[Anthony the PC lover]

I apologize for the stupidness of my question, but I know nothing really about microphones. Myself and two friends are all out to buy new (external) microphones for our computers. One friend has a PC, the other two macs. I want to know if there is any difference in the hardware itself; I mean, are microphones universally-applicable hardware or are there PC and MAC versions? Can they be interchanged freely? I'm asking because I plan to go to an all Apple computer store, and I want to buy all three in the same place, if possible.

Thanks for your help, dudes and dudettes!

[exa]

They are all the same.

They are not the same. PC microphones will not work on the Mac, reverse is probably also true.

[Zwilnik]

PC Microphones are straightforward analog microphones, usually with minijack plugs. These can be used on a Mac for audio recording, but not for speech recognition, for which you need a Mac digital microphone, with the extended minijack plug (which won't work in a PC).
Generally, you can usually use almost any cheap microphone with a normal minijack socket in a Mac or PC for basic audio recording.

I am not so sure about that. I recently tried a microphone made for the PC, although it work on the PC, it does not work on the Mac, even for audio recording. Also, I found that the plugs on microphones for Mac and PC are the same size.

[This message has been edited by Leader (edited 05-03-2000).]

[pdjr]

My magazine has a collection of Macs and PCs. From my experience, they do not work identically. I've used a Mac microphone on a PC, but the sound level was way off. Ditto for using a PC microphone on a Mac.

Do Macs uses some sort of proprietary logic? This has always confused me.

[GORDYmac]

Microphone signals need to be amplified for use with a Mac. The PlainTalk microphone, with it's longer plug, is powered by the computer. Other devices that provide a line level signal will work fine, but a plain microphone will not work.

I got an external plaintalk microphone from the AppleStore for 15 bucks.

[Misha]

A PC mic will not work with a Power Mac (although it will with much older 040 Macs).

You can, however, use a PC mic using Griffin's NEMic adapter.

[tooki]

Basically, the Mac's mike jack is not a mike jack, it is a Line In jack, standard 2V P-P.

tooki

[zac4mac]

So, Misha, where can I get one of those Griffin adapters? want to get a headset/mic but don't want to buy Via Voice just to get one... if Griffins's adapter works, I should be able to use an "off the shelf" PlanTronics rig, yes?

[Krypton]

Originally posted by tooki:
Basically, the Mac's mike jack is not a mike jack, it is a Line In jack, standard 2V P-P.

tooki

Bugger. Wish I'd known this about a week ago...

[Weezer]

Originally posted by Krypton:
Bugger. Wish I'd known this about a week ago...

well you could have known it 4 years ago...

[tooki]

Wow, this is easily one of the very oldest resurrected threads I've ever seen!

tooki

[Krypton]

Unfortunately I had expected a cheapo PC microphone to 'just work' with it being an analogue device.

Interestingly, you can buy an amp that would make it work, but which costs five times as much as I paid for the mic - time for eBay methinks.

[goose]

Originally posted by tooki:
Wow, this is easily one of the very oldest resurrected threads I've ever seen!

tooki

I was thinking the same thing!