All user reviews for the RODE Procaster

An excellent professional quality broadcast style large diaphragm mic. Bulletproof build quality and a 10 year warranty.
Microphone has a distinctive character audio with a boost around 80-100hz that gives voices a lot of "ooomph" that may or may not suit your taste. Works well for announcer type work and is also an excellent HAM radio mic. Audio is quality is great, equal to dynamics at any price and background sound rejection is excellent. Available shock mount is very good.
Cons might be the distinctive sound character, but that may be a pro as well depending on your tastes. Mic is also pretty heavy so a cheap boom is not going to work. Mic requires a lot of gain, a minimum of 60db to really work properly.

If you like what it does to your voice, have good preamps or a FETHead or Cloudlifter, this will be a fantastic deal and the last mic you will ever buy.

The Podcaster is a podcasting mic, it can be used for studio recordings, just depends on what you wanna do and how you want to use it

Let's get into some details

OVERALL OPINION

I've worked with a lot of different microphones over the years. Condensers, dynamics and Usb versions of both. One thing I've always hated was having to adjust my preamp pick up for the environment that I want to record in. True, recording in my studio always worked great because I have it setup for recording, but sometimes I just want to record in the living room/dinning room.

If you've worked with any kind of condenser mic you know they are great for picking up detail. If your recording environment isn't setup for recording you're bound to pick up a lot of background noise, that's just the way it works. The Podcast has a really right cardiod pattern allowing it to block a lot of that extra noise out focusing on the source that is directly in front of it (that being you, your voice)

The podcaster reproduces sound very accurately and it's built to last. I've dropped it 2 twice ON PURPOSE! I did this because, the supplier told me if it broke he'd give me 2 heh so, I thought I'd try my luck. It still works and sounds great. It does come with a heavier price tag than most dynamic mics, but it's worth it in my opinion.

Here are the Pros

Good solid build
Comes with a good warranty 10 years (if registered at Rodemic.com)
Mic stand clip (comes with it)
Quality sound
Excellent noise reduction
Not a lot of self noise

Here are some cons

Doesn't come with a lot of features (not important)
No shockmount – this was a downer for me. Luckily I had my own shock mount
price tag – might be a little rich for some people on a budget.

Dynamic microphone, sturdy, with a nice build quality and finish.

OVERALL OPINION

Knowing that it is a destination radio microphone, I will speak as such.
The microphone is perfect for capturing the voice spoke, he tone of RE 20 with a little roundness of the SM7B.
Knowing that the microphone is only part of the final rendering of your voice, it is ideal for budget:
Rode Procaster: 150 €
Suspension arm +: 150 €
+ Preamp treatment DBX286a: 200 €

If you only have € 500, do not buy a microphone like "Electrovoice RE 27" behind without treatment, otherwise you will be very disappointed with the result.
In the above config for 500 € you have a complete set-up, convenience and sound quality that will bring honor to your project.

- Dynamic Microphone
- Polarity cardioid
- Horizontal positioning (as a vocal microphone)
- Frequencies 75Hz - 18kHz
- Impedance 320 Ohms
- Sensitivity-56.0dB re 1 Volt / Pascal (1.60mV @ 94 dB SPL) + / - 2 dB @ 1kHz
- XLR
- Dimensions 214.00mm x 53.00mm
- Weight: 695g

- Sound quality broadcast, built for voice
- Level out for a high dynamic
- Suspension of the internal capsule
- Suspension Rode HBP1 very effective
- Double grill and pop integrated windscreen unnecessary
- Strong, all metal, heavy and bulky, inspires confidence
- Guaranteed 10 years!

OVERALL OPINION

Warm and natural sound reproduction, in contrast to many existing condenser microphones very aggressive.
Proximity effect barely noticeable, as one stays more than 5cm voice remains natural. Closer we get "the big voice" (type trailer cinema or broadcast U.S.).
It offers good rejection of off-axis sound while leaving a good freedom of movement.
Indisputably a material cut for broadcast, podcast quality, voice-over but it is also suitable for the song, a cover of guitar or bass amp, recording wind instruments, etc. ... wherever the extreme high end is not desirable.

For such a dynamic microphone broadcast (radio, dubbing), the choice is not very large:
Electro-Voice RE20, RE27, Shure SM7, Heil PR40, Neumann BCM705 and Rode Procaster.
This is the cheapest on the list but it is nevertheless comparable to competitors, with each model's personality.