Good microphone in a small room with two people?

[Kaare Bakka]

So, as the title says, I want to find a microphone that works well in a small gaming room where both me and my girlfriend are playing.
The case is that we are both playing the same games, and sitting in the same Discord channel with our friends. With noise suppression in discord and some settings in razer synapse, my mic mostly filter out her voice. But sometimes talking loud and laughing, our friends hears us in both our mics. Its a tough one, but I hope some of you got any experience with this and can come with some suggestions.
It would be great if you can recommend more than just one brand or model, cause i would prefer buying it in a norwegian webshop
I now got a Razer Kraken 7.1 V2. 

[JogerJ]

I don't think you'll find any other microphone that will fix your problem, something like a boom mic will actually capture all noises. You should instead manually increase the input sensitivity threshold in Discord (technically it's a noise-gate filter). There's also software solutions such as RTX voice.

If you both use headsets with analog mic input you might be able to route the mic to a single PC, then use software like Virtual Audio Cable to combine them into a single channel.

[cwheels1138]

A lot of this is about a polar pattern on the microphone, as well as its' general sensitivity.

Dynamic microphones general do better with rejecting excess sound. This is why you might see so many SM7B's and RE20's. You could find wonderful results with just an SM58 though.

If you have a USB microphone solution just be aware of how much clean gain you can actually get. Cranking that too much will just get you noise and other unwanted sounds.

[Motifator]

1 hour ago, cwheels1138 said:

A lot of this is about a polar pattern on the microphone, as well as its' general sensitivity.

Dynamic microphones general do better with rejecting excess sound. This is why you might see so many SM7B's and RE20's. You could find wonderful results with just an SM58 though.

If you have a USB microphone solution just be aware of how much clean gain you can actually get. Cranking that too much will just get you noise and other unwanted sounds.

Those first two are the examples of glorified garbage mics that are overly expensive. SM58 gets the better part of that slack simply due to its reputation of getting better when plugged to $50k worth of studio grade pro gear, or the fact that many drunk musicians rolled with it and it was reliable on the go. They're not actually good mics even the SM58 at full price.

My recommendation would be a cardioid vocal in the form of SM58 that doesn't actually suck, you could get a supercardioid with a more narrow pickup area like the S1, but those tend to be more expensive. Those legit do not pick up voices outside, however in my experience the S1 also fails to pickup lower noises compared to some of my other cardioid mics like the VX10 or the ATM710.

You'll also want a cheap interface that's decent with the mic.

[Brian McKee]

19 hours ago, Motifator said:

Those first two are the examples of glorified garbage mics that are overly expensive. SM58 gets the better part of that slack simply due to its reputation of getting better when plugged to $50k worth of studio grade pro gear, or the fact that many drunk musicians rolled with it and it was reliable on the go. They're not actually good mics even the SM58 at full price.

Bahaha what in the world am I even reading? I've recorded with many mics over the years recording music/voiceover/etc and you certainly do not need "50k worth of studio grade pro gear" to get good results. Especially in the modern era where even your entry model interfaces and mixers have extremely clean preamps with plenty of gain.

 

If you're having issues with sound quality it comes down to the user not the mic. I could use the SM57/58 for basically anything and replace my EV mics if I had to. If you don't like the sound profile of the mics that's fine but that's purely subjective and an aspect that's super easy for prospective buyers to "experience".

[Motifator]

1 hour ago, Brian McKee said:

Bahaha what in the world am I even reading? I've recorded with many mics over the years recording music/voiceover/etc and you certainly do not need "50k worth of studio grade pro gear" to get good results. Especially in the modern era where even your entry model interfaces and mixers have extremely clean preamps with plenty of gain.

 

If you're having issues with sound quality it comes down to the user not the mic. I could use the SM57/58 for basically anything and replace my EV mics if I had to. If you don't like the sound profile of the mics that's fine but that's purely subjective and an aspect that's super easy for prospective buyers to "experience".

You have zero reading comprehension, you spin what you're reading. It's known that the SM58 is pumped up to the moon on studios when plugged to very expensive equipment. I have one and when used alone on say my arranger Korg, it sucks. My other mics perform far better in such usage cases. Get real.

