24Aug Zoom H1 Lavalier Winner?
click image to purchase Audio-Technica ATR3350
As soon as the Zoom H1 was released, I began my search for the perfect ‘low budget’ lavalier microphone. I’m not saying the Audio-Technica ATR3350 Lavalier can outperform other $100.00+ microphones, but from the tests i’ve seen and the comments i’ve received, this is the microphone for me. This little Lav comes in at under $24.00 dollars! This microphone is also battery powered. Just ‘generally’ speaking, powered microphones tend to perform better than non-powered microphones. Whether you’ll find use for this with your Zoom H1 to possibly replace some wireless situations, at under $24.00 dollars it’s a nice thing to just have in the bag. Even without the Zoom H1, this microphone connected directly to your DSLR is already an improvement over the built in camera microphone. So after researching a few Vimeo videos, YouTube videos, and checking out some comments from some of the readers i’m skipping the KFC combo dinner tonight and throwin’ it down on the Audio-Technica ATR3350 Lavalier.
August 24th, 2010 at 10:33 pm
Say no more. I just bought it…LOL.
August 24th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
Just want to also post a link to buy.com http://bit.ly/995qio
$20.77 out the door.
August 24th, 2010 at 11:49 pm
Ordered 2 last week, great to see it recommended here too.
Thanks for the incredible pace of updates too
August 25th, 2010 at 7:00 am
Bro, just when I was going to email you asking for a recommendation for a good wired lav, you go and post this. On top of it Emm!
In for 1!
August 25th, 2010 at 10:04 am
Here in the UK it costs $48, that’s double the price, that’s no surprise unfortunately.
August 25th, 2010 at 11:51 am
Bought 2 a month ago to supplement my wireless and shotgun, Amazing for the price. Fortunately the Zoom H4 has the capability to use a 1/4 phono direct, so the additional expense of a XLR~phono/mini is not necessary.
August 25th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
Just make sure to head to Radio Shack and pick up the mono to stereo conversion.. Cord is also quite long so make sure you’re monitoring your audio, cause the long unbalanced wire can be prone to pick up interference… Other than that can’t complain… $24
August 25th, 2010 at 3:05 pm
I think i’m going to cut some length off when mine comes in. I’ll have a couple and I don’t need them all to be long.
August 25th, 2010 at 8:15 pm
Emm, thanks for these great finds, I assume some testing footage is coming with this soon? (hint hint)
Do you know if these comes with windscreen by any chance?
August 25th, 2010 at 8:21 pm
I believe they come with a bit of foam, and yes as soon I receive i’ll try a few things with it. There’s already a few videos on Vimeo and Youtube that convinced me to get it. You can’t beat the $20 dollars for a powered LAV mic.
August 25th, 2010 at 9:34 pm
First off, love your site. Thanks. Secondly, will you be recommending any sound mixer or wireless lavs anytime soon. I’ve been playing around with the H4 to get comfortable and I’m going to be ready to go further in the sound department for my short films and other projects. Thanks.
August 25th, 2010 at 11:28 pm
I tested a few, thought of a few, but if I had to put my name on it, it would only be the Sennheiser G3’s for wireless. I know, it’s the most expensive, but it does the job well with no complaints.
August 26th, 2010 at 3:01 am
Emm… I gotta say when you first posted about the H1 I kinda thought it was a ridiculous thought that this was going to be even close to a consideration for me as an audio solution. When I saw your post on the plug-in lav function instantly got my wheels turning. I ordered the lav/H1 setup tonight. Seeing that for under $125 I can have an effective wireless setup running on one AA and the easy USB connection and storage… holy cow! So much bang for the buck! Plus in the future could get another one to pickup audio in hidden areas where it would be hard in my event videography and they’d be without clunky boxes and wires. Perfect for my DSLR needs and potentially may not need to by an H4N now! Everything just got simpler!
Amazing how one post instantly changed my thoughts on the H1. This is so cool! Sad now that I eventually won’t need my Sony UHF setup that we bought years back for $500. The direction technology is going is nuts!
