AVerMedia has put its hands into a lot of different types of gear, mainly aimed towards the content creator. Perhaps best known for their capture cards, they have, on occasion, delved into the webcam and microphone market from time to time. Their most recently released microphone, the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350, is a pretty big leap from their earliest days, with spectacular design and the promise of big sound.
In the box, you get the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 with an attached bracket to connect to a base (also in the box) or a mic arm, a lengthy USB-A to USB-C cable, a USB-A to USB-C adapter and a 5/8“ to 3/8“ thread adapter. The base is a decent weight with good rubber footing that covers the entire bottom surface.
On the mic, you have two knobs; one to control your mic gain, and click in to mute, which will activate the small white ring surrounding it to indicate that you are muted. The other is to control your headphone volume. Clicking in on that knob will let you switch what you are monitoring between your PC and your microphone.
On the bottom of the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350, you have your USB-C Port and headphone jack for zero-latency monitoring, as well as a toggle to switch your polar pattern between cardioid and omnidirectional. I am on record as saying that the time for omnidirectional desktop microphones is comfortably over at this point, but you have the option nonetheless.
The design of the bracket attached to the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is one of my favourite bracket designs on a microphone. It has a unique shape that is visually appealing, but the carved-out groove that runs down the middle of the bracket allows you to neatly run the cables from the bottom of the mic through the back. This is a feature that exists on very few microphones, and while not a game changer for the industry as a whole, it is a quality-of-life update that I really appreciate.
The AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is a collaboration with Dirac, a company dedicated to optimizing audio for all sorts of devices, from car stereos to surround sound systems and everything in between. The collaboration was not in vain, for the out-of-the-box sound quality is quite good. You get the usual room noise attributed simply to being a condenser microphone. The better the sound treatment in your room and the fewer things making noise in said room, the clearer the audio will be, but AVerMedia has prepared an impressive solution to this problem and gives you a lot more with the AVerMedia Vibeengine.
“The design of the bracket attached to the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is one of my favourite bracket designs on a microphone.”
VibeEngine is AVerMedia’s software solution that not only helps perfect your sound but is a full-on mixer with a few extra toys for your enjoyment. The software has several preset “scenarios” that optimize your mic for chatting, podcasting, singing or using an instrument. It offers several forms of Noise reduction, including AI Noise Removal (either their own or, if you have an RTX GPU, NVIDIA Noise Removal), Echo Removal for people using their mic in an environment with a lot of hard surfaces, a Noise Gate and a de-esser.
In addition, they offer voice effects, giving you control over the mic’s EQ, a compressor and limiter and manual controls for voice changing settings ranging from pitch to reverb. If you don’t want to play with the manual controls, they have you covered with Voice Changer Presets, which consist of male and female voices (The male one made me feel self-conscious about my own speaking voice, but that’s a problem for my therapist to solve) and go a little stranger with robots, monsters, babies aliens and ghosts. You need to have an AVerMedia account to access all of the presets. If you choose not to do that, you are limited to male, female and robot.
You also have a device control tab which takes the controls on your mic and lets you adjust them on your PC (except the polar pattern toggle). It needs to be noted that these changes are not reflected on board the microphone, so if you are using VibeEngine to make changes, you need to select VibeEngine’s streaming output as a source wherever you are using the AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350.
If you select the mic itself, you are outputting the raw audio. It is also worth noting that this processing takes up resources on your CPU which, for people without a lot of resources and may be trying to stream, can impact the stream’s performance. This is only in cases where the computer is closer to the low end of the needs of a stream, however.
The mixer in VibeEngine is also unique in that you can create your own mixes beyond the stream mix and monitor mix that are available by pressing the plus button below them. You can also make mixes that share the same mix as another one or start a new row for another unique mix. There are use cases for this. A multistreamer could, if they were creative, send one mix to one stream and one mix to another. Say one platform is a little tougher on DMCA takedowns than another, you can send one with music to one platform and leave the music out for the other platform.
“The AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is a good microphone made great by its software.”
The AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 retails for $199.99 USD. It’s at a price point consistent with hardware with a good software solution. It, however, lacks a certain sexiness in terms of on-board features that the mic offers. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing missing from this microphone, but some people are looking for more aesthetic features like RGB, onboard processing (both BEACN mic) and even the XLR/USB hybrid option (RØDE PodMic, RØDE NT1 Gen 5), which a lot of other mics offer.
It’s also slightly overpriced for people who just want a mic that sounds good. The market is flush with microphones, some big brands and some small ones, that can give you great out-of-the-box sound (Neat King Bee II, Sennheiser Profile), but as a more bare-bones setup, it costs you a lot less, saving you upwards of $150. But when you break down everything that this mic can do for you with the addition of VibeEngine, you have a powerful tool for content creation, and that is worth the money, but only if you are going to take advantage of the software.
The AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is a good microphone made great by its software. Its all-metal design is sturdy and sleek, with function added to its fashion. The mic’s audio quality is more than competent, and its only real drawback is the consumer base who will pay the price in a saturated market. If you take the time to see their great leaps in both microphone hardware and software capabilities, you’ll see that AVerMedia is a proper contender in this space now and in the future.
The AVerMedia Live Streamer Mic 350 is a good microphone that I fear could be lost in the sea of good microphones available right now. They’ve made a serious effort to deliver a quality line of mics that stretch beyond what they’ve done before, and that is the case with this mic. Add to that the best software I have seen the company offer, and you have something worthy of your attention.
