Episode 133
Elgato Wave Mic Arm Pro vs Rode PSA1+ Boom Arm Battle
I’ve tested and used a lot of podcasting equipment at this point in my career.
Before I was a podcast producer, I was a musician, so the love of gear runs deep. Anything that I can get my hands on that is going to improve the sound or the functionality of my setup is something I get very excited about.
I also feel like at this point I’ve learned the difference between good and great and I’m quite partial to a gear battle.
So here we are. We’ve got two microphone boom arms in the arena that I have rigorously tested. The Elgato Wave Mic Pro and Rode PSA1+. They’ve both been tested in the studio here at Bamby Media HQ, and out on location in various recording environments. I’ve narrowed the battle down to a few key areas that are worth taking into consideration.
Ladies and gentlemen, let’s begin.
CHAPTER MARKERS
00:00 Introduction: The Battle Elgato Wave Mic Pro vs Rode PSA1+
00:53 Boom Arm Aesthetics: Elgato vs. Rode
03:35 Cable Management Showdown
06:10 Noise and Sound Test
10:00 Setup and Customization
12:50 Branding and Final Thoughts
15:41 Conclusion and Personal Anecdote
Full disclosure: Elgato sent me this Wave Mic Pro but all opinions are my own. They did not instruct me to make a video, an article, a podcast episode. They have had no input into my decision to battle or review this product. I purchased the Rode PSA1+ myself. No sponsorships influenced these findings - just real-world experience from hours of professional use.
Where to Elgato Wave Mic Arm Pro:
Australia - Amazon
USA - Elgato Website
Where to Buy Rode PSA1+
Australia - Amazon
USA - Amazon
BAMBY MEDIA LINKS:
Custom Review Of Your Audio/Edit
GEAR WE USE HERE AT BAMBY MEDIA:
Aputure Amaran 200d LED Video Light
Pre-Amp/Mixers we recommend
Transcript
Why do I have two microphones in my face right now?
Speaker:Bit weird.
Speaker:It's because I am battling two boom arms, not two microphones, two boom arms.
Speaker:We are going to battle the Elgato low profile pro boom arm versus the.
Speaker:Rode PSA one plus boom arm on these boom moms.
Speaker:We have decent sized mics.
Speaker:We have the S SE DC M eight, which is my favorite microphone.
Speaker:I've done a bunch of battles with this microphone.
Speaker:Oh my God, I love it.
Speaker:It's a great microphone.
Speaker:Then we have on the PSA one plus the Sure MV seven plus.
Speaker:I have not reviewed this microphone yet.
Speaker:You are not hearing the audio from this.
Speaker:You're hearing the audio from this, the DCM eight.
Speaker:So for now, that is what's going on.
Speaker:We're going to assess them based on, I think, what is the key factors for a boom
Speaker:arm to be something that is worth using.
Speaker:Worth your time.
Speaker:Number one, the actual.
Speaker:Look of these boom arms, because to me that's actually fairly
Speaker:important, especially if you're gonna be on camera like I am.
Speaker:You wanna make sure that not too much of your frame is
Speaker:taken up by a big old boom arm.
Speaker:You know, you've already got a microphone, which is, in this case pretty hefty.
Speaker:Just the microphone itself is quite hefty.
Speaker:So to have a boom arm also in the shot is a little bit annoying so
Speaker:we've got a lot of room either side.
Speaker:We don't have anything up the sides.
Speaker:It's low profile.
Speaker:The microphone's coming up from the bottom.
Speaker:The microphone's the thing.
Speaker:That's the biggest thing.
Speaker:But this is also like a podcast.
Speaker:This is a podcasting channel.
Speaker:I want a really good microphone, nice and close to my mouth.
Speaker:So that's the decision that I've made on purpose as far as the actual
Speaker:boom arm, how it's looking on camera.
Speaker:You can barely see it.
Speaker:And what you can see is seamless with the black of the microphone
Speaker:and then the black of the actual design of the Elgato boom arm.
Speaker:So I am very pleased.
Speaker:This is an A for me.
Speaker:Big tick, a plus for how much space.
