In theory this could happen to any microphone (capsule) and it can be accelerated by humid conditions in general and/or dirt, saliva remains etc. etc. Not saying this was the case with yours mind.

You say you were really happy with that microphone. Perhaps you could have the capsule replaced with a 30 dollar Chinese capsule, give or take. Maybe you know someone in the UK who is handy with a soldering iron?
Or did it end in the bin?

Or try your luck on another one, used? Shoudln't cost you much.

Personally, I would go for the B2 Pro instead.
Or a 3U Audio, but that's another thread.


Simple "rubber" bands, no matter what they are used for, will always deteriorate fast. It's wise to have a couple spares at hand. Those used to be readily available and cheap. Don't know what the status is now.
The elastic string in a Neumann shock mount lastst longer. But those mounts alone can cost more than a Chinese microphone, mount included.

Honestly, this ridiculous thread needs to be locked.

It's nothing but troll bait and trolls do abound in here.

It happened about five years ago and at the time I couldn't find any inexpensive Chinese cartridges being sold, so I bought an Icon M2 condenser microphone from an online retailer for the low price of 32 GBP, the plan being to transplant the cartridge into my B1. However, the M2 turned out to be so good that I was reluctant to go through with it. I just checked and it's now being sold by another retailer for £107 GBP, so lucky me! The B1 has just been sitting idle in a drawer, but I'll likely try again to source a cheap Chinese capsule for it anyway.

I tried replacing the shock mount bands with rubber hair bands but that wasn't successful, so I just bought a cheap replacement on eBay, which is more rugged, with much thicker bands.

A 797 K67 capsule is about $70 IIRC. I think they're pretty different from the $30 Feilo and iSK capsules.

I use the HD400 hum destroyers. they work good. as a bonus they also convert an unbalanced signal to a balanced one.

was thinking of getting a DI box (DI800) for this, but I just buy the hd400 when I have a problem somewhere.

+1 on the B-2 Pro. It holds up with the much more expensive microphones I've worked with.

I just got the Control 2 USB, and I love it. Well built; substantial case. It does not interfere with the sound, just routes and controls it. Built in RIAA EQ for table. Three sets of speakers. 139 bucks. It just works.

I'm finding recent pages to be informative. Uli B is chiming in, which is nice. manufacturers usually hide far away from threads like this. Not seeing a lot of trolling at all.

Agreed. And Uli (or his guys) actually addressed the issue at hand rather than just pasting in paragraphs of prefab maybe-relevant boilerplate, as had been the pattern in years past. Progress.

Has anyone been inside any of their new synths to see what the protection's like? Or wiggled the power supply transformers? In their older stuff I found a couple units where a chunky toroidal transformer had ripped loose and was the apparent Cause of Death.

The new synths look very cool, but I have not looked inside. From what I've heard, they sound excellent.

No doubt, there were issues early on. I jumped into a few of their early mixers for live work, and they would last about a year before things started getting wanky. FX not working, loud intermittent cracking noises that could blow speakers, etc... I've got the B-made Midas M32R in the TV studio at work, and some of the students beat the living crap out of it. It has not hiccuped even once in more than three years of constant use. Rock solid piece.

A couple years ago a friend was thinking about buying an X32 for his church, and I cautioned him about B's weak spots being things like faders and knobs and switches, which an X32 has a lot of. But it's been in service since mid-2018, more or less, and it's been fine.

For €150, and perhaps despite my low expectations, I am very happy with the ADA8200 I bought last year.

I mix on an analogue desk and specialise in smaller acoustic projects of around 12-16 channels (jazz, folk, contemporary, etc), but occasionally I need more channels to augment my core 16ch Metric Halo rig; the ADA8200 gives me 8 extra outputs which I tend to use for non 'mission-critical' tracks like toms, room mics, audience ambience, FX outs from the DAW, etc.

For this kind of 'secondary' usage I've no problem with the overall D-A sound quality of it in the quick tests I've done through my Soundcraft. I suppose I could do an A/B with my main converters which are 10x more expensive but it hasn't seemed worth it - I just plumbed the ADA8200 into my system last year and have carried on mixing with it ever since.

I can't speak of the preamps, line-in and A-D section as I never use it as an input device, but as an output device for someone needing 8 extra channels of clean, externally-clocked, Line-Level D-A conversion the ADA8200 is in a class of its own in terms of value for money. And it actually cost me less than the ADA8000 I used to own years ago (runs cleaner, quieter and cooler too).

