Produced from 1932 1955, the RCA 44BX is perhaps the single most recognizable ribbon microphone and something of an icon in the world of broadcast and recording history.

The 44BX is a highfidelity bidirectional ribbon microphone designed for music recording and broadcast. It uses a 2" long corrugated aluminum ribbon which is just 1.8 microns thick, roughly 1/20th the thickness of a human hair.

The frequency response from a 3 foot distance is quite flat from 50Hz 15kHz, followed by a steep high frequency rolloff. The bass boost from proximity effect becomes quite apparent at closer distances, and so jumpers are provided inside the microphone to allow for two highpass filter positions (V1, V2 "V" for "Voice" which is typically picked up from closer distances).

The only major difference between models 44BX and 44B is how the output cable comes out of the microphone's housing. Some examples of 44BX have the ribbon assembly placed further back in the head basket, but this is thought to be due to inconsistencies in manufacturing and not necessarily a change in design.

‪@Ribbonmics‬ has been the standard for museum quality reproductions of the RCA 44 for many years. Recently much less expensive clones of the RCA 44 have been release such as the ‪@WarmAudioOfficial‬ WA44. Having recently spent around four thousands dollars of my own my money on a used AEA A440 (A microphone I've had my eyes on for years) I wanted to give the two microphones a comparison and shootout!