No sound detection.

[Invammocon]

I've had Audacity a little over a month and only used it to record sound clips from sites like Youtube. It worked fine for a few weeks and all of a sudden the meters wouldn't move for any computer sounds, I had not messed with any of the defaults and I'm wondering how to fix this.

[Invammocon]

Also, if it makes a difference, I've tried both the regular and beta versions after this and have never had troubles downloading.

[Invammocon]

When I do try to recording, horrible noise ( not the white noise effect) happens.

[steve]

When I do try to recording, horrible noise ( not the white noise effect) happens.

What kind of noise? Like a loud squeal? If it is, then you are getting feedback - make sure that the microphone input and output of your sound card are muted.

[Invammocon]

Not like that, like it'll take what I'm trying to record and make it all static sounding. And i'm pretty sure it just takes the first second of the recording and repeats it but it's hard to tell over all the noise.

[steve]

Go into "Edit menu > Preferences > Audio I/O" and make sure that "Software Playthrough" is not selected.