Stay away from that mic trust me.
TLM102 so much better (for vocals)

Stay away from that mic trust me.
TLM102 so much better (for vocals)

Oh joy! I own an old TLM103! I'm back in heaven! Praise jeezus!!!!

The creator of the topic is absolutely right.

Oldest TLMs have a totally different circuit, the capsule still the same.

On the left is a circuit from a OLD Tlm, the right one is a TLM circuit from Neumman site (nowadays).

Welcome, Danow!

...i couldn't care less though: i regularly get to use various tlm103's (manufactured ca. 20 years apart); with multiple mics spread over the entire stage for all sorts of instruments, i cannot notice much of a difference (if any at all).

based on some comments, i measured fr response of randomly picked tlm103's though - and guess what: they are no further apart than many other older mics i get to use (such as md441, md421, re20, km83/84/85 etc.)!

some folks are always trying to make a big fuzz out of nothing (but possibly don't even use these mics)...



[the most noticeable difference i measured is between two equally well maintained u67's: upon hearing them on any source, one cannot believe that these are two nearly identical mics (with serial numbers very close btw) - i just labelled them 'red' and 'blue' and let musicians choose :-)]

Yeah, 67's do seem to have distinct personalities to a greater degree than other condensers of a similar age. I wonder why that is.

Yeah, there was a change. I bought two TLM103 shortly after they came out. Come to find out, not unlike the C414, there are preamps that don't mate well with the TLM 103. They make it sound spitty. The Focusrite Red two channel pre being one of them.

Time passes. Someone comes to me for VO instruction. I suggest a TLM 103 and Centrance MicPort Pro. He buys them and calls to say there's a noise problem. He brings the gear here and, yes, there is a hiss problem.

I call Neumann and they say someone is coming back from Germany with new circuit cards for the TLM 103 that will probably fix the problem. They do. Don't ask me when. I forget; maybe 10 years ago.

The End.

Regards,

Ty Ford

I actually like the new TLM 103 but agree some mic pre's sound better with the mic than others. It gives a nice full sound and it's great for Podcast