Paul White road tests Peavey's new Diamond mics, which use diaphragms coated with real diamond. Now if anything's going to add sparkle and cut to your sound, that should!

Outwardly, Peavey's new Diamond Series mics look pretty conventional. They are finished to a very high standard and have a beautifully tactile, rubberised paint finish, but they still conform pretty closely to the 'ball on a stick' idea of what a vocal mic should look like. If you could take a look inside this mic at a molecular level, however, you'd come across a few unusual features.

The Neodymium/iron boron magnetic assembly gives the mic almost twice the output of a comparable dynamic mic, but this isn't the unique feature of this mic. What makes the Peavey Diamonds stand out is a patented technique used to coat the diaphragm with a minutely thin layer of pure diamond. Peavey haven't done this to give their mics snob appeal — diamond is not only very hard, it's also extremely rigid. By applying an amorphous diamond coating to the diaphragm, it can be made stiff enough to resist distortion-inducing break-up modes without adding undue mass. Keeping the diaphragm light is an important factor in maintaining a good high end frequency response.

Other than the novel capsule design, the mic also features a newly developed, dual stage capsule suspension system to reduce handling noise. The mesh basket is also designed to be incredibly tough.

LINE-UP

The two mics reviewed are very similar: the 835 is a cardioid model; the 880 is a hypercardioid, characterised by its slightly flat-topped basket. Most dynamic mics allow you to unscrew the basket so that the foam lining inside the basket can be cleaned periodically for hygiene reasons — mouthwash is the usual method. Unusually, these mics unscrew at the ring around the basket. When I dismantled one to look inside, the capsule rotated with the basket and snapped off the wires linking the capsule to the transformer. This is quite unacceptable and is a serious flaw in an otherwise very well-implemented mechanical design.

Both models have very similar frequency response curves from 200Hz upwards, but the hypercardioid 880 has a light bass hump at around 100Hz. The presence peak for both mics is fairly broad and is centred around 5kHz, lending the mics a nice open top end — as opposed to the honkiness you can get from a narrow presence peak lower down the spectrum. The useful frequency range extends from 45Hz to 16kHz in both cases, although the proximity effects will result in a rise in bass response (as with any cardioid mic), if the mic is used close up.

"These are beautifully built mics, they look nice, and they have as low handling noise as any stage mic I've tried."

SOUNDCHECK

Fortunately, I managed to test both mics before shearing the capsule leads off the 835. They delivered a solid, confident sound with a nicely open top-end. For my money, the cardioid 835 has a slighter more open sound than the 880, probably because of the lack of bass bump in the response curve, but both sounded clear and assertive with plenty of available level.

Ergonomically, the mics have a reassuringly solid feel to them. At just over 400 grams each, I would imagine they could get a bit tiring for hand-held use. For our test, they were stand mounted and subjected to the usual indignities of a pub gig where they coped fine. I was also impressed by their resistance to popping.

REVIEW

The world seems to be full of good vocal mics, all offering something unique. Despite this, Peavey seem to have 'out-uniqued' their competition by adding real diamond to the diaphragm. Performance wise, these microphones were comparable with the top end Audix and Samson models I also use. And although no two models sound exactly the same, I would have said they were all in the same league, sound-wise.

As I point out so often in mic reviews, it's not so much a matter of buying the best specified model, but buying one that suits your voice. These are beautifully built mics, they look nice, and they have as low handling noise as any stage mic I've tried. Peavey gear always represents good value, so be sure to put these on your shortlist if you're shopping for a new vocal mic.

PVM835 £195 inc VAT.
PVM880 £195 inc VAT.

Peavey Electronics Limited, (Contact Details).