Low Voltage Microphone Preamplifier with Variable Compression and Noise Canceling
This is a complete microphone signal conditioning project. Designed primarily for voice-band applications, this project provides amplification, limiting, variable compression, and noise gate. User-adjustable compression ratio, noise gate threshold, and two different fixed gains optimize circuit operation for a variety of applications.
This is a complete and flexible solution for conditioning condenser microphones for personal electronics and computer audio systems. It is also excellent for improving vocal clarity in communications and the public address systems. A low noise voltage-controlled amplifier (VCA) provides a gain that is dynamically adjusted by a control loop to maintain a set compressions characteristic. The compression ratio is set by a jumper and can be varied from 1:1 to over 10:1 relative to the fixed rotation point. Signals above the rotation point are limited to prevent overload and eliminate popping.
A downward expander (noise gate) prevents the amplification of background noise or hum. This results in an optimized signal level prior to digitization, thereby eliminating the need for additional gain or attenuation in the digital domain. The flexibility of setting the compression ratio and the time constant of the level detector, coupled with two values of rotation point, make the SSM2167 easy to integrate into a wide variety of microphone conditioning applications.
Low Voltage Microphone Preamplifier with Variable Compression and Noise-Canceling – [Link]