Blue Microphones Tiki – A $60 USB mic to silence your surroundings

Chances are that if you’ve ever tried to have a Skype conversation or a Google+ Hangout in any sort of public place, you’ve found that background noise prevents it from being enjoyable for your partners. Blue Microphones, the company that brought us the amazing Yeti and Yeti Pro (among many others) has just begun shipping a microphone called the Tiki that hopes to end this issue.

The Tiki is a USB mic with a proprietary noise canceling technology that also focuses only on your voice. The hope is that, with the technology aiming the pickup solely at the frequencies of your voice, you’ll not get the sounds of babies crying or someone ordering their latest Starbucks drink.

But Tiki’s not a one-trick pony. The secondary mode, called Natural Recording, is claimed to pick up great sound from things like guitars or a multi-person podcast.

I’ve traditionally not been a big fan of noise cancellation software or microphones, as they tend to add a “warbled” effect to voices as part of their processing. But Blue’s reputation for high quality audio should do well here. We’ll be getting our hands onto one for a full review soon, but if you want to take the plunge then it will only set you back $60.

It’s available today at BestBuy, and will be in Apple retail stores among other locations by the 15th of the month.

➤ Blue Tiki