Why does my PC record perfectly with USB from cassette player using Movavi and nothing from Audacity? I’ve tried all the recommended Audacity settings…nothing. Installed Movavi and worked first time. Would prefer to use Audacity because it’s free and offers more sound editing options. Any help appreciated!
Movavi is a company, not a program.
Also, please supply more information. What equipment, what computer, what operating system, how connected, what settings, etc…
Did you select the USB device as your Recording Device? (Don’t select anything that says “loopback”.)
You can also check your Permissions/Privacy Settings to make sure Audacity is allowed to use the device.
Yes I did, checked more than once. Also checked permissions. No joy
No need to be pedantic, you know I’m using the movavi sound recorder application. I said I’m recording from a cassette player with a USB line out to a usb port on my PC. That should be fairly obvious for anyone familiar with a USB setup.
If Windows is getting the digital audio stream Audacity should work…
What are the symptoms? A “flat line” silent recording? Do you get an error message?
Those are fairly standard but it’s always helpful to say exactly what hardware & software you’re using and give a link if possible. (I did find an application when I searched “movavi” but I’m also not familiar with it and I had to search.)
A lot of people have trouble with those cheap USB cassette players but if it works with one application it should work with any other application.
And “line out” is analog, not USB. Line-in on a regular soundcard is color-coded blue, and headphone-out will also work into line-in. (Most laptops don’t have line-in.)
P.S.
some possible alternatives & work arounds:
You can probably edit with Audacity after recording/digitizing with movavi.
oceanaudio is an alternative to Audacity.
Or, GoldWave is not free but it’s a lifetime license and I’ve had a license for mare than 20 years (I think before Audacity existed) so the yearly cost is nearly zero.
Hi Doug, and thanks for your considered reply. To answer your questions:
- Yes, I’m getting a flat line when recording on Audacity. There is no error message.
- I’m running Windows 11 on an Acer Aspire. The tape recorder is a cheapo NIKO player, which included a set of instructions for using Audacity (which didn’t work, and the version of Audacity they cited was out of date). However, it DID work with the movavi (free) audio recorder.
- I have saved the movavi recording to my PC and can open / edit it with Audacity.
- The movavi audio recording functions are limited. There is no option to increase the volume of the recording and the sound quality is not good. (Certainly not as good as the tape).
- Thanks, I know what “line-in” is, as opposed to a USB port.
- Thanks too for the recommendations. I assume Goldwave gives good reproductive quality, I will have a look at it. Sometimes it’s worth paying a bit for a quality product than screw up your computer with free alternatives that don’t do what you want them to.
Hi,
It is odd that one program works and another doesn’t, isn’t it? I’ve been an Audacity user for a long time but recent releases have knocked my confidence in it to some degree. I can recommend the Ocenaudio (not Ocean Audio) software that DVDdoug gave you a link to. I use that to capture audio from cassettes and vinyl and then do the editing in Audacity. Ocenaudio is fast, lean and stable. It’s also free but not open-source, if that matters to you. There is a very good series of tutorials on YouTube here: Ocenaudio tutorials. If paid software is an option for you could look at Sound Forge Audio Studio which is on offer at the moment.
I hope you get it working in Audacity too though.
Mark B
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Assuming nothing goes wrong (assuming the digital audio data doesn’t get corrupted) your choice of recording software doesn’t affect the quality.
But the effects will give different results, and there is a different set of effects. (I think Audacity has more effects than GoldWave). GoldWave is a “solid” reliable program. And there’s a fully-functional free trial.
But you’ve got an unusual problem and I don’t know if whatever is wrong will also affect GoldWave or oceanaudio.
For my uses, Audacity’s main advantage is the optional FFmpeg import/export library which supports more audio formats. I don’t need that a lot, but when I need to open or create one of the less popular formats, FFmpeg supports almost everything.
I use them both. I’ve never tried oceanaudio. I’ve got a handful of (mostly free) audio/video applications and a couple of special-purpose audio tools too. I don’t expect one application to do everything…
A fairly sound approach, I think. 
I used Goldwave without any difficulty and am very pleased with the results. It gives a more rounded and complete sound than Movavi which sounded at times like the music was being played in a tunnel.
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