ap356
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Forum Member
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Posts: 67
Fuji X100s microphone adapter
Nov 4, 2013
10
Hello all,
For those of you who shoot video, you may have been wanting to use an external mic. For the X100s, Fuji sells the MIC-ST1 microphone with an adaptor that plugs into the camera's USB port. I believe the adapter is the same as used on the X100 and some of the other X cameras.
Since I already have a Sennheiser MKE 400, I really did not want to buy the Fuji mic just to get the adapter. The adapter is not sold on its own. I actually tried getting one from Fuji directly ("Hello, I lost the adapter for my MIC-ST1, can I get a replacement?"), but no dice.
I decided to try and make one. I managed to find an ebay listing for blank E6 connectors (the proprietary Fuji USB connector, also used by Nikon and other cameras), so I ordered those along with a couple of 3.5mm female jacks. I used four strands of an Ethernet cable for wiring.
The first step was to figure out which pins need to connect to the 3.5mm jack. The E6 plug has eight pins plus ground (the metal outer part of the plug). A standard USB connection uses four pins, so there four potential candidate pins for the left and right audio channels. To find them, I first used a volt meter to identify the four USB pins. Since the pins are so tiny I had to use a small strand of wire to be able to touch any of them individually. Then I soldered a wire onto each of the four unused pins, and identified the two L and R pins by trial and error. I just held the wires onto the 3.5mm plug of the MKE 400 while looking at the camera's mic level meter. I couldn't quite get it to work. Eventually I realized that two ground connections are needed, one to the outer casing and another to one of the pins.
I had a lot of trouble actually soldering the connector. I melted the first one horribly, and the second one broke because I bent it too much during assembly. By the third try, I had managed to get four good connections onto the microscopic pins of the E6 connector. Soldering to the 3.5mm jack was easy, since its contacts are nice and big. Put on the casing and heat shrink tubing, and its done!
If any of you are adventurous enough to try and make your own, I will post up the pinout that I established. The part cost for this is under $10. I would also be happy to make one for you for a small fee since I still have a few E6 connectors left.
As far as I know, the microphone in the Fuji MIC-ST1 kit actually has a 2.5mm connector, and comes with a 2.5mm to 3.5mm adaptor, and a 3.5mm to E6 adaptor. This seems like a better solution to me, not only because you can use it with the microphone(s) that you already own, but also because it reduces the number of connections.
My DIY Fuji X100s microphone adapter
My X100s with the Sennheiser MKE 400 mounted and connected!