ELGATO WAVE:3

Elgato fleshes out its streaming range with a great USB mic

SINCE CORSAIR ACQUIRED the Elgato brand back in 2018 (yikes, that feels like a long time ago now), it’s been slowly expanding the options for would-be streamers. We imagine trade has been strong recently, as more people have sought to make some cash while confined to their homes as a pandemic ravaged the outside world. Starting with Elgato’s original selection of docks and capture cards, Corsair expanded into streaming decks, lighting, and even green screens. The Wave:3—one of Elgato’s two shiny new microphones—was the next logical step.

Yes, that’s how it’s stylized. Not the Wave 3, or the Wave: 3. This microphone has demanded that we repeatedly print the :3 emoji all over this page of MaximumPC, and we’re furious about it. But weird punctuation aside, this is a serious addition to Elgato’s streamercentric selection, whether you’re an aspiring Twitch gamer or an educational talk streamer.

We wouldn’t exactly call it revolutionary, as it should be immediately familiar to anyone who has used a similarly high-end USB mic, such as the venerable Blue Yeti X. Still, the Wave:3 (ugh) is no slouch. 24-bit audio, a 96kHz sample rate, and a built-in pop shield mean that this USB-C mic is a viable option for those who take their streaming audio seriously. Elgato teamed up with Austrian audio professionals Lewitt Audio to build this mic, and it shows. In practice, voice recording comes out extremely clear, even when played over game audio. It picks up deep and high vocal pitches well, but what really brings the audio into next-level quality is this mic’s secret weapon: Clipguard.

Clipguard is a built-in limiter and compressor that keeps recorded audio from peaking no matter the circumstances. Even actively shouting into the mic at point-blank range resulted in a coherent recording (if not a very pleasant one). It’s very difficult to make your recorded audio distort with high volumes, and combining Clipguard with the concealed pop filter inside the body of the mic gives great-quality vocal recording. It’s not the absolute best we’ve heard, but it’s certainly up there.

The design of the Wave:3 (and its little brother, the more affordable Wave:1) is pleasingly minimalist. Pale white LEDs adorn the front of this mic’s compact black casing, with a simple button dial and a capacitive mute button on the very top of the mic, allowing you to quickly mute yourself with a gentle tap. Clicking the dial enables you to swap between gain, volume, and chat mix for quick adjustments, but for more in-depth tweaking you’ll want to use Elgato’s Wave Link software.

SIMPLY GOOD

Wave Link isn’t especially complex, and it’s designed for use primarily by gaming streamers. It’s easy to use but still packs plenty of useful features; tweaking the software to better suit your own range of speech will give you slightly better performance than simply using the defaults. There’s a wealth of settings to mess about with here, allowing you to individually tune different volumes, connect multiple mics on the same network, or activate background noise-damping.

The Wave:3 comes with a simple metal stand (which works fine), but it can also be attached to your boom arm of choice via its universal bracket. A shock mount and external pop shield are sold separately, but the latter feels a bit redundant given the quality of the built-in pop filter. Really, the default stand does the job if you have the space on your desk for it; it tilts smoothly, and the rubberized underside keeps it firmly in place atop any surface.

The main downside here is that the Wave:3 only has one polar pattern: A cardioid field that only picks up sound directly in front of the microphone. This means that while the Wave:3 picks up sound from a single person exceptionally well, multiple speakers won’t be picked up to nearly the same standard.

It’s a shame, given the relatively high price, but it does make sense when considering that Elgato strongly leans towards supporting gaming streamers. So for a solo gamer sitting in front of a greenscreen, it’s almost perfect.