Electro-Voice Co11

Singer, guitarist, recording engineer. 25+ years.

Handheld condenser. Requires phantom power.
It seems like a good idea. You can't really use most condenser mics on stage. They're too sensitive. Pick up too much background sound and noise, feedback too easily, too succeptible to handling noise. So .... a specially designed handheld condenser?, by EV ... a quality company.
The Cobalt11? Hmmm ...not so much. It's a fair mic. Worth the 2 for $70 sale price I suppose. (I'm going to guess that they're being discontinued.)But then again, there's a slew of low price handhelds on the market (from China, of course), and this mic doesn't have anything special to offer.
Handling noise was good. Overall tone and range was fair - slightly dull on the highs, but not bad. Proximity effect was very mild (which I consider a negative - I want to be able to control my tone with mic technique), but it was a little hard to judge the proximity effect because I couldn't get too close to the mic. Plosives, pops, distortion and overload all set on too easily. This doesn't neccesarilly surpise me out of a condenser, not out of a studio condenser anyway - but that's the expected trade off with a condenser, the sensitivity. With this mic I couldn't use normal stage mic technique (like "eating the mic"). On the otherhand there was no obvious step up in tone, realism, or dynamics that you might hope for in a condenser.
Overall it was a disappointment. I have several EV mics that I'm happy with, but these are going back to the seller.

I'm a guitarist and singer -- acoustic & electric. Folk, blues, classic rock. I own a Zoom 16 track hard drive recorder, Behringer mixer, compressor, feedback suppressor, various microphones, amps and guitars.

This is a cardioid condensor hand-held vocal mic. It has been my primary live and recorded vocal mic for a couple of years. It's solid, very well made. It is sensitive and expressive and reliable and loud. Moderate proximity effect, similar to other cardioid mics. This mic requires phantom power.

If I lost this mic or it was stolen, I'd buy another immediately. Good quality. Very inexpensive. No problems at all, after numerous gigs and significant road abuse. Solid pro mic.