Speaker:This actually takes up in my frame.
Speaker:Now my frame is a smaller frame.
Speaker:If you were doing a podcast and you had like a panel discussion and you
Speaker:have lots of people and you need a lot of space and you're obviously
Speaker:having a wider shot, you're gonna see more of the boom arm, but it's
Speaker:still low profile enough that it's not
Speaker:bringing attention to itself.
Speaker:It's sleek.
Speaker:The design is really just minimal, and I love that.
Speaker:I love, love, love that.
Speaker:So now I've just switched to the Shure MV7+, the microphone.
Speaker:Okay, we've got more in the actual frame here.
Speaker:I personally think that the Elgato wins because this one has more of
Speaker:it in the frame, and I can't avoid this like Rode branding either.
Speaker:In fact, something I did do on the other side of this Rode, boom arm was
Speaker:I actually super glued a Lego base.
Speaker:Onto the section where this Rode bit is so that I could put some Lego people
Speaker:on it and make it more branded to me instead of like, Hey, here's Rode.
Speaker:I'm representing Rode.
Speaker:Look at all the Rode things I have.
Speaker:I do really love Rode.
Speaker:Okay Rode is a great company, but I don't want a massive Rode symbol
Speaker:in all my videos all the time.
Speaker:So that's something that I had to do to minimize that.
Speaker:So from a way that it looks on camera.
Speaker:Rode you lose.
Speaker:This is like a CI think.
Speaker:Let's switch back to the Elgato now.
Speaker:Next thing we're gonna take a look at is cable management.
Speaker:So this is important too.
Speaker:The cable management factor for the Elgato is really quite cool.
Speaker:Elga Ddo has metal plates.
Speaker:Are magnetic that actually help the cable stay in place.
Speaker:So you run your XLR cable inside, basically the boom arm, and then you
Speaker:put these metal plates on top to keep it all in there and keep it from moving.
Speaker:So I'm gonna put it back in.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:You heard that click, it clicks into place.
Speaker:It's super strong.
Speaker:The magnets are super strong other versions of this boom arm.
Speaker:Apparently the magnets were a bit like, you know, loose and they
Speaker:didn't perform all that well.
Speaker:That's not the case with this one.
Speaker:The magnets are fantastic.
Speaker:So from a cable management point of view, I mean certainly
Speaker:in this case for my frame.
Speaker:If you can't see anything.
Speaker:It's never a problem.
Speaker:It doesn't crunch the cable at all, and it's easy when
Speaker:you're moving out of the way.
Speaker:It's not actually hurting the cable as well.
Speaker:So another A for Elgato for this cable management.
Speaker:You've done a fantastic job.
Speaker:Now let's switch over to the Rode version so that you can get my thoughts on that.
Speaker:You're probably getting a little bit of a review of how these
Speaker:two microphones sound as well.
Speaker:So cable management for the Rode, PSA one plus this particular boom
Speaker:arm has these little clips that are part of the fabric where you can run
Speaker:your cable down it, and then down all the way to the bottom of the actual.
Speaker:Boom arm they're fine.
Speaker:The clips are fine.
Speaker:They work quite well.
Speaker:The only thing I will say is that once you kind of attach them, right, the
Speaker:cable can't move very much because they're clipped in to the stand.
Speaker:And so when you're moving the stand around.
Speaker:Uh, I just, I don't like what it's doing to my actual cable itself.
Speaker:It's a little bit too tense.
Speaker:I can give it more slack in the, you know, the way the cable is running through.
Speaker:But then I've got like bits of my cable that are up like this
Speaker:because there's more slack.
Speaker:Uh, and then sort of it's defeating the purpose of there being some sort of
Speaker:cable management system there for it.
Speaker:So although it's, it's okay, uh, I don't love it,
Speaker:so Rode cable management is, okay, I'm gonna give you a B for
Speaker:this, but it's just not as good.
Speaker:It's not as good as the Elgato.
Speaker:It's not as sleek.
Speaker:I can still see the cable.
Speaker:Doesn't look as good.
Speaker:I'm gonna tell you that.
