I have been having this problem for a while now and it annoys the crap out of me. I recently got a Samson C01U usb condenser mic. The mic is great and steam/skype voice chat works great but whenever I try to record my voice with audacity I encounter 2 main problems. I am almost positive they are unrelated as they started at different times. The first one is that audacity (or any other voice recording software) picks up a lot of static and it has nothing to do with the mic. As you can see below, the mic isn’t picking anything up and nothing from the mic is recorded (the flat line), but when audacity monitors the mic, the bar moves all over the place and when I play the audio, static plays. This doesn’t happen with my speakers (when doing normal stuff besides recordings) but will occasionally happen with my headphones. This is really annoying and I can’t find a fix anywhere. I have updated and reinstalled sound drivers and stuff like that but the problem persists. The second problem is that when I try to record my voice with audacity (or any other voice recording software) my voice is really quiet and barely registers. Again, steam/skype chat works absolutely perfect with no problems whatsoever. I cannot add a boost to mic volume from the levels tab of the mic properties as the boost slider does not show up. The light on the mic is lit up green as it should be and changing usb ports does not do anything with volume (unless I have it plugged into a usb 1 port instead of 2 but that is not the problem). I have installed and reinstalled the driver for the mic but nothing changes. I did install the Pre Arp software that came with the mic but that either has no effect or I am just not using it right. I am really stumped and cannot find any answers anywhere.
My computer is a HP Pavilion Elite 410y. Thank you for your help.
With the static/noise you have to remember that PC’s are noisy environments. Mine does the same even after everything has gone through a mixing console etc. This is why people use an external sound card to eliminate the noise. A lot of on board sound cards have digital noise induced into well… everything. Think about all the fans in there, the data transfer from your LAN port right next to the input of the sound card etc. Laptops and their switch mode power supplies can be noisy too.
The only way I overcome it is to let a bit of silence record before I actually start speaking or playing. Then I select it and do a noise removal profile.
When it comes to the sound issue, try going into Skype and selecting: Tools—> Options —> Audio Settings —> Untick Automatically Adjust microphone settings.
In Audacity have a look at Edit —> Preferences and make sure: Sound Activated Recording is unticked.
In your recording devices: . Click on your USB microphone in the list and select Properties. Click the Advanced Tab. You should see the option to allow applications to take exclusive control. If its ticked, try unticking it and vice versa. Also check your levels here. I use Line In, but still, when you talk you should see the green bar move up and down to almost full. You can adjust these levels in the properties tab.
Can’t think of anything else at this point.
Damien
Thank you for the help with the static problem, the noise removal worked better than I was expecting and I will look into external sound cards. In the microphone properties, the green bar will go all the way to the top when I talk without audacity or anything recording. However, when I try to record, the actual program doesn’t pick up the sound unless I have the mic about an inch or two from my mouth which isn’t something I want to deal with as it makes recording a lot harder.
What are your levels set at under the Microphone properties in Recording Devices?
Damien
If you mean the slider, the level is at max but there is still no change in audacity recording. Like I said before though steam chat and skype work absolutely perfect in the volume department and I can be 3 feet away with an easily audible voice but when I try to record with audacity, my voice is just so quiet that I can’t hear myself in playback without any of the settings in the mic properties being changed.