Karaoke Forums

Anyone own these? Found them for under $50. I've used Gemini wireless mics before and they seemed decent. A friend of mine has been a paid performer for around 20 years and she uses a Gemini single handset wireless that she loves.

I am impressed with the comments about the AKG dual wireless recently and I love the idea of a single AA battery lasting several shows, but @ $250-$350 for a set I'm still looking.

I still have my Nady DKW duo set that's about 2 years old and working fine-they are my first wireless mics, but they aren't as sensitive as some other mics I have used. The sound is just fine on them, they just require the mixer channel to be turned up pretty high. In small venues that can cause feedback sometimes depending on where you have to place the speakers.

Anyways, I stumbled on the Gemini Wireless and I'm curious if they're decent? I'd rather spend $50 than $250 if I can get away with it . . .

Gemini is about the same if not worse than VocoPro. You get what you pay for.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

I was hoping someone who owns them or who has used them would chime in. I've used a Vocopro VHS3000 or whatever it is and it was a decent sounding mic so I don't like generalizations. I've also used a Vocopro 4 mic wireless unit many times and it's a decent mic. People say the Nadys are garbage, but I've used mine many times with zero problems and they sound decent too.

Looking for someone who owns or has used the Gemini in question.

I use the AKG's and they're great, althought they are very sensitive (for me anyway), I use a set of Vocopro's in feedback situations, and I use a wired SM-58 as my main mic. I'd say save your money, go wired Shure SM-58 ($100) and use your Nada as roaming and back up.

What we have here at karaoke-forum is mic inflation like schools now have grade inflation. There is no F, just a rather rancid C.

_________________
[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I have a couple of SM58 wired and a very good Samson C7 wired, but I'd like to eventually get away from wired mics.

I'm not hosting Karaoke yet, I'd like to do it 2-3 nights per week down the road at some point. Right now my solo singing gigs are down since I took a daytime job and things are very seasonal here.

If the Geminis are any good they would be for both my solo singing show and for Karaoke hosting. The Nady DKW Duo are plenty good for Karaoke customers in bars and restaurants.

My hope was that the Geminis might be a tad bit better than the Nadys. If not I have plenty of wired and wireless mics, I just have an addiction to buying audio gear. I have and would consider the AKGs if down the road I focus primarily on hosting and doing my shows for a living and doing weddings. If good money is flowing in then I can justify $250-$350 for a good quality dual wireless.

Spot on Mckyj57!!

For the record, a traveling musician using a particular model means about as much as a drunk in a bar telling that your mix needs more "echo". I've seen singers/musicians use some pretty flakey and awful equipment because the price was right (i.e. Cheap). A great example, we had a singer who recorded at our studio. She used some goofy Radio Shack microphone for all her gigs (might have actually been a gemini since I think that's one of their brands). She had grown quite attached to it and said no mic she could find made her sound any better. She wanted to use it on her recording.

So knowing better, we resisted but talked her into trying an experiment with us. We did three tracks of her vocals. One with her mic, one with a simple Beta58a and one with a Neumann U87 (Large Diaphragm Condensor). While recording, she complained about the Beta and the Neumann saying her monitoring (in headphones) just didn't sound right. When it was done, we played back the three tracks, not telling her which one was which. I'm sure you see this coming, she blindly picked the track recorded with the $2500 Neumann. In fact she was blown away to find out how much she hated the track recorded with her Radio Shack mic. She expressed over and over her embarassment knowing that she had been singing with that for years. I believe after finding out she could get a Beta 58a for $130 went out the next day and got one.

Moral of the story, musicians aren't always the best judge of how their equipment sounds since they aren't hearing what's coming out of the PA.

_________________
DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

We even had our own blind test at the forum here. Just about everyone picked the good mics first and the lousy wireless last.

Believe me, if there were a good cheap wireless you would see a lot of people here recommending it. The AKG WMS40 is the best package in a less-than-pro-quality mic I have seen, though the PG58 isn't too bad. The sound is probably slightly better on the PG58, while handling noise and battery life go hands-down to the WMS40. A lot of people recommend the AKG unit as a result. Even then, you won't find me claiming it is as good as an SM58. It isn't, but at least it doesn't have a compander that kills the voice of anyone with any sort of dynamic range like all of the cheapo wireless do.

