Thronmax MDrill One Pro mic review

The Thronmax MDrill One Pro is the most surprising microphone I’ve had the pleasure of reviewing in the past few years. And I do mean pleasure. Coming from a European audio company that I'd honestly never heard of, the $90 Thronmax MDrill One Pro is a USB Condenser microphone that works with Windows, Linux, MacOS, and PlayStation 4 and 5.

It's a plug-and-play mic, and I can’t stress enough how happy I am that I don't need to use some overly complex software to get the most out of it—I’m looking at you Razer Seiren V2 Pro. No sir, just plug in the Thronmax, and off you go about your business. Thronmax says its Vertigain technology increases clarity and quality by 10% over other condenser mics. While I can't really substantiate that with any scientific accuracy, I can say that this mic sounds incredibly rich and bodied. 

I’ve never sounded sexier and when I sent my wife a little middle-of-the-day voice note over WhatsApp, she was completely blown away. Extra brownie points for me. The mic captures voices with a rich, warm tone with absolutely no hiss or distortion. I did a bunch of testing and realized the optimum positioning for the MDrill One Pro is about half a foot from your mouth. Sure it works fine when it's on your desk but as you can hear from the sample recording when it's closer the audio is so much better. 

There's gain control on the mic itself, but that didn't do too much to improve my voice, it just picked up more background environmental sound. Still, I love that I didn’t need to fiddle around with software to get this good sound. The excellent audio is a result of the aforementioned Vertigain tech that uses three internal condensers to pick up sound waves without being scattered by typical microphone mesh. 

There's also a built-in shock mount that does a fantastic job dampening unwanted desk vibrations. It also helps that the mic has a high sample rate up to 24-Bit/96KHz which is great for professional application.

The MDrill One Pro is also one of the better-looking microphones. It’s a Redbull can-sized Aluminum cylinder painted in gunmetal gray and held up by a hefty desk stand that really brings the word paperweight to mind. It's great at keeping the microphone rock steady and absorbs any wayward desk vibrations. 

You can easily swivel the mic in this stand to get the optimum position but in my experience, mounting it on a boom arm so it can be closer to your mouth results in the best possible audio.

The top half of the mic is slatted metal instead of typical microphone mesh—all part of the design that contributes to the Vertigain. It also negates the need for those foam socks in most scenarios. 

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All the controls for the mic are on the body with volume and gain dials on the back. On the front is a prominent, oblong LED panel inspired by 80's audio tech and it's used to monitor your levels—blue for headphone volume, green for mic gain. 

Above the LED panel are markers for the microphone's four Polar patterns: Cardioid, Stereo, Bi-Directional, and Omni-directional. There are two soft buttons embedded into the top and bottom of the LED panel with the top one for toggling mic mute and the bottom one switches between the different patterns. I really appreciated that the mute button has a bright backlight that stays bright green when on and angry red as if saying, "you're on mute"

Thanks to a headphone jack, you can monitor your audio in real-time as well. Besides the volume dial, there are no other controls to adjust how much of your voice you hear through the headphones or even to just turn it off. Thronmax struck a safe audio balance here but some might prefer better control.

The coolness continues underneath the mic where you have connections for USB Type-C, 3.5mm headphone, a threaded screw mount for use with boom arms, and a button to control, wait for it, the RGB mood light. You can choose any of seven colors for the ring and while it isn't bright enough to bathe your desk in RGB, it certainly looks hella cool and even better when the mic is mounted to a boom arm.

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At under $100, the Thronmax MDrill One Pro is a no-brainer for anyone looking for a quality mic and is an easy addition to our list of best microphones. It’s cheaper than most of our favorite microphones besides the flashy HyperX Quadcast S, it's possibly one of the most handsome. It sounds amazing and just works without any extra software shenanigans. This is a fantastic and fun microphone that just works and I heartily recommend it.