How to know if a microphone has good background noise cancellation / removal?

[Hi P]

I mean before purchasing, one option is to look it up on YouTube, but is there any other way?

 

So far, with my next to zero knowledge I've come to the following conclusion:

 

1. Less than 50 bucks = microphones pickup background noise easily
2. Higher than 50 bucks = microphones do not pickup much background noise

 

I highly doubt this is accurate, but it's what I have seen from videos

[Eigenvektor]

There's always software solutions like RTX Voice, where the GPU is used to filter out background noise. Or, e.g. Krisp.

[Moonzy]

im not sure if i would want my mic to do any filtering by itself

but you can use softwares like nvidia broadcast to filter out noises, if you are using nvidia card

[adm0n]

It depends what you are asking.

The other people have mentioned, that you can always use software for noise cancellation. But there is another side to it. Microphones usually have a pickup pattern. An omni-directional microphone will pic up noise from everywhere, while a uni-directional mic will pic up noises from in front of it.

 

So based on that you can also get the one that works best for you.

[GuiltySpark_]

The only type of microphone itself with decent background noise rejection would be dynamic (as opposed to condensers). Its just an inherent part of their design. 

 

Outside of that, its done with EQ (noise gates, etc..) or software like the aforementioned Nvidia Broadcast. 

[Heats with Nvidia]

20 minutes ago, GuiltySpark_ said:

The only type of microphone itself with decent background noise rejection would dynamic (as opposed to condensers). Its just an inherent part of their design. 

 

Outside of that, its done with EQ (noise gates, etc..) or software like the aforementioned Nvidia Broadcast. 

Not exactly. For example shotgun microphones, which are the most directional microphones, you can get, are usually condensers. On some condenser microphones, you can even change their pickup pattern while you use them.

[cmndr]

Generally speaking, microphones are designed to record sound, which includes noise.
There might be some devices out there with built in digital signal processing that tries to parse out noise but I wouldn't worry much about this. 
There's also SOME microphones which are highly directional and which only pick up noise from a certain direction (this can be good or bad depending on your set up)

 

If you're using it with a computer, I'd look into something like RNNoise or RTX Voice (both usable with OBS) and setting up decent high/low pass filters that'll reject sound outside of your regular voice range. This will work better than just about anything you'd find integrated into a microphone. 

The other trick... really work on mic positioning. Further from the keyboard = better. Closer to your mouth = better. Also consider a "not loud" keyboard. 

 

---

 

From a "low jankiness" perspective certain headphones with mic arrays (Sony XM5) and certain webcameras are "not bad" at parsing out background noise. The overall sound quality isn't as good with a proper microphone though. There IS value in having the software side (OBS/RTX Voice) abstracted away and not being an issue. Speaking from experience (mic issues during a interviews - my sound was great, AFTER I got it working). 

 

 

[GuiltySpark_]

54 minutes ago, Heats with Nvidia said:

Not exactly. For example shotgun microphones, which are the most directional microphones, you can get, are usually condensers.

That's fair. I was thinking more in the inherent design and not so much the pickup pattern.