All right, so, as expected, this has turned into a major expense.
The final setup is:
Condensers
AKG Perception 170 - works good for small metal percussion, though not too stellar really (it does stuff like cowbell, jingle bells, tambourine, etc.). The sound's a bit cold/muffled. Not the best SDC out there, it lacks body and tends to sound cold/hollow with non-metal instruments.
MXL 441 - miscellaneous stuff like tambourine. Overall the MXL 440/441 microphones were the worst buy as they're not properly shielded (the body isn't real steel?) - they pick up the most interference, and the MXL 440 LDC works as a radio receiver, which is a major showstopper for someone living a block away from a radio station. Still, the 441 sounds nice on tambourine, it gives a more mellow/full body than the more common "treble spike" kind of sound. By the way the MXL 441 and AKG Perception 170 look almost like twins, with similar rounded-out bodies. The 441 lacks HF splitter bars, which the P. 170 has, so it's brighter in theory, but in reality it can be down-equalised and then it gives a rather nice presence/body balance.
The 441/440 pack is cheap at around a hundred $, but it's not really recommended for anything too serious. The 440 might work as a voice condenser for a singer by the way, but again, the two are so cheap most likely because of not having true steel bodies, which makes them susceptible to EMI. The 441 likes to throw EMI hum into the mixer, the 440 receives radio. Enough said.
Rode NT5 Matched Pair - everything. They work for stereo sampling and as ambience pickup in pair with a dynamic. There're critics of Rode microphones for either "not cutting through a mix" and excessive brightness. As for the first point, well, a reverse cymbal recorded with a Rode NTG-1 goes through a mix just fine, in fact it had to be subdued with down-equalising and volume drops to fit in. And anyway the way microphones are set up for recording it doesn't matter much as the main body for the weightier drums is provided by dynamics.
The NT5 may not have been the best choice, but they're not the worst either. Frankly what seems to be nicer is a pair of AT4041 SDCs, but it's a hundred more expensive, money which went for a dedicated dynamic.
Dynamic Microphones
Shure SV100 - surprise, surprise. It's a cheap dynamic (methinks cheapest dynamic Shure makes) which gives a warm sound on certain instruments, like bass drums (not a standard battery bass kick, something else entirely, samples coming later). The trick with the more delicate instruments is to take the metal windcage off. Also it was always equalised to compensate for its frequency response, and then it sounds quite full-bodied (opposite to what it sounds like unequalised, with too much empty treble). The best samples produced by SV100 are of coarse-grain maracas.
AKG D-40. This is a possible "SM57 killer". Where the Perception 170 disappointed with its anemic sound, the D-40 surprised by even recording stuff like bells and shakers nicely. This is a microphone designed specifically for recording instruments, and it comes with a drum rim mount clip. The manual mostly deals with recording drums, but it can also be used for wind instruments. AKG's own description is "rugged instrument microphone for onstage use". The D-40 is short, so that even when clipped on a drum it leaves enough space for the drummer to hit at.
Again, the trick is recording with the metal cage head screwed off the microphone. This gives a more intimate, warm sound, though obviously this is not recommended for gigs.
One flaw with the D-40 is that it likes to overdrive/overload, responding with squelching when there's too much air movement. You can't just stick it into a bass drum, in other words. It also needs a lot of gain, driven next to maximum on the mixer. The sound is nice so far, the typical setup is AKG D-40 on bottom picking up exhaust, NT5 picking up the top hit.
Of course either microphone has to have phase switched in the editor, fortunately REAPER has a phase-invert button on each track.
The one setup that also worked quite nicely is SV100 for bottom, Perception 170 on top. They compensate for each other, the SV100 is warm with low midrange presence, the 170 gets the high midrange/treble/space. You can stick the SV100 into a drum or close to exhaust and it'll usually work, even with bass drums.
Bottom line is, no matter what, what gives a nice presence and warm sound is really a combination of dynamic and condenser. IMHO, what would work for recording a whole drumkit is dynamics on drums and overhead condensers for cymbals and ambience.
Now, about the other bits of gear...
The mixing console is a small thing, Yamaha MG-102C, with only 4 microphone XLR sockets and only 2 channels output. You could use the effect send sockets for more (?). Anyway, it's obviously a "budget" thing made by Yamaha, with a plastic body. It sure seems to have a steel cage inside though, as it doesn't get interference and the sound is pretty clean (Yamaha states a ~100 dB SNR). MG-102C is about the size of a 15-inch notebook computer, though it's a tad taller with all the knobs on top. The power supply is a minibrick with two cables, fatter and shorter than a notebook power supply.
The sound interface is Roland UA-1G, which sadly has been killed off by Roland. It's a 2 in/2 out arrangement. The nice bit about it is the analogue attenuation circuit with a control wheel on top of the interface. So the recording level is simply adjusted by the wheel, old-school. The attenuation seems to kick in at about -3 dB, soft-clipping the signal. No harsh digital peak distortion, ever. But, the circuit is a bit noisy.
The notebook, the mixer, sound interface, and some microphones (P. 170, D-40, SV100) all fit into a largeish backpack, complete with all wiring, and there's still space left for a small bag with Akai LPD-8/LPK-25 MIDI controllers. The backpack gets packed tight then, and the whole setup is a bit heavy (~10 Kg). Still, it works, though for battery-powered recording the only option is a dynamic plugged directly into the sound interface on an unbalanced cable.