August 26th, 2010 at 6:52 am
Have to second Emm’s comment on the G3’s. Have used it for 3 weddings now and they work perfectly. If you do go for the G3’s, make sure you read up on SQUELCH. At first I didn’t know what this was and just left squelch on the factory setting of “low”. I was receiving lots of hiss and static. After contacting Sennheiser about it, they told me to set the squelch to high — it removed all hiss but at a price — it limits the distance of the wireless signal.
October 17th, 2010 at 7:19 pm
Hey Emm,
Just bought mine. Nice mic
Any ideas about a setup with 3 of these mics? To record an interview with 1 hoster and 2 guests, for example.
Tks! Nice job by the way, keep on.
October 18th, 2010 at 7:19 am
@Jadher I also own a Zoom H4n if I really wanted to record three labs at the same time on individual tracks. Then again I also own three Zoom H1’s.
October 29th, 2010 at 2:31 am
hey,
has anyone tried to hook this ATR3350 into a VXLR connector and run it into the Zoom H4N through one of the line inputs? I just tried and it seems to not be giving a signal, wondering if i’m missing something here?
October 29th, 2010 at 6:07 am
@Jake – The ATR3350 is a mono microphone and only uses one channel (left I believe). The adapter you have might be mono also, and possibly using the right side? That’s the only thing I can think of.
November 13th, 2010 at 7:12 am
Hi,
can you tell me if the ATR3350 work with “plug-in power” of the Zoom H1 or if they really need the battery despite plug-in power?
Regards,
Oliver
November 13th, 2010 at 8:12 am
@Oliver – It does not work without the battery.
February 2nd, 2011 at 1:53 pm
Just bought 2 a couple of weeks ago.Today on Amazon for $19.00.Test at http://vimeo.com/19129323
February 26th, 2011 at 1:02 am
You should also look at the Olympus ME-15 lav mike. The cord is shorter meaning less bulk and handling for situations where the H1 is carried on the same human as the lav. Also it doesn’t need a battery since it’s powered by the host device, so there are no thingies hanging off the cord to get in the way.
I just plugged my ME-15 into my H1 and verified that it works. I find that many of these portable recorders provide the phantom power even though they don’t mention it.
February 26th, 2011 at 10:54 am
Emm,
Would there be any diff in quality if you used this mic plugged into an H1 versus an H4n? I know very little about audio. I just recently used an H2 without a lav and it sufficed for a really basic job. The $50 AT lav we got was actually broken and we didn’t have time to get a new one so we just recorded using the H2’s mic.
Thanks,
Paul
February 26th, 2011 at 11:08 am
@PK – It would sound much better through an H4n. The H4n’s pre-amps can boost a signal and keep it clean. It’s a cheap LAV that will get you through many jobs, and eventually you can upgrade to some real high end stuff. So far this cheap one has been working for me next to my shotgun microphones.
March 2nd, 2011 at 12:28 pm
Is it generally better to go for a Stereo mic over a mono? Does it matter much?
March 2nd, 2011 at 1:06 pm
@Racer – I think it depends what you’re recording, but I like hearing in Stereo if it calls for it.
March 2nd, 2011 at 3:20 pm
Thanks, but are there any real advantages over a Stereo mic? for example can I achieve the same by affect as a stereo mic by using a mono -> stereo adapter? Will it give me the same affect?
March 2nd, 2011 at 3:25 pm
@Racer – It will not give the same effect. If you have stereo headphones or speakers you can actually tell left from right when the audio is playing back.
March 3rd, 2011 at 4:16 am
Thanks, very much appreciated.
March 20th, 2011 at 4:07 pm
Anyone know how these compare to the Giant Squid Audio lavs?
March 29th, 2011 at 8:30 am
I have one ATR3350 and an H1. Great sound for just one talking head, but need to shoot a two-person sit-down interview. If I get another ATR3350 how do I get both mics into the H1? Do I need a mixer?
