So this is going to be a story about my experience with the BOYA BY-M1 from ordering to getting it set up. I'll add a TL:DR at the end if anyone wants to just get the point.
So here's why I bought this microphone. For a long while, I have needed a mic since my headset one died and was making do with the built-in of my webcam. My expectations were low since all I needed was for it to sound decent when talking in voice chats and live streaming.
For a while, I was looking at a full-size USB mic with a boom arm for $160 + other fees until a friend suggested Lavalier mics and how they are even used in large shows, meaning there has to be some magic in being that small and still used at the high end. After some quick research, I find this, think about it for a bit and jump on the purchase a day later.
One of the first things that impressed me was the service. I didn't need to make an account here at Rubbermonkey so the process was easy for the first time. Then I get updates after ordering and I know how quick they are moving to get me the mic. After ordering on a Monday the package arrives on Wednesday the same week which was awesome, AND you guys put a Pascall milkshake & Banana fruit burst candy in with the packaging. They gave me bonus candy for a $30 mic, clearly an excellent service.
With the product in my hands' things were simple enough. Open it up, pop the bubble wrap and plug it into my PC. This, unfortunately, is where things go downhill a little bit. I could not figure out why any of my software didn't detect the device and I was really confused. A little bit of research later and I found that you need to plug the battery in for a power source which is weird because the manual said this was NOT the case. After that and some more jumping between different PC ports, I got the audio going into Discord and OBS.
When testing the quality of the BY-M1 there was a great jump for the best from the awful, echoing, and clipping mic of the webcam. Now things were better as I could hear. The mic quality isn't amazing for the $30 as you can hear a slight static and the sound of my keyboard clicks, but it was still decent and the price justifies this. Also, I could actually take those negative sounds away after spending some time in OBS by adding a noise gate and noise suppression filter.
TL:DR. The guys at Rubbermonkey made an amazing, and fast service so I had it quickly. The mic sounds decent for the $30 paid after getting through some technical issues and can be made clearer with a little bit of software.
I would recommend the BOYA BY-M1 to anyone looking for a decent first mic on a budget and are able to play around with some easy tweaks.
Read more
Read less