There are, to my mind, five important things with wireless mics:

1) Does it have drop outs? (particularly as people walk between it and the receiver)
2) Sound quality, particularly what happens as the energy changes
3) Off-axis response
4) Durability
5) Battery life
6) Handling noise

The cheap wireless fall down in most of those regards. The AKG WMS40 is excellent except on 2), where it is only passable.

_________________
[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

We will have to disagree on number two as I feel it is hands down better than the Sennheiser that I replaced it with.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

If that's the Freeport, I think the sound is roughly equivalent. (I own both units.) But that is really a re-badged Trantec, not a true Sennheiser head.

I would have liked the Freeport better except for 1) that stupid antenna just waiting to break and 2) chewing up and spitting out 9V batteries. Also, it seemed that the off-axis response was not as consistent as with the AKG. That makes the sound less reliable, which you could see as 2).

_________________
[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I record my singers through a decent consumer level interface, and I think that if you want to find a comparable wireless mic to "X" wired mic, expect to pay about 6-10X the price. I use two wired SM58s, a wireless PG58 as my announcement mic, and have Samson R21s as backup mics.

I left my SM58s in my mobile rig for one of my weekly gigs and ran my show with the PG58 and R21s as the singer mics.

You'd be surprised how much these two mics sound alike on a recording using the same nominal settings. The PG58 might have a slight edge, but not too much. I then compared them to a recording with the SM58s, and there was no comparison.

That was about a year ago, and it made me pay attention when I'm out at other karaoke bars of the mics they are using, and how they sound.

I have yet to hear a wireless mic that sound anywhere close to the quality of a decent wired mic. Notice I said "decent wired," not the low-end lots of yall say sounds "just fine."

Anyway, wireless mics are obviously meant to serve the need to have a mic without wires, but for anyone that is buying a wireless for the first time, just be prepared that unless you are prepared to shell out $800+ for a wireless, you are probably going to take a step down in audio quality from an established wired vocal mic like the SM58.

That said, I still love my PG58 as an announcement mic and occational mobile rig vocal mic! It is very well built, decent battery life, and I have never had any interferance problems in about 4 years of use at various venues.

_________________
C Mc
KJ, FL

Great list, I have two more to add. You may have lumped them in with #3 but they're traditionally treated separately when evaluating microphones. They are sensitivity and background rejection. Sensitivity referring specifically to pickup response on-axis but from a distance, and background rejection referring to response to sound sources from outside the polar pattern of the mic. (Usually off-axis response refers more to coloration and signal level for sound sources intended for the mic but from an off-axis position)

_________________
DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

I'll just say this. If you think Vocopro & Nady mic's sound good, then I am sure the Gemini will work just fine for you.

WOW! This has got to be the most civil microphone discussion here that I can remember. I appreciate the well thought out comments and suggestions. I'm still definitely considering the AKG and I may go that way when the money is rolling in.

I may try an experiment and see if I can get some performers and bands to try my Nady wireless to see what they say about it.

Not the mic in question, but my wife had purchased me a Gemini headset mic, the thing crackled first words out of my mouth, sounded eh eh if I was talking at a low volume, but anything with high energy and it wouldn't work, this was going through a compressor as well.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Being involved in many of these discussions I think you will find that when you do side by side comparisons with MICROPHONES / SPEAKERS / MP3's etc 90% of the the time people picked the "BETTER" choice. There is no argument that a $300 Shure Sm58 Wireless microphone is hands down "BETTER in every aspect " than a $50 set from Nady or Gemini. But the majority of these discussions start off with someone asking about a "budgeted" item and suggestions coming in for items that are unrealistic to the ORIGINAL POSTER.

Sometimes it's not about what is better a $50 item or a $600 one. It's which of the $50 items is a better choice . Think about that ......

From what I recall on this forum, and this thread is another example, most of the conversations start with, "I saw these microphones that are 1/10th the cost of the ones I know people recommend, are they good too?" or "Are they good enough?". So the result is a varying interpretation as to what is good versus not good, what constitutes "good enough" and people respond in kind.