Speaker:So next thing we wanna take a look at is the sound that these boom arms make.
Speaker:So if you're a streamer or someone that like moves your microphone around a
Speaker:little bit on the boom arm, how much noise is that giving in the actual
Speaker:audio that you are, you know, recording?
Speaker:So let's do a little bit of a test.
Speaker:So I'm gonna move this around a bit.
Speaker:Can you hear that creaking?
Speaker:So the creaking is like the fabric with the cable.
Speaker:It's not actually coming so much from the actual standard self.
Speaker:Yeah, but it is there.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So there is definitely a creaking sound.
Speaker:Now what about if I'm like touching, banging the table?
Speaker:How much of that is being transferred into the microphone?
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:So it does a quite a good job of not transferring the desk noise
Speaker:through the stand into the mic.
Speaker:All I'm hearing there is the actual microphone picking it up from the desk.
Speaker:It's not being transferred through the actual boom arm itself.
Speaker:That's a good thing.
Speaker:Ah, I can't be sure what I wanna give this yet until I get the Elgato one in.
Speaker:So let's get that one in.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Now we have the elga back in.
Speaker:I just swung it back in.
Speaker:Man that's silent.
Speaker:As far as there are no C creeks.
Speaker:I cannot hear any c creeks from the actual stand itself.
Speaker:I can push it out of the way
Speaker:very easily, but in saying that, when I move this,
Speaker:the sound from the stand is being transferred into the microphone.
Speaker:Like, I can hear that sound a lot more just pushing on it.
Speaker:I couldn't really hear any movement in the Rode.
Speaker:I can hear quite a lot in the Elgato.
Speaker:It's like it's a more hollow sound and then when I hit on my desk,
Speaker:mm, I'm getting sound transference.
Speaker:Obviously.
Speaker:I can hear the hitting and the typing.
Speaker:I can hear that.
Speaker:From the mic, but I can also hear the transference through
Speaker:the actual stand itself.
Speaker:So in saying that, Ooh, this is a, this is a tricky one because I think
Speaker:for streamers and stuff like that, if you can actually hear those,
Speaker:there's like this little sound if you can hear that.
Speaker:That's not great.
Speaker:So I think that maybe even though the Rode has some creaking, the transference
Speaker:of noise into the mic will mean that the Rode wins on this one because
Speaker:it's not picking up so much of the transference from the actual table
Speaker:into the microphone itself there.
Speaker:So Rode, you win on that.
Speaker:Let's give Rode a b. Yeah, let's give Rode a B on this.
Speaker:'cause it's not an A, like it's creaky.
Speaker:Let's give the Elgato, let's give it a B minus.
Speaker:I don't think it's a C. It's a B minus.
Speaker:So that means Rode you win this round of noise for your boom arm in saying it.
Speaker:I think that, you know, that doesn't weigh into my decision as much because
Speaker:once I have my microphone in place, uh, as long as I'm not like banging my table
Speaker:too much.
Speaker:That doesn't really matter because it'll be in place.
Speaker:I won't really be moving it all that much at all.
Speaker:So it doesn't weigh into my decision as much as the other things too.
Speaker:Now, if we look at things like setup, so the setup is pretty
Speaker:much the same kind of deal.
Speaker:They both come with the attachments to be able to screw it
Speaker:onto the desk like with a clamp so that you can just clamp it on really easily.
Speaker:The Rode, PSA one plus did come with a actual like mount thing.
Speaker:That means that you could screw into your table if you wanted to.
Speaker:Not using the clamp then, and actually just have it screwed into the table.
Speaker:The Elgato did not come with that.
Speaker:I don't know how useful really that is having that extra bit that you
Speaker:can like screw into the table and attach there because I'm a person
Speaker:that wants to move things around.
Speaker:Uh, you know, I wanna change my desk setup.
Speaker:Certainly we are on location, we're recording other people,
Speaker:we're recording our clients at
Speaker:all these different places.
Speaker:So we need the clamp system more than we need something that
Speaker:actually screws into a desk.
Speaker:So it's a nice feature, but again, of shmeh, you know
Speaker:that that's a shmeh for me.
