Audio-Technica Pro-70 or K+K?

chip3174

Hi all,

I'm thinking of getting a pickup for my D-500 and wondered if any of you had any experience with these two particular brands. I've been told both are good, and they are both within my price range but I just wanted to get any pros and cons on each.

Thanks in advance,
Chip

periclimenes

Pro-70 is amazing. (no experience with K+K). Wonderful sound, but it (and all mics) is prone to feedback if you need to be really loud. Gonzalo Bergara and his whole crew use the Pro-70, so you can see youtube videos and see/hear for yourself. They'll be playing with either the small cube AER amps or a Roland AC-66.

chip3174

Hey thanks Periclimenes! Very informative. Am I right that I will need to purchase a separate mount for the soundhole with the Audio-Technica?

Thanks,
Chip

periclimenes

The soundhole mount comes with it, but you need to unscrew it and flip the mount around 180 degrees.

gitpicker

I have a K&K in my guitars but ever since I got my Pro-70 Mic, I have never ever used the K&K. The mic sounds WAYYYY better. You can experiment with different configurations in terms of mounting: off the sound-hole, near the tailpiece, etc. Anyway, the mic sounds way better. Plus you can use it on all your guitars.

Only thing is, if your amp doesn't have an XLR jack, you'll need a cable with XLR female to standard 1/4" jack. If you do that, you'll want to use a preamp as well to boost the signal as you'll lose gain going from XLR to 1/4" line jack. Totally worth it though!

Doug

Craig Bumgarner

I've been using an AT813b which is similar to the AT70 for about a year and half. It is by far the best "pickup" I've used. I've tried probably a dozen piezos, bigtones and magnetic pickups and have always come back to the mic. Choice of pickups is subject to personal requirements, preferences and strong opinions, but for me, the mic is able to produce the volume I need and passes along the acoustic tone and more importantly, the dynamic range of the guitar better.

Feedback can be initially daunting and learning to control it takes some time, but once you've got that down, a clip-on mic is a simple, reliable system. BTW, I think a good mic on a boom stand is even better and allows you to work the mic for volume adjustment. The downside is it adds to the complexity and weight of the gig kit and adds clutter on stage.

Location for the clip on-mic will produce a wide variety of tonal response and feedback issues. I've experimented a lot. I used to advocate mounting it just below the bridge, but I've found the tone there kind of thin in spite of it being feedback resistant. Right at the sound hole will howl like crazy, but a couple inches back works good. Duh, just like where the clip AT supplies puts it :? .

I've recently been trying it inside the guitar. This seems to give a little extra punch and less extraneous noise from fingers on the top. I dangle it through the sound hole and use the windscreen to prevent clunking noises if it swings into the box. The mic is suspended about 3" - 4" from the bottom edge of the hole, secured with a little piece of tape. FYI, tape will pull French polish finish, don't ask how I know this :oops: . Periclimenes post about turning the AT clip around makes me think it might be possible to use the AT clip turned around inside the guitar, I'll have to try that. I have also seen another system which clamps to the sides of the guitar and holds the mic on an adjustable arm a few inches of the top, directed at it. That looks cool, but you won't go too far wrong using the supplied clip in the intended fashion.

BTW, my AT813b absolutely HATES phantom power. It is supposed to be able to use it, but mine, at least, doesn't like it AT ALL. Tried it on three different systems, all the same, quite repeatable. Maybe mine is defective somehow. Don't know why, but the presence of phantom power causes the sound to change dramatically, sounds VERY thin, scratchy, brittle, tinny. The supplied pre-amp has its own battery which seems to last forever even if you forget to turn it off occasionally, so phantom power is not needed. If someday I'm sharing an amp or PA where someone else needs phantom power, however, this might be a problem.

2 cents,

CB

periclimenes

The 180 spin trick I mentioned allows me to have the mic inside of the soundhole. There's an extendable arm that you can adjust to fine tune the placement. I normally have the mic "floating" close to the middle of the hole, pretty much right under the g string. My pro 70 also works well with phantom power. A previous poster mentioned using a preamp with an XLR-to-1/8" adapter. I have never tried that, but I have used a $10 impedance converter on the end of my mic cable (it outputs to 1/8") and have had good results.

Good luck!