Sorry maybe I'm too literal, but if someone asks if a set of microphones "is good" they're not asking "are these a good value for the price". They are two very different questions. And I can say at this point I know of no wireless microphone that can be had for under $400 for a single transmitter/receiver that I would title good. I know of many that offer multiple transmitters for even less money that I would say are good value for the money, but that doesn't mean they are "good".

When it comes to microphones, particularly wireless microphones, you definitely get what you pay for. There is also a point of diminishing returns where spending a few hundred (or thousand) dollars more doesn't gain you a whole lot more. Each of us has to decide where we want to draw that line. But it is safe to say you won't find a $200 Dual mic kit that performs as well as a $1000 mic kit. Features, quality, etc all come into play there.

Just like everything else in pro-audio there are a lot of factors you have to weigh too. Mics need to be chosen based on their characteristics and how they match up to a given application. There are plenty of times where a $2500 condensor is going to be a horrible choice and the $150 super-cardioid dynamic mic is going to be the tool of choice. But again, this doesn't fit into the question of "is this mic good".

Ultimately, I have no doubt that a lot of the crabbiness surrounding this topic comes from a few key aspects. 1. We revist this topic almost weekly and often times regarding the same mics. 2. People here have become annoyed with those that want to be a part of the club but don't want to pay the entry fee 3. People get annoyed with others that suggest a solution that doesn't fit the proposed usage scenario offered in the original question (either too expensive for the proposed budget, too cheap compared to the budget, doesn't meet the requirements of the application, etc).

In the end, "Can't we all just get along". Given human nature, probably not.

_________________
DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

As long as we're keeping this thread alive. I originally asked about a specific product if anyone owned or had used it.

Apparently it's either a new product or just not well known or distributed since nobody seems to know anything about it.

It's a legitimate question about a wireless mic that I've never seen before and I was curious about it. If nobody has ever seen or used one them then I could see how the thread could just quickly fade away, but it didn't.

I KNOW I can spend hundreds of dollars and get a good quality Shure or Sennheiser or Electro Voice or Audio Technica wireless set. That's easy, plunk down a lot of money and generally you get something really good. The big surprise is that the Nady DKW Duo isn't a bad dual wireless mic. I've used mine MANY times and I've gotten paid every time including last Sunday for a solo singing gig. Never once has anyone said that they sounded bad. For Karaoke use they work just fine and I bet many people who bash them just because they are Nady have never used this particular mic. If they really were crap I wouldn't have continued using them.

One thing I know from experience and I've done quite a few shows now, a good mic won't make bad singers sound good. I've used cheapo Behringer, Samson, Nady and other cheap mics and they sounded just fine. Some mics have a lot more handling noise, but many of these products that get bashed just are not that bad.

I did buy a couple of wired SM58s and a wired Samson C7 and they do sound very good, but the average Joe has no idea, no clue and doesn't care. The speakers especially and then the amp and mixer matter as much or more than the mic.

There are people that run their systems with no vocal effects. Adding some reverb or echo or delay makes more difference than if you're using a cheap mic rather than using an SM58. I'm not saying my Nady DKW Duo is as good as an SM58 wireless, but for most people it sounds plenty good. I could throw a Nady DKW Duo in the trash every year for 10 years for the same price as one Shure SM58 wireless. This is why myself and others are always looking for a "decent" inexpensive wireless.

If you're making the big bucks as a Karaoke host or if your band is terrific and getting paid a lot, then more expensive gear is justified. Most gigs for me are around $125 to $150. I can't see buying a $500 wireless mic. I also wouldn't feel comfortable handing a $500 mic to someone in a bar singing Karaoke. That's just me.

If these mics aren't bad, what mics are?

Bottom line is this -- for some people bad is good enough, and for others it isn't.

_________________
[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

And thank you, you've just demonstrated my point about each of us having our own line to draw. For you a mic that isn't bad, is good enough. For me it's not. That's my choice and yours to make.



Agreed totally, in fact in many cases it can make them sound worse as a more accurate reproduction of their voice can highlight harmonics and elements of their vocals that you'd rather keep buried.

_________________
DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke