Audacity Forum

If the original songs were on CD, you would use a CD ripper program to extract the songs as WAV files. Import the WAV files into Audacity and use the various tools to edit and arrange the songs as required. Export the final mix as a WAV file. Use a CD burning application to burn the WAV files to CD ...

Switch off "Software Playthrough" (near the bottom of the Transport menu).
If you need to monitor the input through your headphones, do so from the headphone socket on the USB sound card.

As you've now discovered, Audacity will usually do a lot more than just load the interface, but in some cases there may be some features that are unavailable. In particular, any features that require real time processing, routing of multiple audio streams, or MIDI support will be unavailable. Both A...

I have Windows Vista, the latest version of Audacity The latest version of Audacity is 1.3.12, so I assume that this is the version that you have installed. You can check by looking in Audacity "Help menu > About Audacity". If you do not have Audacity 1.3.12, uninstall Audacity and then d...

It sounds like the chain has got corrupted somehow. Lame is not required for exporting WAV files, it is only required for exporting MP3 files. The "defaults" when you add an effect to a chain are not fixed values. Most chain effects will default to whatever value was last used. For example...

Which version of Audacity?
(look in Audacity "Help menu > About Audacity")

Did you know that for DVDs that are not encrypted, it is possible to "rip" (digitally extract) the audio from the DVD? For sound quality, this is the best way to "record" a DVD. You can do this with the free format converter "SUPER" by erightsoft. Copy the VOB files fro...

I'd first recommend that you upgrade to Audacity 1.3.12 http://audacityteam.org/download/ The problem is a sound card setting that you need to change. This will either be in the Windows Control Panel, or in the sound card "mixer" application (there may be an icon for the sound card near th...

Check that you do not have "software playthrough" enabled (in Edit menu > Preferences)
Check that you do not have a microphone active.
Check that your recording level is not too loud.

If you go to "Edit menu > Preferences > Devices" you should have an option "Host" for either "MME" or "Direct Sound". Try them both and see which works best.