InnoGear Microphone Boom Arm Review
Looks Better Than the Price Suggests
Getting set up to start recording good audio doesn’t require sacrificing an arm and leg at all. While wiry, metal boom arms have been a staple in the affordable microphone stand scene for ages now, a natural evolution in the lower priced space has continuously pushed the quality in which can be obtained by buyers.
InnoGear sent us their $39.99 microphone boom arm to review and I’d confidently say that it looks rather nice for such an affordable item. Would this arm fit in front of the camera for your stream or video setup? Let’s figure that out right now.
RETAIL Price: $39.99
Disclaimer: InnoGear sent us a unit free of charge to review, but all thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are our own and were not discussed with the company prior to publishing.
A Different Look
No exposed coiled springs
Like I mentioned before, lots of affordable arms consist of exposed coiled springs and an open metal design that, in my opinion, doesn’t produce the nicest looking set aesthetics for microphone holders. They all ultimately do the same job, suspending a microphone over a desk, but I do find InnoGear’s design choice for this one to be pleasant to look at on screen.
While the material for the arm is alloy steel, it’s lightweight and thin plated at best. It doesn’t have the premium metal feel that more expensive arms emit due to the heft behind the material, but this is a step up above the entry level arms I’ve owned in the past. The enclosure neatly conceals the springs and cables to exude a uniform, tidy appearance.
There’s a dedicated cable management compartment on the upper side of the enclosure. It’s sealed by a removable rubber cover piece that can be pried off using a fingernail. It’s not the prettiest way to lock a cable into an arm, but the black on black combination does at least conceal the cable into the body of the boom to keep everything looking nice for the camera. I also predict that this will survive longer as I’ve had a lot of plastic pieces snap over time on other arms that hide cables using a plastic cover that locks into place. Relying on thin plastic locking edges is a recipe for short lifespans.
Adding Some Height
The included riser raises the stand an additional 6.3 inches
Using a standard 5.8” adapter, the microphone connecting spot covers the mounting point of most microphones on the market. The arm supports a maximum weight of 3.5 pounds, which should be more than enough for a consumer grade USB or XLR microphone.
You’ll have a decent amount of wiggle room with this arm as it covers about 14-inches in distance with 135 degrees forward and backward movement on top of a 180 degree vertical rotation. And of course the arm rotates a full 360 degrees. I have a pretty long desk and the arm had no issues pushing to the center of the workstation where my body is seated.
InnoGear also provides a 6.3-inch detachable riser with the purchase to increase the height of the overhead position. I’ve been using the arm with the Earthworks Icon which has a directional recording structure so a drop-down arm has little benefit for my use case. However, a gaming microphone like the HyperX Quadcast would slot in perfectly into this orientation.
The cable management system on this boom arm
Budget Cuts
Slight areas to nitpick at are obvious areas that InnoGear had to steer the direction of the design to save in production costs. The clamp fits on a desk with a max thickness of 2.36-inches. There’s anti-scratch protective padding on the upper side of the desk, but not for the metal twisting ring. The locking ring is also a bit small in circumference as I’ve used arms with a larger mass that gripes the desk more solidly. That’s more of a premium option that I miss, but InnoGear’s mount still does work just fine. The arm isn’t heavy enough to cause issues regardless so it still does the job as long as you mount it under the desk properly.
The other obvious budget point is the screw point that mounts the microphone. Most budget arms show an exposed metal plated screw where the microphone twists onto. Once again like the clasp, it does the job just fine, but it just doesn’t look that great in front of a camera. As a video maker, I do find the arm’s aesthetics to play as big of a role as the look of the microphone it mounts. While InnoGear was able to do away with the exposed springs, which is also another staple of budget arms, the mounting and clasp points retain their budget heritage.
final thoughts
There’s not a lot of fundamental negatives that correlate with this product. It’s a basic arm that masks one of the three core budget design aspects. That does make this InnoGear arm a bit more desirable of an offering than competitors in this similar price range.
Once it suspends the microphone in the area, the arm performs just about as well as every other arm out there in absorbing the weight load of the mounted microphone to keep the audio close to your face. Movement of the arm is smooth and quite muted which is also good for people who perform live. Overall, I do find this arm to be competitive in the budget space when it comes to microphone boom arms.
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FIFINE is back with another solid sub-$100 dynamic microphone.