Stereo or mono mic?

**wambulance** · October 17th, 2009, 06:28 PM

How can I tell the difference? Sounds silly I know, but I can record from a mono mic and it can be stereo on say, an avi. It's just that both channels are synchronized.

The reason I ask is because I have a very expensive mixer that I want to plug a mic into and it says, "DO NOT PLUG A MONO TYPE MIC INTO THE INPUT AS IT WILL CAUSE PERMANENT DAMAGE TO THE EQUIPMENT".

How can I know for sure if my mic is stereo or mono?

**JLK03F150** · October 17th, 2009, 06:38 PM

The jack on a stereo mic would have 3 contact sections, left, right & ground. Mono would just have + & ground.

**wambulance** · October 17th, 2009, 06:45 PM

Gotcha. I found a website earlier that showed two identical plugs and said either could be used for mono or stereo. I can't find it now, but they did outline that the end of the plug was for microphone power or something. But everywhere else I look, it's like you say and the plug looks obviously different.

Thanks a bunch, I'll plug it in and try it.

**JohnE.** · October 17th, 2009, 06:59 PM

Unless it's specifically a "stereo microphone", having 2 separate mic elements and 2 separate output connectors (or a single 4-pin connector), all microphones are mono. Standard mono microphones can be either balanced (3-pin connector/2 conductor+ground) or unbalanced (2-pin connector/1 conductor+ground). I've never seen or heard of any mixer that will accept only "true stereo" microphones for input, so I suspect they mean don't use an unbalanced microphone with it.

Edit: balanced microphones (3-pin XLR or "stereo" TRS connector) are low impedance devices, whereas unbalanced microphones (2-pin XLR or "mono" TS connector) are high impedance. Plugging a high impedance microphone into a low impedance input can indeed damage some mixers inputs if they're not specifically designed to handle both low & high impedance.

**wambulance** · October 17th, 2009, 07:03 PM

I'm sorry, I've mis-quoted the instructions. It says verbatim;

"DO NOT USE A MONO PLUG-TYPE MICROPHONE, DOING SO WILL CAUSE PERMANENT DAMAGE"

So I suppose it is referring to the plug type after all and not whether or not the mic is mono or stereo.

I plugged it in and it worked fine. Didn't blow up or anything. Think I'm good to go. Was just being cautious as I just dropped $250 on the item and didn't want to screw it up. Thanks folks.

**bigBonehead** · October 18th, 2009, 04:13 AM

Originally Posted by JLK03F150

The jack on a stereo mic would have 3 contact sections, left, right & ground. Mono would just have + & ground.

Not necessarily so. A Balanced 1/4 inch mic plug will have 3 contacts: TRS= Tip/Ring/Shield.... It is Not 'Stereo' On the other end it will have a XLR Female connector that plugs into the body of the mic...