hey everybody welcome back to podcast egde my name is banjo and i am back with another
microphone test video for you guys as I'm sure you could tell today I am testing out this guy this is
the blue snowball not to be confused with the blue snowball ice and this was requested by our
viewers Erin and Paul does youtubing so this is a USB condenser microphone that has two microphone
capsules inside of it which I will explain in a little bit before we go any farther I'm sure some
of you are asking what's the difference between the blue snowball and the blue snowball ice well
there's only one difference the blue snowball has those two microphone capsules and what those two
capsules do is it allows this microphone to switch polar patterns from a cardioid polar
pattern which basically just picks up audio in front of it and it allows you to switch
to an omnidirectional setting which allows you to speak all the way around the microphone and
pick up audio 360 degrees the blue snowball ice does not have the ability to switch or
add the omnidirectional setting it is stuck in the cardioid pattern okay and as per usual if
you are interested in this microphone I'll throw a link in the video description down below and it'll
set you back about 60 bucks on Amazon now let's talk about what you get in the box obviously you
get the microphone then you get about a six foot USB cable then you get a desktop microphone stand
which is much nicer than the stand that comes with the blue snowball ice then you get some
documentation which is actually kind of nice and I want to note that the blue snowball comes with
a two year warranty the build quality of this thing is only kind of nice it's a plastic body
and feels kind of cheap there but the actual mic stand feels incredibly nice and I do like that
but just like the other mic stands I've tested out or talked about I don't like this because
it offers zero shock absorption for the microphone so you'll hear a lot of noise when you're banging
on your desk if you end up using this stand there is a ball joint on the microphone that allows you
to tilt the microphone maybe 30 or 40 degrees then the back you have the USB cable and then
directly above that you have the three-way switch to switch between cardioid which is setting one
cardioid with a 10 decibel pad which decreases the volume by 10 decibels that's setting 2 and
then setting 3 on the very end is omnidirectional when it comes to specifications the blue snowball
is severely lacking in that department it doesn't list them anywhere they do provide
a couple of graphs in the user's manual here's an image of those a frequency response over here and
the polar patterns right there but then I found a website sound on sound comm that lists this
microphones frequency response as 40 Hertz to 18 kilohertz but as you will hear coming up the
different polar patterns that you set this on will severely affect the actual EQ that you're
getting now I'm on the cardioid setting and I am going to go ahead and move around the microphone
to determine the polar pattern what happens when you get around to the sides and what happens when
you get around to the back what happens when you get beneath the microphone what happens
when you get on top of it now I am on at the Omni setting and I'm going to go ahead and move around
the microphone to determine the polar pattern see what happens when we get around the sides
to the back to the top and then down to the bottom now I am on the cardioid setting and I am banging
on the keyboard directly behind the microphone to see how much my voice it picks up versus how much
of the keyboard behind it it picks up now I am on the omnidirectional setting and I am banging
on the keyboard behind the microphone just to see how much of my voice it picks up versus how
much of the keyboard it picks up okay now I'm going to shut up and do the silence test on the
cardioid setting now I'm going to continue to shut up and do this silence test on the omnidirectional
setting I am on the cardioid setting and I am one foot away from the microphone I'm on the cardioid
setting and I am two feet away from the microphone I'm on the cardioid setting and now I'm about four
feet from the microphone and I'm shoes today I'm on the omnidirectional setting and I am about one
foot away from the microphone I'm still on the Omni setting and now I am two feet away from the
microphone still on the Omni setting and now I'm about four feet away from the microphone
even though you'll never come clean you know it's true those sheets are dirty and so are you
so as you could tell the two different microphone capsules in this mic have two completely different
tones and sounds the cardioid polar pattern sounds much more natural and full and just
all-around better when you switch to the omnidirectional setting it sounds very
tinny very hollow and just very unnatural and I don't think it sounds good at all as expected
when we were doing the keyboard sound test and background noise test we heard a lot more noise
when we were on the omnidirectional setting so if you're going to be using this near a computer I
do not recommend an omnidirectional setting honestly I don't think the Omni setting is
usable at all the only thing I could imagine it being usable for is if you're recording a
conference or a meeting and you're just going to use it to listen back later and you're not
going to release it or maybe if you have a band and you're just sitting in a room and you want
to get a rough demo out for pre-production or something like that I think it would be useful
in that situation but as far as releasable audio I don't think the omnidirectional polar pattern
setting on this thing I don't think you can use it the cardioid on the other hand sounds pretty
decent it's nothing amazing it's not gonna be CD quality audio or just blow people's minds
it's a $60 microphone and it sounds like a $60 microphone so when it comes to recommending it
I don't think I can recommend the blue snowball over the blue snowball ice unless you are going
to be in one of those situations where you desperately want the omnidirectional setting
for personal use and personal playback I think you should go with the ice but the ice is about
50 bucks and I think the audio-technica ATR 2100 USB is a slightly better option so check
the card up in one of the corners and check that review out alright guys well I guess that will
do it if you do have any more questions about the microphone leave them in the comments down
below and I'll try to answer them as soon as I can if you found the video fun interesting or
helpful thumbs up if you thought it sucked give me a big ol thumbs down don't forget to vote for
the microphones you want to review next as well as follow me on all the social media links all
those in the video description down below and if you want more of these videos click Subscribe a
clicking the logo in the corner and I will see y'all later thank you guys from watching by