I've not been shy of indulging in a bit of B*hringer-bashing on this Forum for their out-and-out copycat design philosophy, but to be fair their 8x00 series of digital ADAT boxes has always been a bit of an original outlier of a product which they have continued to make available at a ridiculously low price for nearly 20 years. We all know the Behringer business-model by now which is build 'em cheap and sell a bucketload, so given these volumes it wouldn't surprise me if people encounter faulty units that shouldn't have got past whatever mass QC Behringer have in place, but to be honest, even if my ADA8200 went kaput after a couple of years at that price I'd probably buy another one (but 96k for the next ADA8400 please!).

I suspect there are way more of these super-useful and stupidly affordable ADA8x00 units sitting in studios all over the world as backup/overspill/extra I/O than their owners will ever admit to.

After years of reticence and only in the case of this particular B*hringer original design, I've decided to come clean and 'fess up!

In summary and in my opinion... the ADA8200 definitely does not suck.

People seem to be very happy with the X. I always wondered how much difference there is between the M and the X. I imagine they have to downgrade somewhere to offer the same functionality for less money. The M is very robust. But I might have reservations about putting the X in my situation, where students often have lab time supervised by other student workers.

Commenting again, any of their not bottom of the barrel stuff is great. The B5, the B2 Pro (it's bright and articulate, but some people like that), the UMC1820, and pretty much any of the UMCs (if it's got the MIDAS pres it's fantastic), and their consoles, apparently the more expensive mixers are good too despite using the Xenyx pres. Just don't buy the C series mics, or the tiny portable mixers and Xenyx interfaces and you'll be fine. My Behringer stuff has been way better than my Zoom garbage. If Behringer made a portable recorder for film with 8 inputs using the MIDAS pres I'd get rid of my Zoom F6 in a heartbeat. The B5 sounds as good as if not better than the KM184 in some cases.

I've had ups and downs over the years with B gear.
Most recently I had a BCR2000 simply die, no reason, light studio use only.

And then my new (6 months old) X Touch One simply refuses to power on for no reason either as at two days ago. That's been my overall experience in 20 + years - some of the gear lasts and lasts, and other items just seem to completely conk out.

And yet other bits and pieces (the mini 'tube' preamp, denoiser rack unit, little old mixer, etc) just keep on keeping on for years and years.

Don't know whether it's a PSU issue or lack of internal protection, but when these things go, they seem to *really* go.

It makes me very wary of buying a B synth, which is a shame as I'm keen on the upcoming BBG Wave and the existing Minimoog clone... but not if it's just going to suddenly go dead in the middle of a session.

*EDIT* My BCR2000 came back to life after I took the covers off and reseated the fuse (which was working upon testing with multimeter) - and changed the power chord to a new one. No idea whether it was loose fuse or power cable or both - but now it's working fine.

My X Touch One is fine too - the wall wart PSU had died (very cheap Chinese unit which is built very, very badly, probably popped in the box by local distributor for Australian power). Tried a different X Touch One PSU and it worked fine, so... just FYI if anyone has the same issues, it seems it's all about the power on these two units. I am investing in a good solid 2A rated 9V PSU for the X Touch One for future use as honestly, the supplied one is garbage.

I've had one of my BCF2000s freak out -- it just jiggles the faders and that's all.

I've had minor issues with the BCR/BCF controllers; by and large they're built very well, but they have one massive achilles heel -- that flimsy plastic arm that connects the power button to the switch. It seems like it was designed to fail.

My FCB1010s with the EurekaPROM are absolutely heaven though. Behringer really surprised me with the FCB because it's so unlike anything else they made in that era. That pedalboard is built like a tank, I mean this thing is built to be abused. But with the right firmware it's also one of the most useful MIDI control devices for live work.

Mixed situation here: I bought a Behringer XM8500 about a year ago, at first it seemed fine, but now I'm giving it a bit more of a session. I'm horrifed to hear it distort on a med-singing voice up close!
Just me doing singing exercises, I'm not loud and there's overload. So I reach for similar mic I bought in 1986 a Primo UD320 (med price back in then) and that's fine. I tried an old Sure Unidyne III and that's fine too. All into the same desk channel, cable etc.

That's another Behringer mic going into landfill. Their C1 is rubbish, that didn't last long before it proved to be, good looking, nice build but sounded naff. Landfill.
We need to save the planet, less CO2 etc. Simple, Beh stop making these mics, or at least take them from the point of manufacture straight to the recycling plant in China. Just think how much pollution, CO2 has not been produced in shipping them to me and I just dump them into landfill.