Speaker:If that's something you really need, then the PSA one plus is
Speaker:gonna be your winner in that regard.
Speaker:But yeah, both have a similar system that just screws into the desk.
Speaker:I do find that the Elgato screw system, though, uh, it's a wider
Speaker:base, it clamps easier, it can clamp on more things more easily.
Speaker:The PSA one plus is a smaller clamp.
Speaker:The actual section that grabs is a lot smaller, and so I
Speaker:found that more challenging.
Speaker:I believe that the Elgato wins for its clamp system,
Speaker:the way the setup works there.
Speaker:The other thing in the setup that I really like about the Elgato is that it
Speaker:actually has a bit of customization in it.
Speaker:You can actually.
Speaker:Like take a bit of the stand away and then just have one
Speaker:section, not the two big sections.
Speaker:Meaning that if you don't need it to be a super long stand,
Speaker:you need it to just be shorter.
Speaker:You want it to come up in a different way, then you can do that.
Speaker:If you don't have a very big space, that's awesome.
Speaker:You can customize it more.
Speaker:I really like the fact that you can do that.
Speaker:With the Rode you can't customize anything.
Speaker:You can position it in a bunch of different places because of its like.
Speaker:You know, it's super, it can go super long it's pretty massive, like if you're
Speaker:trying to customize and get it to the place it wants to be, and it's this
Speaker:huge, big sort of arm thing in the way.
Speaker:I don't love that.
Speaker:It's a pretty big profile.
Speaker:It's definitely not low profile from a setup perspective.
Speaker:So I'm going to say that Elgato wins for setup because of
Speaker:the better screw mechanism.
Speaker:For screwing onto desks, and also the fact that you can customize it more.
Speaker:So we're gonna give the setup with the Elgato and A, we're gonna give the Rode
Speaker:probably, I mean, it's not terrible.
Speaker:This is still a very good boom arm.
Speaker:Let's go with a B, because the functionality with the screwing
Speaker:into the desk is a little bit worse.
Speaker:And then also the fact that it's not that customizable with the actual setup itself.
Speaker:Another big factor for me, and it's something I already mentioned, is
Speaker:the fact that this Rode branding drives me absolutely nuts.
Speaker:It's like, look, Rode.
Speaker:I've already bought the product.
Speaker:Okay?
Speaker:I've already like your products.
Speaker:Thanks.
Speaker:I don't need you to be advertising on every single one of my videos.
Speaker:Because you got this giant branding on it, so I don't like that at all.
Speaker:That to me is a d feature of this boom arm.
Speaker:'cause you can't remove this easily.
Speaker:I've had people like, you know, on YouTube videos showing how
Speaker:you can like scratch all this off and then it looks kind of bad.
Speaker:Like, anyway.
Speaker:I hate that feature of the boom arm.
Speaker:So you're getting a D there man.
Speaker:Uh, and then the boom arm for the Elgato.
Speaker:There is like the smallest amount of branding, you can't
Speaker:even see it on my setup.
Speaker:Elgato not shoving their branding down your face.
Speaker:And that to me is a big deal for how I want my videos to look.
Speaker:I just want my videos to represent me, to not represent other things that
Speaker:aren't sponsors, and then all of a sudden they're there on my thing because
Speaker:there's this big bit of branding there.
Speaker:So Elgato, you definitely win here.
Speaker:You have done a really great job of just providing something that a consumer wants.
Speaker:That's an A for that.
Speaker:Rode big down marks for yours and a d I'm, I'm, I'm sorry, but I
Speaker:have to give you the honest truth on this because it's important.
Speaker:And as I said, I love Rode products.
Speaker:I have a bunch of Rode microphones.
Speaker:I have one sitting right here.
Speaker:You know I got the Rode Wireless Micro.
Speaker:I haven't reviewed that yet.
Speaker:I've got so much Rode stuff.
Speaker:I don't need your branding all over my things.
Speaker:The other thing I'll mention is the actual like weight of a microphone and
Speaker:how the boom arm handles both of these.
Speaker:Boom arms handle heavier microphones versus lighter microphones.
