I’ve been using Audacity for quite a while now and have been able to work problems out on my own for the most part. But I’ve hit a wall with this one!
What I want to do is record my mic audio and pc audio to different tracks in Audacity so I can edit them as needed.
I realize Audacity likely won’t do this on its own so I’ve found the program Voicemeeter and VB Virtual Audio Cable to try to get this to work…but I just can’t figure it out. I’ve also taken a look around and can’t find info on how to make this work. The closest thing was the Skype tutorial on Voicemeeter’s manual, or stereo mix. But those didn’t work (as far as I know how to use them).
The main reason I’m asking here for help is because I’m not sure if my (kind of) odd setup is part of the problem.
How I route my audio:
Mic > Headphone Monitor > Phantom Power > USB Sound Card > Audacity
My guess would be that there’s a problem at the sound card, but I’m not sure what it would be or how to fix it.
I can’t use the main sound card input because it’s on a laptop that only has a single line in and relies on software to tell it what kind of signal it is (just a guess, but wasn’t very reliable).
If I’ve missed any info please let me know. This isn’t an urgent problem, but now that I know I can’t figure it out I REALLY want to do it.
Are you preparing a Skype podcast? Unless you get insanely lucky, you’ll need purpose-built software to record a Skype show.
For the most part, Pamela has been good go-to software. They claim to be able to put the Skype voice on one track and your own voice on the other and save the work as a high-quality WAV sound file, suitable for editing and post production, pretty much exactly what you want. I know the upper two licenses do that, but that’s been a while now.
Other people make Skype recording software, but be careful not to get in bed with software that insists on using MP3 sound files. MP3 creates sound damage and you can’t stop it.
It seems like Skype is just a simple communications program, but it’s not. Skype got to be a world-famous chat application by brutally taking over the computer that’s running it. It is usually required that your capture software “knows” what Skype is and how to work around it. Generic sound programs like Audacity usually fall apart when their sound services and drivers are ripped away from them and used for other jobs.
There are people I’ve been calling Celebrity Unicorns who run Skype and Audacity, press Record and turn out show after show. Chase did this with the Reel Life podcasts.
Skype is mostly just an example. I’ve thought about doing some kind of Skype podcast, but it’s not something I’m doing right now.
I’m making gaming content on YouTube and my goal is to be able to record both my mic audio and game audio into Audacity so I can edit with both in mind. Use auto ducking while I’m speaking, make sure both can be heard, fix audio range (not sure I’m using that right) etc.
I can’t export just the audio from the video with my current video editor.
My Laptop
I’m not sure how much the computer matters in this, but Amazon doesn’t seem to have my exact model any more. As far as I can tell the only difference is the video card though.
Audacity does not apply effects while you are recording.
Using Voicemeeter, all you will manage as far as I know is to record the stereo game audio and the mono mic mixed into that stereo track. If that is your aim, try https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6rp9lkiFBU.
If you want more exotic routings you could try VoiceMeeter Banana which also has its own integrated recorder which can record multiple channels. The integrated recorder “might” be able to record the mic in one mono channel and the left and right of the game in another two channels. We can’t provide support for how to use Banana but support may be obtained from the author.
Sorry I forgot to specify I would be making those changes in editing, not while recording.
I’ll grab VoiceMeeter Banana and see how it works. I’ll keep messing with it in Audacity for a while to see if I can get it to work. I’d rather keep using Audacity, I like how it works.
As a last resort I’ll use avidemux…which I didn’t realize could export only audio.