Sony has been making microphones for a long time, a very long time, but 28 years ago something special emerged from the Japanese giant. They called it the C800G and it would go on to become one of the most desirable microphones on the planet. A classic tube mic with a modern twist, the C800G’s flagship thermo-electrical cooling system and it’s unmistakeable fins quickly earned their place behind the glass in the world’s top studios. It’s known users include everyone from Kanye West to Dr Dre to Mariah Carey.
Beyond the specification sheet it’s important to focus on the real world performance of microphones, but in order to grasp exactly what it is that Sony has achieved here it’s important to understand what 50kHz actually means. Human hearing isn’t generally that great below 20Hz, or above 20kHz and so most audio equipment is made to perform well within those boundaries, this is known as Frequency Response.
Digital recording works by converting an electrical signal into 1’s and 0’s using input devices called Analog to Digital Converters (ADC) and output devices called Digital to Analog Converters (DAC). This process works almost like a movie camera, taking ‘pictures’ of the signal, but at more than 2000x the speed. How many times these ‘pictures’ are taken every second is called Sample Rate which generally ranges from 44.1kHz (pretty fast) to 192kHz (really fast).
In theory the faster the sample rate, the higher the frequency response and the more detailed the signal. It’s here that Sony’s extra 30,000hz of top-end comes into play, you might not be able to hear it, but the computer can. To cater for the Hi-Res digital format that Sony has been heavily involved with, these are microphones that can match the enormously extended range of high sample rate playback. Theoretically this dizzying extension offers your plugins greater detail to work with.