CMU School of Drama


Thursday, February 27, 2014

Ghost In The Machine: Phantom Power

Pro Sound Web: Unsure about phantom power? Let’s clear up the mystery. Nearly all mixing consoles and audio interfaces provide phantom power at their microphone input connectors. Most condenser mics need phantom power to operate, so you simply plug the mic into the mixer to power it.

2 comments:

Philip Rheinheimer said...

I was hoping that this article would make the need for phantom power clearer, and while I do now understand how p48 is sent over XLR, I don't really understand why some mics need it. But I guess that's because I don't really fully understand how microphones work. The "using it" section was particularly unhelpful. I was hoping for an explanation of the actual uses for p48, not how to plug in a mic that requires phantom power. I'm sure this article would have been much more helpful if I had a better knowledge of microphones and how they work.

Mike Vultaggio said...

Similarly to what Philip said, I was hoping for this article to give a more in depth explanation of why certain mics need phantom. Though I know which ones need them and for the most part why, but was never really given an in depth explanation of the science behind it, which really interests me. Though this was what I was expecting, I was disappointed with how basic the explanation that this magazine gave. I think that a magazine that markets itself to the professionals in the sound company should produce an article that delves deeper into the science behind the phantom power.