★★★★☆
While Røde built its reputation on microphones, the Australian company’s first on-ear wired headphones deliver surprising audio quality for everything from studio monitoring to casual listening. This Røde NTH-50 headphones review finds the $99 wired cans challenge what we expect from professional headphones at this price point.
Is Røde’s entrance into the headphone market worth your attention? Let’s find out if these newcomers deserve a spot in your audio setup.
It’s easy to get addicted to using Touch ID whenever you need to gain password-restricted access to anything. But not everyone is a big fan of Magic Keyboard with Touch ID (not the function, the keeb itself). Today’s MacBook Pro setup user found an odd but practical solution. They use a Keychron Q1 mechanical keyboard as a daily driver and Velcro a Magic Keyboard with Touch ID to the edge of the desk so they can reach the Touch ID button.
I’ve seen a few amazing man caves and she shacks while covering cool computer setups for Cult of Mac, but not many can compete with the home of today’s M4 Mac mini setup. The user converted a backyard shed nestled in the woods of the Pacific Northwest. So now the man shed M4 Mac mini setup doubles as a home theater sporting a gargantuan screen. You can find all the gear in the links list below for both the computer and home theater setups.
Rode Wireless Go III, the new generation of the popular mobile microphone system for content creators the company unveiled Tuesday, introduces upgrades like an expanded recording range, 32-bit onboard recording and, for the first time, a palette of vibrant color options to the $300 system. Black may go with everything, but now you have a choice of 14 colors, the company said.
Rode showcased a new microphone and two MagSafe mounts for iPhone at NAB 2024 in Las Vegas on Sunday that should serve mobile content creators like podcasters and streamers. They’re the new Rode Interview Pro microphone, the Phone Cage and the Magnetic Mount.
This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: The latest iPhone 16 Pro rumor comes with a mockup that looks like a fidget spinner. Will Apple really do that? On the other hand, the latest iPad rumors sound totally believable.
Also on The CultCast:
Listen to this week’s episode of The CultCast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video live stream, embedded below.
It might seem unlikely that a computer setup could take 2 years to build and idealize — until you see just how loaded and beautiful it is. Today’s M2 Pro Mac mini went through many iterations in the past couple of years, its user said, and now they’re finally happy with it.
And they should be. The setup rips through gaming and streaming tasks using an awesome lineup of gear. Read more below and check out that gear list.
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Some computer setups are bare-bones but functional, others are swanky as all-get-out. Leaning toward the latter, today’s setup rocks a powerful M2 Ultra Mac Studio desktop computer driving a new, 49-inch Samsung G9 super-ultra-wide display. If you’re looking for a mac mini monitor, check out this impressive Samsung ultra-wide monitor setup.
But that’s not all the finery the solid standing desk supports. Festooned with key lights, it’s also a great videoconferencing station, with a premium webcam, a mounted USB microphone and killer speakers.
Røde, maker of high-quality audio products from Australia, has unveiled what it calls “the most powerful wireless mic ever”. The Røde Wireless Pro is a system of elegant and compact microphones with an audio recorder that “delivers crystal-clear, incredibly stable audio with a range of up to 260m.”
The kit comes with all the accessories needed to connect to any modern smartphone, computer and camera rig. Røde’s GainAssist makes sure you have balanced sound in any circumstance and the Røde Central software for Mac and PC easily syncs it with your video.
The Røde Wireless Pro kit retails for $399 and will be available later this month.
This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: The latest iPhone 15 rumors paint a somewhat troubling picture. This year’s models might look a lot like last year’s models, which already seemed pretty darn familiar. Plus, is that camera hump really going to get even bigger? And will we once again revert to non-parity between Pro models, so you have to go ridiculously large to get the best features? Oh dear …
Also on The CultCast:
Listen to this week’s episode of The CultCast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video live stream, embedded below.
A top question folks have when they put together a computers setup is, “how simply can I connect everything?” How little hardware and how few cables can I get away with?
Today’s featured M2 Max MacBook Pro setup makes things easy by driving two beautiful Studio Displays with one cable via one of the best docks on the market. And don’t miss the great-yet-affordable speakers and cool podcasting gear, either.
In the battle over who offers the best 5K display, Apple doesn’t always win, even with Mac users. And it’s usually because of price.
Today’s featured Mac Studio setup relies on a 40-inch LG 5K2K curved ultra-wide monitor — picked over a pair of Studio Displays that would cost twice as much — and the user more-or-less said they they couldn’t be happier.
