Cannot Record Windows 8 Line In or Stereo Mix

Audacity 3 Help Forum Windows
1

Hello Forum!

I’ve been using Audacity without issues on my PC running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, but recently upgraded to Windows 8 Pro 64-bit and now I am unable to record from Line In or Stereo Mix. Playback using stereo mix works fine through the computers speakers, the input source sounds fine this way. But when I record in Audacity, I just get this buzzing noise (quite loud) which I can vary by adjusting the volume on the Sony digital recorder. When trying different settings, I either get the buzzing sound or no activity at all (meters are flatlined). Setup is as follows:

Audacity 2.0.2 (reinstalled)
VIA HD Audio (Drivers: VIA_Audio_V6016699_Win8)
Input from Sony ICD digital recorder (meeting recordings, human speech)

I’ve tried all combinations of the following settings:

Audio Host: MME / Direct Sound
Output Device (shouldn’t matter?): Speakers (VIA High Definition Audio) /or/ Microsoft Sound Mapper
Input Device: Stereo Mix (VIA High Definition Audio) /or/ Line In (VIA High Definition Audio) /or/ Microsoft Sound Mapper
Input Channels: Mono /or/ Stereo

I took care to match the sample rate and bit depth (44.1 / 16) in the VIA settings and Audacity. I cannot figure this out. Nothing has changed with the hardware, just the operating system. This also happens using the default drivers provided with Windows 8, I downloaded the VIA drivers after experiencing this issue.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

2

Is the output of the digital recorder an analogue line level output such as headphones, or S/PDIF?

I suggest double-checking in Windows “Sound” that both “Exclusive Mode” boxes are checked ( see http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Windows_7_OS#sample_rates ).

Are there still Windows 7 drivers available? It might be worth trying those.


Gale

3

Analogue line level output for sure, it’s an older recorder. Sorry, when I said digital I meant that it wasn’t using tape :wink: I can use headphones on the Sony recorder without issue, I’m using a 3.5mm stereo plug (both ends male) to connect to the line in (blue) on the back of my PC.

Exclusive mode was a good suggestion, did not have any impact though. Also, I saw in a couple of other recording posts that people suggested trying Windows Sound Recorder to isolate issues with Audacity … in my case, Sound Recorder does exactly the same thing as Audacity, both suffer from excessive buzzing when I try recording. So this isn’t an Audacity issue per se but something with my drivers or OS.

I’ll hunt down Windows 7 64-bit drivers for my VIA sound chipset and get those installed, then update back. Thank you for the suggestions.