Was this mike really £499 and now reduced to £149 ? If that’s true it seems a little bit of a bargain , has anyone had any experience with the R1 at all ?
The advantages, for consumers, is that Chinese mass manufacturing brings formerly ‘too expensive for consumer’ products to the average consumer.
I own two Chinese ribbon mics: A Nady RSM-2 and an MXL R144. The RSM-2 uses a 6mm aluminum ribbon, while the R144 uses a 1.8mm. They both perform wonderfully. I’ve only tried them on my own vocal so far, but they are warm and responsive. They are also quite sensitive, so subtleties are not lost in translation. You can extrapolate that the 1.8mm ribbon is considerably more sensitive, but also suffers more from proximity effect. Both use Chinese origin transformers modeled after Lundahls, and sound excellent.
I’ve also modified both of them, removing standing-wave-producing mesh, designed for protection from lazy users. Once this is done, you must use pop screens every time. For the record, all of my other studio condensers are modified in this fashion, as well.
Also be aware that mass-produced ribbon mics can come with factory defects, such as sagging ribbons (my R144 has a sagging ribbon, but still produces great sound). These defects won’t necessarily make them sound bad.
That’s all very nice and thanks for the heads up on mods , ive been striping mikes apart for years and trying bare capsules with wet lips 
BUT im interested in the R1 , I bit the bullet today and bought the R1 and the 2200a mk2 multi pattern and will be testing them a bit later , couldn’t resist the temptation as the R1 seems to have held it’s own against the £500 range ribbons