The base station is certainly convenient, but if you want to keep the microphone attached to the stand, you can unscrew it and use the long USB Type-C to USB Type-C cable supplied (otherwise, strangely enough, even if you screw it down, you still need to connect the microphone to the base station by you have to use a small Type-C to Type-C cable).
The Torch has two mute options. Either by pressing down on the volume knob or there is a non-contact toggle on the top of the microphone. This non-contact toggle can be switched between two levels of sensitivity, with the highest sensitivity being achieved by waving four fingers over the unit. Thankfully, it doesn’t affect your head or hair, but you might want to turn it off if you’re prone to gesturing.
[content-egg-block template=offers_logo hide=price]On the back of the base, there’s a headphone jack, a sensitivity switch for the mute gesture sensor and a button to adjust the brightness of the RGB LEDs (because, of course, there are RGB LEDs) In addition to the Roccat logo and ‘mute’ or ‘live’ action buttons, a gain slider Two vertical stripes on the head light up in response. It’s a neat effect, especially as the colours light up in response to the pattern settings. This RGB is also eye candy, as it cannot be addressed in software.
An advantage is that the microphone can be removed from the base and used with a boom arm like any other studio microphone. The package includes a fairly long USB-C-to-C cable to facilitate this, allowing the base control to be placed on the desk and the microphone on the boom, streamer style. While I appreciate these options, I prefer a cleaner all-in-one design. People who choose the Torch over a standard USB mic are unlikely actually to want to use it with a boom arm.
The mixer has several controls, including polar pattern, headset volume, mic mute and a slider for gain control. The latter offers much finer control than a simple dial, allowing you to quickly adjust levels when you notice peaks.
The problem is that, by default, the microphone is screwed to the mixer, so it picks up the click of the switch. This is easily solved by using a microphone arm (mine is quite cheap on Amazon).
Roccat has solved this problem by including a gesture microphone mute on the top of the microphone, so that the microphone can be muted simply by placing your hand close to it. Other settings, such as headphone level and polar pattern control, are usually set before recording and are never changed.