Enter the Røde Podcaster: This USB microphone promises to make recording professional-sounding audio with your Mac really simple. But does it live up to the promise?

What’s in the box

The Podcaster comes in a sturdy black box: Apart from the mic itself, you’ll also find a USB A to USB B connector (the kind most printers require but never include), and an adapter ring for connecting the mic to a stand.

Build Quality

The microphone has a solid metal enclosure that gives it considerable heft and weight, but in a really good way. It has a fairly large pickup area that is also protected by the outer casing, which is good as the mic grill is something that is often damaged by knocks or drops on traditional microphone designs.

The adapter screw also doubles as the USB port enclosure and is also entirely made out of metal. This should also do wonders for this mic’s durability, as the stand adapter is often under a lot of strain on mics and can often crack if made out of plastic.

The one minor gripe I have is the headphone volume control on the front of the mic: It’s made out of plastic and feels a bit wobbly and out of place on a mic this well made.

Audio performance

Probably the most important factor when choosing a mic: How good does it actually sound? Røde promise “High quality broadcast sound” and I’m pleased to tell you that the Podcaster delivers. It has an incredible textured sound that gives recordings a “studio” feel. It sounds very accurate without too much treble and produces clean, warm audio.

A normal recording setup requires:
- A mic
- A mixer with preamps and monitoring capabilities
- An audio interface

Whilst there are some solutions out there that can act as an interface as well as a mixer, this mic is so much quicker to get set up: A single cable to your Mac, plug in your headphones and you’re set. Ever tried to record decent audio without hearing yourself? Or without hearing your overall mix? Getting monitoring set up (without a delay!) is usually more trouble than it’s worth – the Podcaster solves that issue nicely and you have zero timing issues.

I’ve created a short audio snippet to give you an idea of the audio quality: Both the voice and guitar heard in this video were recorded with the Podcaster.

Compatibility

The Podcaster works out of the box with OS X: Just connect the USB cable and you’re all set. There are some Windows drivers and applications on the CD that’s included, but you can safely ignore those. Fire up Garageband, select one of the vocal presets and you’re good to go. It also shows up as an audio output device immediately as well.

Tip: Remember to turn off Garageband’s live monitoring feature if you use the Røde as your output device (the mic will already pipe your audio to your headphones) – otherwise you’ll start hearing yourself twice!

Conclusion

The Røde Podcaster is a great microphone for any Mac user. It is well suited to creating podcasts, screencasts, movie voiceovers and even recording music. The build-quality is almost flawless and it offers an ideal feature combination of features for fast and easy recordings.
I’ve found myself quickly recording song ideas and voiceovers, simply because it’s so much less hassle to do so (previously I had been using an interface with a traditional microphone, which usually required extensive setting up and configuration to get decent results).

The Podcaster includes a 10 year guarantee and is available online for around $229 – less than a traditional microphone, audio interface with mixing capabilities would cost you. The convenience and audio quality you get for that price is currently unmatched in my opinion.
Highly recommended.

Links:

Røde Podcaster manufacturer website

Support Jetplane Journal: Buy the Rode Podcaster at Amazon.com

1) Audio Issues

Low call volume, background noise and feedback are some of the problems you might typically run into.You can avoid most of these by using a headset (luckily now also available in better-looking behind-the-head designs, but if you don’t happen to have one handy, try these tips:

Volume

iChat tries to automatically optimize the call’s volume, but you can increase the overall volume of the call in the “Sound” section of your System Preferences. Under the “Input” options, drag the volume slider to your preferred level and also check “Use ambient noise reduction”, to minimize background noise.

Feedback loops

To prevent feedback, try lowering your volume, or either use external speakers and keep them pointed away from your Mac’s microphone. Alternatively use headphones along with the internal microphone.

2) Connection issues

Port forwarding

If you receiving a lot of connection issues whilst trying to a new video chat, try activating Port Forwarding on your router. Whilst not strictly necessary, it seems to make connecting more reliable in my experience. iChat uses the following ports: 

5060, 5353, 5678, 16393-16402 (UDP) and 5190, 5297, 5298 (UPD & TCP).

If you’re unsure how to configure Port Forwarding on your router, head over to the handy PortForward.com website, select your Router’s brand and model and then select “iChat” as your application for full instructions.

Audio or video keeps breaking up 

iChat adjust the AV quality depending on the available bandwidth. However this can sometimes cause jerky video or choppy audio if the available bandwidth fluctuates.

To fix this, open iChat’s Connection Doctor from the “Video” menu and select “Statistics” from the drop down menu. Monitor the bandwidth values and make a note of the general average. Then head over to iChat’s Preferences (iChat > Preferences) and select the “Audio / Video” tab.

There you can specify a bandwidth limit. Select the value just under the average you made a note of above. That will force iChat to reduce the overall quality of the call slightly, but the quality should be more consistent. 

3) Auto-Accept calls

If you don’t want to have to dash to your computer every time you receive a new call, you can also get iChat to automatically accept all incoming calls.

Go to the “Events” in iChat’s preferences and select “Video Invitation” from the “Events” list. Then check the “Run Applescript” box and choose “Auto Accept.applescript” from the list. 

(Note: If you only want to auto-accept calls from certain contacts check out the free iChat utility, Chax).

iChat is a great tool for keeping in touch, so I hope these tips can help make it even better for you guys!