone, and I

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was like, oh, about, you know, about time they did that. So,

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you know, something that kinda really makes sense and, exciting new piece

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of gear for, for all of us podcasters.

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So in order to talk about the s m seven d b, I wanna talk

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about the s m seven b a little bit. And if you've ever used,

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Shure SM seven d before, where, you you might be aware

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of this problem. Actually, in episode 37

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of this podcast, we talked about, the issue of the s

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m seven b and how to fix it. So in case you didn't listen to

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that episode, I'll go into a little bit of that issue. And, basically, when

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you use the Shure SM seven b, it's a very gain

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heavy microphone. It needs a lot of gain in order to be used.

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And gain you know, another word could be power. Right? It

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needs a lot of power in order to be used. So if you were

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to just take the s m seven b and plug it directly into your

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audio interface. You know, a a popular interface out there is a a

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Focusrite or a Presonus or, you know, any of those kinda

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like average, middle of the road type of interfaces. What ends up

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happening is because the Shure SM seven b is so gain heavy,

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it's actually, like, super quiet when you record. So, there's

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a preamp on your audio interface, which is what provides the gain.

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And on any audio interface, you'll see a knob that either says gain or maybe

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it says volume or something like that where you can adjust it and turn

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it up, then you can turn it down. But the issue with the s

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m seven b is when you turn it pretty much all the way up, it's

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still kinda really quiet. And it's just one of those things that's, like,

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really frustrating. Because when you turn that gain all the way

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up on your interface, now you're introducing noise because they're

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not very expensive preamps and, you know, there's noise

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that's generated from the cheaper electronics. And it kinda just, like,

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sends you down the spiral of, like, oh, it's not loud enough or maybe it

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is loud enough if I talk really loud into it, and then there's also this

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noise now that's in the background. So It's a really frustrating

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problem because you just spent, you know, $400 on this

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really nice microphone, and now you can't even really use it very well.

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And it's a it's a very frustrating issue. And I remember the 1st time it

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happened to me. And actually, what I did to to solve the problem is

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actually called Sweetwater where I bought the microphones from, and they have

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really excellent customer service. And I remember I was

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driving, talking to, like, one of their sales reps and being like, hey. I got

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this problem. I got you know, I don't know what's happening. And immediately, he was

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like, yep. You need an inline gain booster because that shore is

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super gain hungry, and it needs a lot of gain. So

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what he explained to me there was, basically, you just need

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a source for Morgane. Right? And this could be

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any sort of external preamp. The Cloudlifter is

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one that's sold in conjunction with the SM seven a lot

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of times. And the Cloudlifter is just a little blue box, and

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you plug your microphone cable Intuit, and then you get

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another microphone cable and plug it, the Cloudlifter, into your

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interface. And then what that does is it just provides additional amount of

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gain. And when you use that and and you have that

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sort of setup, you got the microphone, you got the Cloudlifter, and then you have

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your interface, then you have no issue. You got plenty of volume, and

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you can go ahead and record just like with any normal microphone.

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The game booster that I'm using is the SE Electronic d

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m one dynamite stick, which I like a little bit better because it's

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a lot smaller. It's literally like I don't know. It's like a little

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cigar almost. It's like the same diameter as an XLR cable, and

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it's maybe, like, 3 inches long. And you can kinda, like, plug

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it into the back of the microphone or you can plug it into the front

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of your interface. You don't need an extra microphone cable, which is a plus

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to me. They're cheaper than the Cloudlifter. And I also

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believe you get a little bit more gain. So, I've had nothing but good things

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to say about the d m one dynamite stick. But, you know, it's another,

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like I think they're I I think I paid a 100 for them, and I

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think maybe they're, like, 90 now or something. But, you know, it's another $100 that

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you gotta spend in order to use the microphone that you just spent, you know,

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$400 on. So all that to say, like, it's

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it was a frustrating process to buy the s m seven b and then have

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to go through all this problem solving to, like, get this new piece of equipment.

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And then even if you knew that going into it, you you know, you gotta

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save up for the microphone, and then you gotta save up for the inline

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gain booster or or whatever gain boost you're using in order to use the

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microphone. So it's like you gotta buy 2 things in order to just use the

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1 microphone. But sure, last week released

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the SM seven dB, which has this

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inline gain booster that we're talking about built into the microphone.

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So now you have 1 microphone, 1 unit, and it's completely

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self sufficient. It doesn't need to rely on an external

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game booster anymore because what Shure did was they said, hey. You

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know, instead of you going to a different company and giving them $100 for a

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gain booster, a $150. Let's just put it in the mic and charge you

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for it and keep the customers here. Right? Which is

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genius and smart because they identified the problem, and then they

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created a product to serve the customer that had the problem.

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And, yeah. It just it made so much sense when I saw it. And I

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was like, oh, wow. They. That I'm surprised they didn't come out with that, like,

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years ago. So I I haven't used the mic or anything yet. It literally just

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came out, like, you know, last week, I think. And and some

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cool features about it is, you know, it's all built in. It's it looks like

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it has the almost the same or the same exact housing as the s

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m seven b. It might be a little bit longer or bigger, you know,

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in diameter, but it looks very, very similar. And

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everything's all built in, and you don't see any of it. So

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it's essentially like you're just using the s m seven b and you

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don't need anything else. So you should be able to plug that, you know,

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directly into your interface and not have any issues.

