The various political and economic reforms that took place in China years ago brought radical changes to the country’s industry, originally devoted to military weaponry and later retooled in different directions, such as electronics and precision engineering. This is the case of SE ELECTRONICS, born from the initiative and experience of Simei Zou, a renowned musician in China from Shanghai, with a post at the city’s conservatory, considered a highly talented, multifaceted man... (he had his own recording studio) who achieved great success as a performer and conductor as well as a composer. This took him to the United States in the seventies to teach and give concerts, and he eventually became a US citizen. Given his technical knowledge of the different types of microphones, his prestige in China and his knowledge of products arriving from abroad after the first liberalization of imports following the Cultural Revolution, he developed a viable line of microphones for one of the largest factories in his country. This line of microphones was in turn imported into the United States through Mr. Zou’s California-based company, SE ELECTRONICS.

In early 2003, Simei Zou set up his own factory when the previous one was privatized, with the following philosophy: "I want to make the best microphones, but affordable ones compared with the established European brands. It’s not just a question of money, but also a passion for making the best possible product."

THE SE 2200
The SE 2200 is a microphone with FET circuitry, free of an output transformer, with a design of Japanese origin. This electronics is soldered onto Panasonic boards from Japan, with "well-known" components and a good quality of finish. It also has a ten-decibel attenuator and a high-pass filter.

The body and grille are beautifully finished in cast aluminum and, according to the manufacturer, are made by a different company from the one used by the rest of the Chinese manufacturers. That quality is also reflected in the shock mount, large and sturdy, with the same aluminum-colored finish. Very solid and good-looking.

The capsule is the real jewel of this microphone: one inch of Mylar imported from the United States and vacuum-gilded using an electroplating technique with pure gold six microns thick, a process carried out with extreme care and hand-assembled by specialized technicians.

IN THE STUDIO
In the studio this microphone performs excellently. Fantastic on acoustic guitars, and very linear and accurate on vocals. It has a slight vintage tone (curious in a microphone with FET circuitry) and overflowing quality, especially considering its price (189 euros), which gives it a sound worth twice what it costs.

Using the console’s preamps, it behaves very much like it does with more expensive preamps, needing little or no EQ, which shows its linearity and confirms the manufacturer’s data, with a deviation of only +/- 1 decibel across the whole spectrum from 20 Hz to 20 kHz.

On drums it performs very well, with broad, punchy sounds, perhaps excessively bright on the cymbals, with a small peak standing out at 9200 hertz, but this is more a sign of character than a flaw in itself.

CONCLUSION
This is the best Chinese-made FET studio microphone I have ever tested, worth far more than its price and probably the best you can buy for a home studio, where investments have to be small and where we need a microphone that doesn’t change excessively with different types of preamps and that behaves well with low-cost preamps.

In a professional studio it is a very worthwhile microphone, of which we can get several units to complement our "studio mic," that is, our C12, N149, bottle, etc., covering mic positions where, since we can’t afford a dozen great mics, we often end up using dynamics, 57s or 441s, or leaving orchestral sections to chance...

PROS
- Great value for money.
- Flat sound and bright response.
- High-end finish.

CONS
- Cardioid pattern only.
- Excessive brightness on cymbals.
- Distortion above 125 dB (135 with the pad)