Audio Technica AT3035

A large‑diaphragm Audio Technica condenser mic, with shockmount, for less than £200? Paul White rubs his eyes and believes his ears...

The influx of affordable, good‑sounding capacitor microphones into the project‑studio market must have had a serious impact. The established names in microphone manufacture have already responded with low‑cost microphones of their own (AKG with their C2000 and C3000, for example), which means that the home studio owner can now make exceptionally good audio recordings for a fraction of what it would have cost them a decade or so ago.

At Attack

The included shockmount fits snugly using a groove in the mic's outer casing.

The AT3035 is Audio Technica's first counterstrike in response to this new competition, and it is a very aggressive one indeed. This new condenser mic is beautifully engineered, incorporating a large‑diaphragm capsule with a fixed‑cardioid polar pattern. A serious shockmount and a carrying pouch are also provided, yet the whole package retails in the UK at under £200. We're told that good capacitor mics are very labour‑intensive, and hence expensive, to build, but Audio Technica make the AT3035 in their own factories using high‑quality materials. So how is this sub‑£200 price possible?

For a start, many of the manufacturing stages normally undertaken by hand have been automated to reduce labour costs and aid mass production. Surface‑mount electronics replace traditional hand‑built circuit boards, and the upper half of the elegant body shell is machined from tubular stock rather than from a solid block of metal.

Audio Technicalities

The mic measures 170 x 52mm and weighs a reassuring 390g. The metalwork is finished in an attractive metallic grey, with the 25mm‑diameter capsule physically protected by a single‑layer, steel mesh basket. Switches are provided on the body of the mic for low‑cut filtering and a 10dB pad, and these are recessed to avoid accidental operation. Output is via an XLR with gold‑plated pins. The simple shockmount has been very cleverly designed and is made from reinforced plastic. It is surprisingly secure and the swivel joint is reasonably resistant to drooping if tightened adequately.

Because the microphone uses a permanently charged, back‑electret capsule, there's no need for a high polarising voltage, so the mic can run from phantom power sources from 11 to 52V DC without a problem. Its frequency response is nominally flat from 20Hz to 20kHz, with a less obvious presence peak than many other large diaphragm mics. From the supplied curve, the high end response starts to roll off at around 15kHz and is down by about 3dB at 20kHz. When switched in, the low‑cut filter (12dB/octave at 80Hz) helps to counter the proximity effect when the mic is used close up. The maximum SPL handling is 148dB, and increases to a massive 158dB with the pad switched in, so the mic should be just as at home recording artillery as vocals! Not having a Chieftain tank in my equipment rack, however, I was unable to test this...

In spite of the ability to handle very high SPLs, the mic has a noise figure of just 12dBSPL, which equates to a signal‑to‑noise ratio of 82dB (1kHz at 1Pa) — not atypical for this type of microphone. The quoted sensitivity of 25.1mV/Pa compares well with similar mics, and the off‑axis response is pretty consistent at angles of up to 90 degrees.

In Action

The AT3035 is a mic that works very well in real‑life situations, especially where you need just a little high‑frequency presence. The mic needs to be used with a pop shield when close‑miking vocals, as is common with studio mics of this type. More unusually, however, I noticed while I was checking the mic's sensitivity to handling noise that the metalwork of the AT3035 has a tendancy to 'ring' slightly when tapped with a fingernail — certainly more so than with other mics I've tested. I couldn't think of any situations where this would be a problem, given the quality and effectiveness of the shockmount, and I couldn't detect any resultant coloration in the sound of the mic during normal use, but it is as well to know that this body resonance is there if you plan to use this mic in any particularly demanding application.

I set up the AT3035 alongside the more expensive AT4033, and a Rode NT1. All three produced results of what I'd say was a similar fidelity — the sensitivity of the three mics seemed very comparable, for example — but there were noticeable differences in tonality. While the AT4033 presented a greater sense of transparency and detail, the AT3035 seemed a touch weightier at the low end. The Rode was slightly warmer‑sounding still, though that mic's less‑than‑flat high‑end response meant that the AT3035 had more presence.

On the whole I'd say the AT3035 has a nice balance between accuracy and flattery with a convincingly natural sound that should suit most vocalists. It also works fine on just about any acoustic instrument — its high SPL handling means it won't flinch at loud percussion or guitar amplifiers. At street prices, the obvious competition for the AT3035 is the Rode NT1, the AKG C2000 and C3000 and the Octava MK219/219A models. Each has a slightly different tonal character that will suit some singers better than others. I don't think it's possible to say which of these is best, as 'best' can mean different things to different people, but given its sound, its build quality and its bundled shockmount, I think the AT3035 will have no trouble attracting admirers.