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So, right now, I just kinda wanna go through a little bit of

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the specs of the microphone. I'm going to Shor's website right

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now. And and yeah. If you if you look at the back of

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the microphone, one thing that they included in this mic that I really like

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is the ability to bypass the preamp. So you can

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either keep the preamp on and have that additional gain boost, or

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you can shut it off and, basically, you have an s m seven b.

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So if there was an external preamp or something that you

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would rather use. Maybe you had, like, a really expensive tube preamp that

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you like. You can still do that with this mic. So the preamp

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itself has actually 2 different settings, which I think is also

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kinda cool. It's not just like a on or off. They have, 2

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positions. 1 is 18 decibels gain and then 1 is

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28 decibels gain. So it kinda gives you, like, a lower and a higher amount

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of gain. And, you know, it's it's just really easy and simple. It's like a

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switch on the back of the microphone. It seems to be very

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simple and really easy to use, which, you know, is is appreciated.

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And, it also looks like it comes with both of the standard s m

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seven b, like, the windscreens. The the normal one

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that's, like, kind of the sleeker looking one, and then the bigger one that's

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kinda, you know, bubbly or like a puffy sort of thing. Looks

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like a like a news broadcaster microphone. It's the

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one that I use because it helps a little bit more with plosives. So

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It's nice that they also include that. And, yeah, basically, the only difference

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between the s m seven b and the s m seven d b, it you

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know, price wise is the d b, the newer microphone with the

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preamp built in is $100 more, which I think is more

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than reasonable pricing. Because, you know, like we said earlier, if you're

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gonna go buy an external preamp, you're probably gonna spend $100

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anyways. So, you know, it's not like they're price gouging you. It's

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a pretty fair assessment and, you know, you're gonna spend that

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much with somebody else anyways. So, you know, maybe it makes sense

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to just buy the whole thing in 1 unit, spend the extra $99 with

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Shure instead of somebody else and have a simpler

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setup. Because that's what this mic basically does for you at the end of the

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day, is it gives you a simpler setup. You don't have to have anything else

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plugged into the microphone. You don't have to have this, you know, Cloud Lifter blue

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box sitting on your desk somewhere. You don't have to have multiple sets of

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mic cables. You just plug from the mic right into your

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interface, and you should be good to go, with the amount of gain boost that

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you have. The last thing that I wanna note that I

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just remembered that I want to know is the amount

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of gain that the Shure preamp built

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in provides versus, like, the Cloudlifter or the d m one dynamite stick.

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So the Cloudlifter advertises that it gives you an extra

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25 decibels of gain boost. And like we said, with the Shure

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SM seven d b, you have an option for 18 decibels

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of gain or 28 decibels of gain.

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So, you know, that means the sure preamp actually

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gives you 3 more decibels of

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gain, than the Cloudlifter does. And the Cloudlifter, again, right now is

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$150. So, you know, even just cost wise, if you're looking

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at that, you get more bang for your buck with the Shure preamp. And And

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then if you look at the d m one dynamite stick, they actually give you

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28 decibels of gain for $99.

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And And, you know, that's the same exact amount that I'm

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getting through my d m one dynamite stick right now. And, you know, it's the

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same price. So So, really, the the only difference is

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being, like, everything's gonna be built into your mic or you have to, you know,

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have this d m one dynamite stick sticking out of your mic or sticking out

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of your interface. So, you know, decibels wise, I think that Shure

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did a good job with providing enough decibels

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of gain in their in line preamp. That would be, like, one of my

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main concerns is, like, did they give you enough of gain boost with that built

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in preamp? But they gave you as much as the d m one dynamite stick,

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and I can tell you from using the d m one dynamite stick that the

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28 decibels of gain is enough for this microphone, and it

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works really well. If I'm looking at my interface right now, I got my

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dynamite stick plugged in, and I got my gain on my Focusrite

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interface just, like, directly at noon, 12 o'clock. So I got plenty of

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headroom to crank it up if I need to. And, you know,

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the 28 works really well. So, just wanted to make a note of that and

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say, like, sure is not skimping on the, amount of gain that

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they're giving you. They're actually giving you just as much as a d m one

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dynamite stick. So I think that's really awesome. And, you know, hopefully, I'll

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use 1 soon, and I'll be able to, like, test it out. The microphone

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is $500. It's 4.99 for this new microphone,

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and, look forward to seeing what people are saying about it. And hopefully, people are

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enjoying it. And hopefully, it's a, you know, a good microphone. But thanks

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for tuning in. If you, buy this microphone or if you if you're

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using it, send me a message and let me know what you think about it.

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I'd love to know, you know, what people are thinking of it. So thanks

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for tuning in, and I will see you next time. We've reached the end of

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the episode. And if you enjoyed this podcast or you got something

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from it, you might be interested in my weekly newsletter that

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I send out every Monday morning full of podcasting

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tips, tricks, and news. So if you like this show, you might like

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this newsletter. To sign up, just go to the show notes and click the

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link. Thanks