Speaker:They both win here.
Speaker:There's no issues with either of them.
Speaker:I have put so many different microphones on this boom arm, the Rode.
Speaker:PSA one plus, it has never been an issue.
Speaker:The suspension that it has in place here, it's never drooped.
Speaker:There's never been any issues withholding any microphone at all.
Speaker:Similarly, for the Elgato, this again has not been an issue with any
Speaker:microphone that I've put on this stand.
Speaker:It also has a section where you can actually tighten your stand
Speaker:as well, using an Allen key.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:If you do have a heavier microphone and it's kind of drooping, then you
Speaker:just get the Allen key that's included and you just tighten it up and then
Speaker:there's absolutely no problems.
Speaker:So both of the stands function as they should with any
Speaker:microphone you can adjust them.
Speaker:Some microphones are heavy, some are light.
Speaker:I have not had any issues a for both of you there.
Speaker:So who wins?
Speaker:We've got the Rode PSA one Plus, and we've got the Elgato Low Profile Pro.
Speaker:It's pretty obvious who wins based on the things that I've said.
Speaker:The Elgato has provided a better product.
Speaker:In so many ways, this is a better product than the PSA one plus.
Speaker:The PS A one plus has been out for a while.
Speaker:Maybe Rodes working on some sort of other competition to the Elgato Pro.
Speaker:But to me, just go buy this.
Speaker:Boom, mom.
Speaker:It's a really good boom Mom.
Speaker:You can get it on Amazon.
Speaker:There'll be a link in there.
Speaker:It's about, for Aussies, it's 299 a UD.
Speaker:You're looking at about 180 something US dollars.
Speaker:It's not gonna break the bank.
Speaker:It's gonna last you a really long time.
Speaker:There are no issues with it.
Speaker:I love it.
Speaker:I'm so happy that Elgato has sent me this boom arm.
Speaker:Funny story with that too.
Speaker:We went out and we did an on location in store for a client.
Speaker:I. Where we bought a bunch of gear.
Speaker:We advised them what they needed.
Speaker:They had a budget.
Speaker:We adhere to that budget, and then we came with the gear that we bought for them.
Speaker:We set it up at their location.
Speaker:If you're in Australia, that is something that we can absolutely do and provide.
Speaker:Just reach out and let us know.
Speaker:Thing was is that I brought some other things with me that I thought potentially
Speaker:the client might need, and one of them was a boom arm that wasn't in the
Speaker:initial invoice that I'd sent through.
Speaker:She wanted it.
Speaker:She purchased that boom arm.
Speaker:That was great.
Speaker:But the problem I then had was I was down a boom arm and I was like,
Speaker:damn, I'm gonna need another boom arm
Speaker:now.
Speaker:I was at the washing line and I was thinking to myself, ah, I should get
Speaker:one of the Elgato low profile boom arms, because I've been wanting to try that out.
Speaker:And then literally the next morning I got an email from partnerships at Elgato
Speaker:saying, Hey, would you like some boom arms to test and see if you like them?
Speaker:And I was like, yes, that's, uh, that's, I exactly need that.
Speaker:It was like I manifested some boom arms and I hate the word manifesting.
Speaker:I like, I hate manifesting as a whole, like, um, manifesting, but I really
Speaker:did manifest a boom arm from Elgato.
Speaker:So thank you Elgato for being on the same wavelength as me, and pardon the pun on
Speaker:that one, and then giving me a boom arm.
Speaker:I'm so happy with this.
Speaker:I really recommend everyone buy it.
Speaker:I have not been told to say anything.
Speaker:I have not been told to tell you to buy this boom arm.
Speaker:I just love it.
Speaker:I really think it's a very good product.
Speaker:So yeah, I hope you enjoy it.
Speaker:That's it for me today for this battle between the Rode, PS A one plus WA
Speaker:and the Elgato low profile boom arm.
Speaker:Only thing I will say that's a long name.
Speaker:Maybe work on some smaller names for your boom arms in future.
Speaker:If you like this stuff like it, subscribe it.
Speaker:I'll be back.
Speaker:Bye.
