With most of my family living in New Zealand, Skype is often the only way my parents get to to see the girls. Sad face. But it can be a pain in the long distance backside when you get a bad connection, or dodgy sound.
The sound on my old MacBook was rubbish, and certainly not helped by Lil Sis spilling drink all over it (the sound cut out completely, followed a few weeks later by the entire computer going kaput).
To be fair, the in-built mic on my replacement MacBook is pretty good, but I’ve definitely noticed that the sound is crisper and clearer using this funky Snowball professional USB mic, from Blue Microphones.
It’s so simple to use – you just plug it in via the USB cord and change your settings from in-built mic to the Snowball.
I’ve also found it’s handy for vlogging, as one of the settings helps to isolate my voice from the ever-present background noise my kids so kindly provide. For that reason it would also be great for podcasts, which a lot of bloggers are now doing.
And if you’re a bit of a muso you’ll love this too, as it can be used to record music, or vocals over tracks that you’ve composed using software such as Garageband.
So basically, any room can be transformed into a professional recording studio. I haven’t tried it out myself (seriously, you do not want a recording of me singing – unless you’re trying to scare vermin off your veggie patch) but I’ve read loads of reviews from different sites that all claim it’s a great quality option for home recording. I’ll take their word for it (see clarification above, in brackets).
If you wanna make sweet music for yourself, the Snowball is available from www.apple.co.uk for £89.95.
• the Snowball mic was provided for purpose of review
This looks awesome. With a lot of family overseas, might have to give this a go!