Judging by the picture on the front of the User Guide, it is suggested to position the microphone with its top facing the speaker. The box also contains a small folded manual with some technical details – I’ll include a scan at the bottom of this review.Īt the front of the microphone there’s a green LED, volume control knob and an on/off switch. The whole thing folds together to a height of about 18 cm and a diameter of about 6 cm (or 7″ x 2.5″). It contains the microphone with its attached USB cable, affixed to a mini tripod stand. In the box we find a silver-grey furry bag, closed with a silver drawstring.

Perfect – that’s exactly what I’m looking for. This tells me I’m not dealing with a cheap plastic product, but indeed with something that may rival the Blue Yeti. The microphone with the box weigh about 600 g, or about one and a half pounds. Picking up the box itself reveals that the product is much heavier than I had expected. On top of which a silver embossed ZAFFIRO icon greets me. Instead, it came in a luxurious matte black gift box, held together by magnets.

Unlike many of the cheaper products we get from China these days, the ZAFFIRO Desktop Mic didn’t come in a buff brown generic carton.

The first thing that struck me was the box itself. Here’s what I found after a couple of weeks of working with it. I thought I’d give it a spin – and I really like it. So I discovered the ZAFFIRO Desktop USB Mic, for over $100 less. Currently I’m using a wonderful Blue Yeti with my Mac on my main desk (or Studio A as we like to call it), and every time I do a screencast or podcast on my Windows workstation (or Studio B as we’d like to call it), I have to bring over the Blue Yeti. I was looking for another desktop USB microphone for my second desk.

Blue yeti mic not picking up sound