March 29th, 2011 at 8:40 am
@boo radley – The ART3350 only puts audio into one channel (one side). If you’re crafty you could find a way to get one to the left and one to the right side of the recording. The problem though is you can’t adjust each one seperately. There’s an image shown here: http://www.juicedlink.com/audio-preamps-mixers-etc-c-66/ds214 where the DS214 can take two microphones and you’ll be able to adjust each left and right channel seperately.
August 20th, 2011 at 11:22 am
Hey Emm, awesome recommendation! I bought two H1’s and two ATR-3350’s because of this post!
I had a question, how did you trim down the ridiculously long chord? Is it hard? Do I need to solder?
August 20th, 2011 at 12:59 pm
@shane – It’s not too difficult. There are two wires inside, one set runs on the outside, and there’s another wire that runs down the middle. As long as you isolate each one from crossing you can reconnect them. You might have a bit of a bump where it connects if you’re not familiar with soldering, but as long as they are reconnected it will work.
August 20th, 2011 at 3:17 pm
Emm, thanks brotha. Just got done cutting off the insane amount of excess cable. Worked just fine except now I’m getting two different levels from each mic. I made sure to isolate the cables with heat shrink so I don’t know what’s going on. The different levels aren’t bad, and their is no weird distortion or anything, but one is definitely “hotter” than the other. By the way, the experiment was done by plugging one mic at a time into one H1 and monitoring the sound with studio headphones. Have you tried both mics side by side?
August 20th, 2011 at 3:34 pm
@shane – Not sure how large of a connection you have, but that could be causing resistance in the line.
August 20th, 2011 at 3:46 pm
I just soldered the conductors, wrapped em’ in heat shrink, and that was it. What method did you use?
August 20th, 2011 at 5:58 pm
@shane – Same method, but keep the solder to a minimum.
September 10th, 2011 at 7:08 am
Emm,
i got a question. is it easy to cut the 20′ cord down and soldered back together? what do i need? never done something like this before and i guess i will try. i want to Lav the mic in groom’s pocket and w/ 20′ cord, im not sure how he will like that. hahaha! any help will help.
i did get the Azden EX-503 Lavalier Mic, but it doesnt appears to pick up the person w/o the mic as great. (volume level become low). if its on the person, sounds great.
btw, i got the Zoom H1 recently thx to your review. love the recorder
john lo
September 10th, 2011 at 7:14 am
@johnlo – There’s just two small wires. One runs on the outside of the other wire. You just need to connect them back after you cut them, and make sure they don’t touch each other. It’s not very difficult, just try not to make the re-connection very large.
September 10th, 2011 at 7:23 am
@Emm, thx for speedy reply. where would be the best place to cut it? or it really doesnt matter?!
September 10th, 2011 at 7:47 am
@johnlo – It doesn’t matter, but I would start in the middle and not too short. In case you have to do it again, you have room.
September 10th, 2011 at 9:59 am
Thanks Emm, time to pick up a soldering gun at Home Depot. I will let you know how it turns out
September 11th, 2011 at 6:41 pm
re comment above about using this microphone without a battery: I’ve seen a posting by a respected videographer on a cinematography list that says you can rewire this lav directly to a mini jack, without the battery box, and it will work on the plug-in power of the H1. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I believe him about this.
September 14th, 2011 at 3:49 pm
Emm,
just wanted to say thx. Finally soldered the wire and made it shorter. took me three tries, but finally got it.
March 7th, 2012 at 5:40 am
Hi, I have the ATR 3350 but I can’t get it to work with my zoom H4. I have a 1/4 ” jack adapter for the mini-plug but no sound enters the zoom. If I plug in my Sony ECM-S959C microphone (also with the 1/4″ adapter) it works on the zoom— But not the A-T lavalier mic… which, otherwise works on my camera etc. I can’t figure it out unless it is the adapter that for some reason doesn’t work well with the A-T. Any ideas?
March 7th, 2012 at 8:47 am
@Dawn – The ATR3350 is a mono LAV and only sends audio through one channel. I wonder if your adapter is not the correct type for the one side it needs. The Zoom H4n also has a 3.5mm input so you don’t need to use a 1/4″ adapter. Just plug it straight in.