I did support Behringer, but after the mess with the RD8 and these naff mics (the DI20 is landfill too).
Mind you last week I bought a TC-Helicon D1, made at Behringer Ch factory, it works but upon close inspection, a mistake. Just why make this product? I can get near the same effect with a quick digital delay (10-50ms) and a chorus..

Just feeling rather at these near useless products.

One moment you're going on with that "save the planet, less CO2" crap, then you're announcing to the world that you're sending your two Behringer microphones into the landfill. It's the height of inconsistency, considering the existence of recycling.

Incidentally, both myself and my brother own an XM8500 microphone each, and both have no noticeable distortion. In fact, with his high tenor voice, he has a tendency of sounding like Paul McCartney in the early Beatles albums - and to the best of my knowledge they were recorded with Neumanns.

Ianpb: you've missed my irony and humour! Beatles history...

Must be the sun, it's very hot and sunny here, I pop in and out the house to keep my tan topped up, pop indoors to do a little more testing.

Mind you, the plastic boxes the Beh mics come in are nice, I can reuse them. One is already a toolbox in my gig case.

What dynamic mic should I buy other than a Beh and not made in China?

In the interests of this thread, I do have Beh kit that I use, I have a VAMP2 and that gets used for recording, I can usually find a guitar sound good enough quite quickly. I have a number graphic EQ that work well, done many gigs. The Feedback Destroyer is a near miss, in theory it's good, in practice it's not so good. But is it good for a midi controlled EQ. The Boog is good too eventhough they messed the firmware up on release. The RD8 is good now they have finally got some decent firmware. I use a UCA202 USB audio interface just about everyday, just perfect for me. I gig a K1800FX combo amp but I needed to tweak the speaker/tweeter as I think Beh have got that wrong, its mixer/fx and power amp are very good. The mixer is >60kHz bandwidth and the power amp is >20kHz. All the graphic Freqs are spot on as are boost/cut. The power amp can deliver >180W RMS. Yes I've measured them all.

XM8500 have been perfect here, cheap as chips too, zero distortion, on stage, in theatre, kids and adults, reliable and no distortion.

I own 3 Behringer products. All three serve their purpose. My ADA8000 I bought back when I was I still using a DIGI002. I still use it for extra inputs and mic pre’s for my Apollo. I bought a Neutron synth just for the experience of using patch cords. I also have a Bugera GT-5 amp which works perfect for recording & practicing in the house without shaking the walls. Most of my gear is decent but nothing extra special. I’m not a gear snob & I get aggravated when someone tells me my gear is inferior.

There are many opinionated folks in this business who think the gear is more important than the music.

Hmm.. Mr Deleted 9c61fe2 you have convinced me to try again with my XM8500, it's currently next to the dustbin awaiting landfill.

To be fair, most of the older XM8500 were pre this new factory build, Behringers QC is suspect at the best of times, you may have a dud.

I always though that was the official Gear[space] motto.

I also think a separate forum for "people who think that ragging on Behringer increases their cred" might be quite busy.

It could have three sub-forums:

[1] people who think Behringer gear sounds bad;
[2] people who think Behring gear is unreliable; and
[3] "synth justice warriors" who want to air their theories on how intellectual property law would be re-written if they were running the world.

Although I assume that most posts could fall under all three categories.

Or you could just call the forum "double standard arseholes" it would pretty much cover it.

There's a lot of love in this room !

I think the B1 and B2/B2-Pro are very acceptable at their price point, as is the B5 pencil microphone.

I have only tried the XM8500 dynamic as a quick - doesn't matter if it breaks kind of microphone - fix, but while not a perfect microphone, for speech it was very acceptable.

I do agree with the C1 and C3 being a complete waste of money and resources.

The ADA8200 8 channel mic pre with adat/optical out. Very functional and perfectly fine for adding low-noise channels to a cost-conscious application.

Ultra GI-100, without the cab sim. Used it last week to feed my interface and record the cab. Did fine.

Same goes for two passive DI-400P.

Almost forgot.
Did a church install, but knew that if I didn’t get some speaker management happening, I was going to have phase issues. The only product that we could afford to do the job was the Behringer Ultra-Drive Pro DCX2496 Loudspeaker Management System.
Not the easiest piece of gear I’ve ever used, but in the end, it did the job of managing speaker balance, distribution, delay, crossover and EQ for $250. It has been reliable and sounds just fine. The next closest product to do the same job was two to three times the price, which we had no budget for.
In the end, an excellent solution.