Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Techniques for getting your tone to tape.

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vanhalen5150
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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by vanhalen5150 » Thu Jul 12, 2012 3:17 pm

rgorke wrote:
vanhalen5150 wrote:Just watching some of those fake SM57 vids..... :shock:

I'm starting to wonder about mine.....
yeah, I saw that too. I bought mine from the local shop and my grill spins...on my mic. :scratch:
The vid where the guy shows the box's. The fake box looks pretty familiar. He also said they are from a Canadian distributor that sells them on ebay. I got mine from a Canadian chain and paid $119.00 for each. If they are fakes I'm sure they didnt know. I think the grill spins on mine but he says they may have fixed that as well. He has a link to photo's of the inside circuit.

I just know mine do not sound great.
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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by rgorke » Sat Jul 14, 2012 8:14 pm

So, the broken mic I picked up I am pretty shure :) was a fake but all I wanted was the body so I didn't have to take out the transformer in my real SM57. I switched bodies so the real SM57 has the Tape Op mod to it. It really sound a lot better. It use to have a honk to it but not any more. I may do some A/B ing to convince myself.
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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by Reeltarded » Sat Jul 14, 2012 11:01 pm

Convention is pin 2 hot, 3 is -.

Don't think for a second that old mics sound better. Old doesn't mean shit to a piece of shit. Crap has always been crap, always will be. Modern mics might sound bad on average because the market is flooded with garbage made by slaves on third-hand CNC machines out of spurious materials and to an awful tolerance.

If you want to hear a real mic, get a golden era Sinatra recording. 57-62 or so. The golden years of German condensers. My knees are weak. I am such a big girl. Heh
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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by inkomodo.dragon » Wed Jan 30, 2013 9:15 am

In case you don't want to mess with your SM57 there's another (more civil) way of getting similar results. The idea is to lower the input impedance to a more healthy value (500R). You have to find out the input impedance of your mic preamp (in my case 1300 Ohms) and solder a specific resistor to ground (in parallel) effectively reducing the impedance. The value of the resistor required can be calculated with this formula:

Rp = (Rs*Rd)/(Rs-Rd)

Rp: Parallel resistor
Rs: Stock Input impedance
Rd: Desired input impedance

In my case Rs=1k3, Rd=500R so Rp=812R. I'm going to use a 820R 1% 1/2w metalfilm resistor.

You can implement this resistor in a couple of different ways. One would be to open the 57 and solder it inside. A more conservative way would be to place it inside a cable connector which would give you an easy way to A/B the sound change. You can also put it inside your mic preamp (not recommended).
Read THIS ARTICLE for a more detailed explanation.

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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by garbeaj » Wed Jan 30, 2013 11:09 am

AustinTx wrote: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E73QNHoPsqs[/youtube]
Jesus, that is night and day! Hook 'em 'Horns!

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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by SteadyEddie » Sat Feb 02, 2013 1:22 am

Just ordered a patch cable to try the resistor mod. Our band uses a behringer mixer and it appears to have a 20k input impedance, so I'm hoping that I get a big improvement from this.
inkomodo.dragon wrote:In case you don't want to mess with your SM57 there's another (more civil) way of getting similar results. The idea is to lower the input impedance to a more healthy value (500R). You have to find out the input impedance of your mic preamp (in my case 1300 Ohms) and solder a specific resistor to ground (in parallel) effectively reducing the impedance. The value of the resistor required can be calculated with this formula:

Rp = (Rs*Rd)/(Rs-Rd)

Rp: Parallel resistor
Rs: Stock Input impedance
Rd: Desired input impedance

In my case Rs=1k3, Rd=500R so Rp=812R. I'm going to use a 820R 1% 1/2w metalfilm resistor.

You can implement this resistor in a couple of different ways. One would be to open the 57 and solder it inside. A more conservative way would be to place it inside a cable connector which would give you an easy way to A/B the sound change. You can also put it inside your mic preamp (not recommended).
Read THIS ARTICLE for a more detailed explanation.

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Re: Shure SM57 "Tape Op" Mod Audio Comparison

Post by HTH » Sat Feb 02, 2013 9:39 am

inkomodo.dragon wrote:In case you don't want to mess with your SM57 there's another (more civil) way of getting similar results. The idea is to lower the input impedance to a more healthy value (500R). You have to find out the input impedance of your mic preamp (in my case 1300 Ohms) and solder a specific resistor to ground (in parallel) effectively reducing the impedance. The value of the resistor required can be calculated with this formula:

Rp = (Rs*Rd)/(Rs-Rd)

Rp: Parallel resistor
Rs: Stock Input impedance
Rd: Desired input impedance

In my case Rs=1k3, Rd=500R so Rp=812R. I'm going to use a 820R 1% 1/2w metalfilm resistor.

You can implement this resistor in a couple of different ways. One would be to open the 57 and solder it inside. A more conservative way would be to place it inside a cable connector which would give you an easy way to A/B the sound change. You can also put it inside your mic preamp (not recommended).
Read THIS ARTICLE for a more detailed explanation.
I've read that same article and this is on my list of things to try as I do feel the need to cut some mids on the desk when I'm micing up my amp at gigs.

I'm using a slightly older desk (A&H GL3) with a 2k input on the mic channels, so I'll try a 470ohm resistor for around 380ohm input. Would be worth just putting a pot in parallel so you can tune it to ear, maybe as low as 250ohms up to whatever your desk's stock input impedance is.
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