Creative Live! Mic M3 Microphone

A respectable option for home recording

Creative's Live! Mic M3 offers a good product for a reasonable price. You get a compact microphone with an adjustable ball joint stand, two polar recording modes (cardioid and omnidirectional), a mute button, headphone jack with volume control, and even an included pop filter.

The first thing you'll notice is the microphone's size. It's 8.46in tall with the filter and stand attached, so it's small enough to pack in a bag when you're out of the office. The mic itself is lightweight, but the stand's base is heavy at 13.4oz - while this keeps it solidly rooted, it'll add to your travel weight.

Recordings were pleasantly crisp with no ambient hum, although they were a little quiet. There's no gain control that could have rectified some of that quietness, sadly. The frequency reange of 50-18,000Hz is narrower than the 20-20,000Hz of the $49 JLab Talk GO we reviewed earlyer, but in practice it's fine. The pop filter, however, is a great inclusion, and makes a real difference to recordings by eliminating loud plosive sounds. We really love its magnetic attachment, too.

The adjustable stand is a handy way to maneuver the mic to the angle you need. You might want to mount it on a taller stand or boom arm to raise its height and counteract its small stature, though.

At $60, the Creative Live! Mic M3 is fairly priced for what it offers. That said, one of our favorite mics, the Movo UM700, has seen its cost drop from $100 to $80. At that price, the Creative has a real fight on its hands, but its Live! Mic M3 still has plenty to offer.

Creative Live! Mic M3 Microphone Features

Dual polar pattern, real–time mic–monitoring, 24–bit/96 kHz recording resolution

Creative Live! Mic M3 Microphone Price

$59.99

Good recording quality and some handy extras.