Elgato Wave DX on an Audient iD14 MkII: an XLR-only microphone with 600 Ω of output impedance and no published load limit
The Wave DX needs 53 dB of the iD14 MkII's 58 — five decibels of margin, and none at all on a 50 dB interface. Elgato publishes a 600 Ω source impedance, four times a Shure dynamic's, but never says what load it needs.
Signal Chain Compatibility Matrix
Select gear and parameters for live gain, impedance and SPL calculations.
Input Equipment Setup
PASS: Optimal Signal Chain
Requires minimum +60dB of clean pre-amp gain. Most budget entry interfaces max out at +50dB to +56dB and introduce hiss at max pot. An inline preamp booster (Cloudlifter CL-1 / FetHead) is strongly recommended.
The interface preamp provides sufficient headroom.
$538
$405
-25%Tonal & acoustic characteristics: Flat, wide-range frequency response for clean music and speech. Smooth, warm acoustic character with air-suspension shock isolation.
Technical advisory: With +69dB max gain, the Gen 4 Solo can drive demanding dynamics like the Shure SM7B natively without requiring an external inline booster.
Physical Interconnect Topology
Shure SM7B
Direct Cable Connection (No Intermediate Box)
1x Shielded Balanced XLR Cable (3-Pin XLR Male to XLR Female)
Focusrite Scarlett Solo (Gen 4)
Host: Apple MacBook Pro (M1/M2/M3/M4)
Short answer: 53 dB of the iD14 MkII's 58. It fits, with five decibels in hand — and on the cheapest interfaces it does not.
The numbers. Elgato publishes Sensitivity 2.5 mV/Pa, -52 dbV/Pa — both units, and they agree, which is rarer than it should be. At 85 dB SPL that puts −58.8 dBu on the cable. The iD14 MkII clips at +12 dBu, so a −18 dBFS take needs 53 dB of its 58 dB. On a Volt 176 the same microphone needs 50 dB of 55. On an AudioBox GO it needs 51 dB and the card has 50 — one decibel short. This is a genuinely gain-hungry dynamic, and the cheap-interface bracket is where it stops working.
The XLR-only part. The Wave DX is sold beside Elgato's USB Wave microphones and looks like one, but it has no converter inside and no USB socket. It needs a real interface with a real preamp, and 53 dB is the size of that requirement at speaking level. Buying it as a “Wave” without an interface is the most common way this microphone disappoints.
The number nobody can act on. Elgato prints Impedance 600 Ohm. That is four times the 150 Ω of a Shure SM58 or Beta 58A, and the highest source impedance among the microphones in this batch. A high source impedance is exactly the case where the load matters — and Elgato publishes no minimum or recommended load at all. Sennheiser prints Min. terminating impedance 1 kΩ for the e 835, sE Electronics prints Recommended load impedance >1k Ohms for the X1 S. For the Wave DX there is no such line, so a question like “is the Radial McBoost's 600 Ω input setting safe for this microphone?” cannot be answered from any datasheet — not because the answer is complicated, but because half of it was never printed.
The gem. Source impedance and minimum load are different specifications, and only the second one lets you check a pairing. Shure and Elgato print the first; Sennheiser and sE print both. When you are choosing between two dynamics for a chain with a transformer input, a load-switching booster or a long line, the microphone whose maker printed the load line is the one you can actually plan around — and that is worth more than a decibel of sensitivity.
What to do: one XLR cable, no phantom needed, gain around 53 dB. Do not pair the Wave DX with a 50 dB interface, and if you are already on one, this is a chain where an in-line booster genuinely earns its place.