[ProAudio] Microphones question

[Scott Dorsey]

2N4401 and 2N4403 have the largest die area of any transistor that you could
get for less than a nickel each and consequently were pretty good performers
in linear amplifier stages with low-Z sources like mike preamp front ends.
Not GREAT performers, but okay performers for cheap.

The problem is that today we have a lot of vendors making 2N4401s and some of
them are actually making 2N3094s that are stamped 2N4401 on the box.  Some of
them have shrunk the die and pretty much all of them have cheap epoxy that 
contaminates things in spite of all attempts at passivation.  

If you're willing to increase your budget to ten cents each you can do better.
THAT makes some excellent transistor arrays which are probably as good as you
can get today... but they are almost five dollars which is more than the
whole channel strip on a cheap console gets budgeted.
--scott