[NinJake]

The SM58 is a fine dynamic microphone choice for removing unwanted background noise. The SM7B and RE20 are also excellent choices.

 

The best solution would be to either each get a room, or to try and arrange your setups in a way that reduces each others' voice. (don't sit next to each other so your voices range isn't in a "line of sight" to each others' mics) Depending on the room, you could try and hang some blankets or do other types of acoustic treatment to prevent reflections.

[AAJoe]

The best advice I have is to use some kind of active noise filtering and a somewhat aggressive noise gate (which is often part of the filter). RNNoise is free if you don't have a RTX card, but a little tricky to set up. I wrote an article on how to set it up here: https://antlionaudio.com/blogs/news/free-active-noise-suppression-without-rtx-voice.

 

But at the end of the day the mic's job is to pick up sound, so there's only so much filtering and gating is going to do for two mics in the same room.

 

 

[cwheels1138]

On 7/27/2022 at 5:44 PM, Motifator said:

Those first two are the examples of glorified garbage mics that are overly expensive. SM58 gets the better part of that slack simply due to its reputation of getting better when plugged to $50k worth of studio grade pro gear, or the fact that many drunk musicians rolled with it and it was reliable on the go. They're not actually good mics even the SM58 at full price.

My recommendation would be a cardioid vocal in the form of SM58 that doesn't actually suck, you could get a supercardioid with a more narrow pickup area like the S1, but those tend to be more expensive. Those legit do not pick up voices outside, however in my experience the S1 also fails to pickup lower noises compared to some of my other cardioid mics like the VX10 or the ATM710.

You'll also want a cheap interface that's decent with the mic.

I really don't want to have to respond like this, but this reads like something a pretentious boomer would say. There's entirely too much gatekeeping in the pro-audio space, and this kind of response doesn't help.

 

The honest point of my original post was to point out that certain kinds of microphones do generally better at certain tasks when handled by someone with low or entry level experience. At no point did I say that any of the 3 devices were going to definitely give the results they wanted, more so that dynamic microphones or microphones with different polar patterns can provide some different results in each situation. All 3 are perfectly fine pieces of hardware that have found success in the commercial and hobbyist spaces. I do find it weird with how much disdain it appears you have for the SM58. I get that it's basically sub-$100, but on every album I've recorded I haven't had an issue with the results it gets, especially knowing that I don't have 50k of extra equipment with it. Maybe this user isn't trying to record a stellar album, and maybe they just wanna game in the same room as someone else? Calling some other popular mics glorified garbage also reeks of elitism. You may truly know better, but it ain't coming across with that kind of approach.

 

I think the most egregious statement was "cheap interface that's decent with the mic". Don't make such bold statements without also providing the context for what makes an interface or preamp good for the mic. That's so counterintuitive. The mics you recommended in lieu of the SM58 were price points above it, but recommending a cheap interface could mean they wind up with a truly disastrous preamp that would undermine an investment somewhere else if not utilized correctly.

 

If you know better, then do better.

 

[Fluph]

On 7/27/2022 at 10:44 PM, Motifator said:

Those first two are the examples of glorified garbage mics that are overly expensive. SM58 gets the better part of that slack simply due to its reputation of getting better when plugged to $50k worth of studio grade pro gear, or the fact that many drunk musicians rolled with it and it was reliable on the go. They're not actually good mics even the SM58 at full price.

My recommendation would be a cardioid vocal in the form of SM58 that doesn't actually suck, you could get a supercardioid with a more narrow pickup area like the S1, but those tend to be more expensive. Those legit do not pick up voices outside, however in my experience the S1 also fails to pickup lower noises compared to some of my other cardioid mics like the VX10 or the ATM710.

You'll also want a cheap interface that's decent with the mic.

This is nonsense.  The SM58 has been a mainstay for performers due to its performance/construction.  
It will run fine on a £100 audio interface (and some cheaper ones at that).  Where are you getting 50k from 
You appear to have no idea what you are talking about.  Do you even know what the gain knob is on an audio interface?

Also you recommended a super cardioid without even mentioning the fact it picks up sound directly behind the mic (unlike a cardioid).  Very important depending on their seating arrangement!

OP - go one youtube, find Podcastage, join his discord and post your question there
There is everything from streamers to pro audio guys all willing to help.