Noise While Recording

[StarWarder]

While recording off of the stereo mix, I get a low level snow that I would really wish to get rid of. I've tried to remove it using the noise removal feature in audacity, but even at the lowest setting, that tool changes the sound of the audio noticeably so I don't want to use it. My computer hasn't always done this. It's only started doing it recently and I have no idea what changed between now and before. I've read the wiki article on recording sound and it doesn't seem to help. While I am recording, I cannot hear the snow but I can see that audacity is recording something because the monitor moves slightly. Then when I play back the recording, the snow can be heard. I've muted everything but the wave in Windows' volume control. Can anyone help?

Here's a sample of the snow:

http://www.supload.com/sound_confirm.ph ... 486808.wav

[steve]

Check that you do not have any recording inputs hidden - the mic input is the most common culprit.