Starting a recording sometimes scrolls and other times not

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

Hi,

When I press record, sometimes Audacity starts scrolling straight away so I get the start of recordings, other times I press record and it does nothing until I start to play what I want to record and it misses the first note. How do I get it to always scroll when recording so as not to miss the first note?

2

Topic moved to Windows forum.

I assume that you are recording sounds playing on your computer using WASAPI loopback?

If so, then the solution is to ensure that there is an active audio stream.

I rarely use Windows, but this might work. Please try it and let us know if it does:

  1. Start playback from your playback app.
  2. Stop playback.
  3. Start Audacity recording.
  4. (Re)start playback from your playback app.
3

Hi Steve, thanks for the reply and yes your assumptions are correct, I’m using Windows 10 with WASAPI loopback, unfortunately your possible solution doesn’t work as at step 3 it still needs an active audio stream and still misses the start at step 4.

I was hoping there would be a setting somewhere that doesn’t always need an active audio stream to start recording. It’s strange that it works without an active audio stream for about 10-20% of recordings and requires an active audio stream most of the time :confused:

4

That’s a shame, but thanks for trying. It would have been a nice easy workaround if it had worked :wink:

OK, so what you need to do is to go into the Windows Sound control panel:

  1. open the run dialog with Windows logo + R
  2. enter: mmsys.cpl
  3. press the OK button

In the Recording tab, enable “Listen to this device” for your sound card.
That should force the device to maintain an active audio stream.
Good luck :slight_smile:

5

Thanks a lot Steve, I’m pleased to say this works :smiley:

For me the option to “Listen to this device” was buried a bit deeper in the Sound control panel. For me it was "Recording tab/enable Stereo Mix/ Properties/Listen tab and then I could select Listen to this device

6

Super :smiley:


As I said, I rarely use Windows, but I had every confidence that you would find it :wink: