From the course: Microphone Techniques: Essentials

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Maximum sound pressure level (SPL)

Maximum sound pressure level (SPL)

From the course: Microphone Techniques: Essentials

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Maximum sound pressure level (SPL)

- [Instructor] The next spec we can take a look at is maximum SPL. This is a really important specification because it really tells you how loud the source can be before the microphone will start to distort the signal. The fact that the Royer R-121 has a maximum SPL of 135 makes it so that it can handle pretty loud sounds. It's tough when you put a microphone like this on a TomTom or a snare drum or on a really loud guitar amplifier because those are loud sources. Although these Royer microphones are good at standing at especially the guitar amplifiers, they sound as good or better than anything on guitar amplifiers. But 135dB is pretty loud. If you really want to get your decibel meter out and measure how loud it is at the guitar amp speaker, this maximum SPL gives you some idea of what you're dealing with. Dynamic microphones are pretty rugged and this SM 57 doesn't even have a specification for maximum SPL because it'll handle quite a bit of volume before it starts to break up. And…

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