AKG C900
A gold-ringed handheld condenser that a Grand Ole Opry engineer took to the Ryman and the Wild Horse Saloon, and came back impressed.
Overview
The C900 was AKG's attempt to sell a stage condenser to working singers who were ready to move up from dynamics but not ready to pay large-diaphragm prices. It's a handheld vocal condenser with a matte-black finish, a 24-karat-gold-plated decorative ring, and a gold-sputtered transducer. It looks and feels like it costs more than it does. That was the point. Mix (November 2002, p.77) called the C900 the flagship of AKG's Emotion Series of performance microphones.
The PB1000 Presence Boost Adapter is what sets the C900 apart from other stage condensers. It's a screw-on cap that ships standard and adds a 3-4 dB peak between 5 and 13 kHz. Reviewer Tim Farris, writing in EQ (October 2001, p.108), found the adapter wasn't a nice-to-have. He thought it made the mic. Bare, through an AMS Neve V3 and monitored on Genelec 1031As, the C900 sounded heavy in the low end, somewhat repressed in the mids, and short on openness. With the PB1000 fitted, the same voice came alive, clear and present through the upper range, and the extended bottom read as clarity rather than mud. So check for the cap before buying one used. It's part of the sound, and a C900 without its PB1000 is only half the microphone.
The capsule's cardioid pattern is frequency-independent, which is the well-behaved way to build a stage mic. EQ (October 2001, p.108) did note one wrinkle, a spike around 10 to 12 kHz at 180 degrees off-axis, while observing that most condensers share the trait. The same review measured a slight midband suppression around 1.6-2 kHz. That keeps the C900 pleasant at high SPL instead of brittle when a singer leans in.
Durability was clearly on the design brief. The transducer case sits in a rubber shockmount ring that EQ (October 2001, p.108) described as rugged and sturdy, and it does real work against handling noise. A traveling vocalist cares about that after the third load-out. The mic's XLR output is also removable. Pull it, fit the optional TM40 UHF plug-in transmitter, and the C900 goes wireless without changing its sound or its feel in the hand. The D880 dynamic in the same Emotion line does the same trick.
The field reports are the interesting part. At Nashville's Ryman Auditorium, engineer Les Banks ran a Soundcraft SM-16 feeding 12AM wedges powered by Carver CBA-1000s. EQ (October 2001, p.108) found the C900 loud and clear there, with gain before feedback that bettered the other mics it was compared against. It also had a warmth and 8-12 kHz clarity that the dynamic vocal mics in the room couldn't approach. On a grand piano it held its own against large-diaphragm condensers costing two to three times as much. At the Wild Horse Saloon the same review's engineers high-passed it around 150 Hz and pulled about 6 dB at 400 Hz to tame proximity. After that, monitor engineer Mike Thamann called it "spectacular" and "painfully loud."
It isn't much of a collector's piece. The C900 is a working microphone, priced at $250 new. The things to check on a used example are the usual ones for a stage condenser: that the PB1000 cap is present (they get lost), that the rubber shockmount ring hasn't perished, and that the removable XLR output still seats cleanly. Mix (July 2002, p.114) noted that engineers will quickly learn to roll off the lows and cut some low-mid on the C900. It also noted that singers who like the extra power proximity lends their monitor voice will find it attractive.
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