Apple’s 5K Studio Display in on the pricey side for many folks, so many less-expensive 4K monitors like the one in today’s featured MacBook Pro and Lenovo laptop setup tend to stand in for it.
But not every big-selling 4K display is designed to look like it belongs in an Apple setup. This one is.
Australian audio powerhouse Røde introduced five new products and two major software updates Monday — its “biggest product announcement ever,” it said — at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Show in Las Vegas.
Two new products headlined — the Streamer X audio interface/video capture card and the compact RødeCaster Duo AV production tool. The new PodMic USB, important firmware updates to the Wireless Go II mic system and the RødeCaster Pro II production tool, and handy new accessories rounded out the mix.
The new Røde Wireless ME Compact Wireless Microphone System, with clip-on transmitter and receiver, tries to make pro-level audio recording effortless — not to mention inexpensive.
With the new release, content creators who want to hit the ground running with quality audio have another option.
We often see big upgrades to setups we’ve covered here in the past. But they’re not usually comprehensive, where everything from the daily-driver Mac to the input devices to the audio gear gets made over (and in some cases greatly expanded).
Let’s just say today’s featured MacBook Pro setup looked a lot different 2 years ago. It’s more evidence that a setup is never, ever “done.”
It’s always nice to hear from professionals relying on Apple gear and finding it meets or even exceeds their expectations. That’s a good indicator that Cupertino is going in the right direction.
Today’s featured computer setup shows that enthusiasm. A mobile app developer offers high praise for his M1 MacBook Pro. And his stacked displays and raft of AV gear aren’t bad, either. Let’s take a look.
Ahoy there, would-be video streamers — today’s featured computer setup comes from an airtight and seaworthy pro streaming operation you might want to emulate.
The folks behind Sailing Illustrated streams shared their rig, based on a Mac Studio, an M1 Mac mini, an M1 MacBook Pro, a Rode RodeCaster Pro production studio and a slew of related gear and software.
Røde’s new NT-USB+ microphone brings exciting new features to the company’s well-reviewed NT-USB from 2014.
Like its predecessor, the NT-USB+ is an all-in-one microphone for streaming, capturing vocals, playing instruments and recording podcasts. The refreshed version adds higher bit depth, a built-in low noise/high gain preamp and a high-powered headphone jack to the classic model. Plus, it connects over USB-C at both ends.
We can count the number of times we’ve come across a three-Pro Display XDR workstation in our Setups travels on less than one hand — maybe two or three times. And if you throw in a late-model Mac Pro and a pile of great audio-visual gear for professional-level videoconferencing, well, that’s even more rare.
Liam Hudson, CEO of a qualitative electronic trading company, sent his “ultimate computer setup” for at-home work to Cult of Mac. And it’s really something.
Rode unveiled its RodeCaster Pro II Monday, giving content creators a powerful production studio tool that adds features over its popular predecessor, the RodeCaster Pro.
The update provides an all-in-one audio tool for streamers, podcasters, musicians and other content creators at a price you don’t need to be famous to afford.
Popular microphone brand Rode, based in Australia, dropped the mic Tuesday with major news: It’s getting into the premium headphones business.
The company rolled out its first pair of high-end cans, the Rode NTH-100 Professional Over-Ear Headphones.
Known for its flexible tripods and mobile lighting, Joby is now covering the content creator market for audio recording like a blanket. It rolled out five new microphones in its Wavo lineup to take on rivals like Rode, Shure and Sennheiser at several different price points.
The new mics mean more options for vloggers and audio streamers of all stripes. Four of the mics are available now and one, the Wavo Pro DS, comes out in March.
Joby’s deeper embrace of the microphone market doesn’t come as a complete surprise. After all, its parent company, Vitic, recently bought two microphone brands — Rycote in 2018 and Audix in January.
Earlier this month, Røde launched a new, single-set version of its popular Wireless Go II microphone with one transmitter rather than two, suiting it nicely to solo content creators.
Aimed at mobile journalists, vloggers and videographers, the Røde Wireless Go II Single is an ultra-compact, single-transmitter wireless microphone system offered at a lower price point than the original, two-transmitter set released last year.
Reader and technologist Andrew (last name redacted, so to speak) runs a “boutique AV, IT [and] cyber systems integration company from a home office” in London — though he supports sites worldwide. Clearly, he has a lot to do.
And he does it using a late-2013 Mac Pro he fondly said should be on the Death Star from Star Wars, plus a 2017 MacBook Pro he described to Cult of Mac as “perhaps the worst-constructed laptop I have ever owned.”