Review: Turtle Beach Stream Mic

When it comes to condenser mics, there is usually the one tried and true most popular among streamers and YouTubers, the Blue Yeti. And I'll agree, it's a fantastic mic with some neat bells and whistles and a pretty great build. But it is pretty bulky and heavy, and it retails for $150. Not exactly the most inviting price point. Turtle Beach has an answer to that, albeit still a somewhat pricy one, but as an entry style microphone, it certainly does the job.

The build is small yet sturdy. The mic itself is rather light but is nicely weighed down to your desk with its base. Even though its light weight can make the mic itself seem more cheap than its competition, the combination with the base make it feel slightly more premium.

You'll find all the necessary functions you'll need directly on the mic, making it viable to use on consoles without its first party software that you can download and use alongside it on the PC. As condenser mics go, you have a few different polar patterns to switch from, such as the cardioid and hypercardioid for streaming just yourself or if you're in a noisy room respectively. There's also a bi-directional and omnidirectional feature, in case you wanted sound being recorded from two or all four sides.

I was pretty excited about the hypercardioid pattern since my house isn't always quiet, especially with two kids, but sadly the noise filtering isn't all too great, and I was still able to pick up some of the occasional chatter, however, it is still a great solution when you are in a quiet room, as it really focuses only on your voice, and makes it come through extremely clear.

The Stream Mic also has a built in headset port, which lets you not only monitor your own voice and make sure it sounds great, but you can also have the game audio stream straight through there, which is almost always important since you wouldn't want that audio being picked up by the mic. Sadly there isn't a gain knob that allows to adjust the sensitivity of the mic itself, however the button that switches the patterns can be held down to switch between two modes. The tabletop mode is active when the back LED is green, and raises the gain to allow the mic to be placed on your table. The boom/close proximity mode is active when the LED in the back is off, and that's used when you have the mic almost directly next to your face, usually aided by a boom scissor arm stand. After testing both of these modes, and actually having a boom scissor arm at home, I can safely say that the latter setting is the way to go, at least if you're going for amazing voice clarity.

However, the reason you won't want to rely on the included microphone stand is because it actually picks up quite a few vibrations when its sitting on your desk, and you'll immediately hear that in your recordings. So unless you put something soft underneath, having the mic suspended above you is really the only way to cut that out completely.

The box advertises the mic for the Xbox One, but it can be used on any of your home consoles, as well as your PC, since the mic is simply plug and play. The only thing you really have to worry about is flipping a switch on the back so it's compatible with the Xbox One, or the PS4 and PC.

Normally the Stream Mic retails for $100, but it can now be found $20 cheaper on the official site as well as Amazon. If you've been looking to up your streaming game with a much better sounding mic, or you're maybe looking for better audio quality in your video productions but don't want to spend over a $100 on the Blue Yeti or other similarly priced condenser mics, then the Turtle Beach Stream Mic is certainly a great option, and provides the voice clarity you're looking for. Just remember to also invest in that boom scissor arm.