I did a trade and ended up with a rode nt1-a.. seems to sound like its working fine unless i blow it in.. which then it like cuts off and on.. opened it up.. checked the wires they seem to be connected fine.. i did notice two things though..

one is that the gold plated diaphragm looked to be dirty or something so i tried to whipe it.. which took most of the gold off.. now little black circles are exposed..

second.. i noticed one of the xlr prongs was further out than the others making me think it might be a connection problem.. but it only happens when pop sounds are being made so i'm not sure.. i'm not the best solderer so I'd rather have opinions on what the problem is before i work on something

Hmmmmm. Sounds like you've already worked on it. bumpkin

Don't really understand... maybe you missed something

"one is that the gold plated diaphragm looked to be dirty or something so i tried to whipe it.. which took most of the gold off.. now little black circles are exposed.."

And that comment prompted:

All I'm suggesting is that whatever damage you thought had occurred has been reinforced by your action....

Oh, so the gold is suppose to wipe off like dirt?

it didn't change the sound any

Alright I will say it. You have probably destroyed the mic diaphram, futhermore what the hell are you doing blowing in a condensor mic or any mic for that matter?tutt
My recommendation would be to take it someone who knows what they are doing and have it looked at, and ask him/her nicely as to how to care for it, assuming it's not trashed.

Sorry for being blunt, but I'm not sure how else to put it.

Ditto

Well to make you feel better the one prong sticking out further is normal. It's part of Rhodes mics. But like others said. Your diaphragm is probably shot

1st, I wasn't blowing into it till i noticed it cutting on and off.. I noticed only pop sounds made it do that.. not distort but turn off like there was a short or something.. then of course blowing followed which I can do into any other condenser without it cutting on and off.. I'm not blowing hard or anything to cause damage..

2nd, Me touching the *diaphragm changed nothing in terms of how it works, I only touched it with a soft silk like material to see what was on it.. then the gold wiped right off it like dirt off a table..

Nothing in this thread has anything to do with me ruining the mic.. I'm not asking what not to do.. I'm asking people with experience, like evanjames with helpful information, thanks man.. on what to do.. or what situations cause this problem..

I cant determine myself if its the diaphragm because how perfectly the mic sounds till pop sounds are induced..

If that is a normal sign of a bad diaphragm then I'll mod the nt1-a with a different capsule..

Or if that is normal activity with a nt1-a.. I should know about it.. etc etc.. there's a lot of information out there that could possibly "help" me in terms of fixing the mic.

The bashing is unneeded and only makes you appear as if you don't know anything about the topic at hand..

I remember when we were recording some of my stuff it kept overloading on my plosives so baaaaaaaad, I had to literally switch the mic to SM7B.

It has a slight bump around 150hz which makes the plosives stand out more, and overload the microphone from what I remember.

It can't handle the plosives from my experience, unless you got a very rugged pop filter that can diffuse the air pressure as it hits the capsule

Yea, I wouldn't have opened it up like that if I were you. I own a NT-1A and have had no such problems. It works like a dream on spoken word or rap vocals and baritone/tenor 2 voices, so it's probably just a busted diaphragm, sorry to say, but I hope you didn't trade away something too valuable.

Maybe if you got it modded, he would mod it and fix the problem as well?? perhaps its worth a shot if you have the doe to get it modded!

I have an nt1a and I don't have any problem with plosives (I use a pop screen and USUALLY position the mic about 7 inches away from the vocalist.. their nose is usually lined up with the gold dot on the front of the mic) Maybe the mic is too close to the vocalist??

I had the same problem with my Rode NT1A. It would clip and drop out during some extreme plosives and whenever the mic was moved or handled.

RODE will repair and replace for free under their 10 year warrantee. Rubbing the gold off the diaphragm was a horrible idea.

MC

I know this is a very old thread but just came across it looking for some sort of answer for my NT1 problem.

After I bought it a year ago I used it for about 3 months, the it went dead. By dead I mean dead. It had not been touched and was static on a stand all the time. No bumping, no blowing nothing. Just 1 day it was dead.

Took it to Rhode and they gave a report....

They sent it back last November and it has sat in that box since then, still all plastic sealed, until tonight when I was going to use it for a session tomorrow.

I had a SM58 plugged into a cable so took that off, plugged the NT1 in but itb was dead. Changed cables, inputs etc but dead.

I am going nuts trying to,work out why. It has not been touch, all sealed.

I will call them and return it again tomorrow, but I would like to know why?

oz

Oz, I don’t mean this in an insulting way. I just want to be sure you didn’t miss anything. When you switched from the SM58 to the NT1-a, did you make sure phantom power was on for the Rode?

Scott

Along with what Scott asked, what are you plugging the NT1a into (preamp, interface, etc., brand and model number)
The connecting cable is an XLR to XLR and not an XLR to 1/4" (?)

Holy shit... I know this thread is very old, thank you so much. There is just no information out there if condenser mics are supposed to do that or not. As a beginner this is really hard.

I have the NT1 and i fiddled for almost 2 weeks now. My rode NT1 started clipping and cutting out if moved it even a little bit.

Sending it back now. thank yo so much!

I have an NT1a.

It's not a bad mic for what I paid. But a big problem was the it is terrible and handling plosives.

"Puh" and "Buh" sounds destroy the mic.

I have a Black Lion Audio Revolution. So maybe it matches better with a different interface.

But I recently purchased an AT4040 and really love it, so NT1a got sent to the bench next to the Studio Projects C1 and Avantone C12.