Sound while recording

[bjdealer]

While recording from a cassette player, I would like to listen to the recording via my external speakers. Where would I set the proper control please?

I use XP Home Edition on Dell Dimension E520. I use line in audio cable from deck. It records fine.

tks all

Bill

[steve]

Look in the Windows Mixer (loudspeaker icon near the clock). The Windows Mixer has separate pages for playback settings and recording settings. Enable the playback setting for the Line Input.

[bjdealer]

Can't find the selection you are referring to Steve. I right clicked and left clicked the speaker icon. Can you be more specific?

tks again.

bill

[steve]

I right clicked and left clicked the speaker icon. Can you be more specific?

Unfortunately it's not that easy to be specific about the details - in the old days when XP was young, it was pretty much the same for most sound cards, but in recent years the sound card manufacturers have increasing used custom interfaces for their device drivers, making them vary from one set-up to the next.

If you right click on the speaker icon, you will usually get a menu appear. Hopefully you will get an option of "Adjust Audio Properties", "open mixer" or "show settings" or something like that.

If you are still unable to get the mixer up, the alternative way in is through the Windows Control Panel:
Start > (Settings) > Control Panel > Sounds, Speech and Audio Devices > Sounds and Audio devices

For more details and pictures about accessing the Windows Mixer through the Control Panel, see the XP section of this page: http://www.audacityteam.org/wiki/index. ... bar_Issues

Note (1):
There are two ways that the mixer can be set up -
One method is to record everything that goes to the speakers - this is called "stereo mix" or "Mix" or "What U hear". Using this input allows you to record any sounds that are being played on your computer, but for recording from a cassette player this is not the best recording source to use.
The other method is to select "Line In" as the recording source - this is the better method and will give better quality recording.
In order to hear what is being recorded, the Playback setting must be enabled for the recording input that is being used. So if you are recording from "Line In", then "Line In" must also be enabled for playback.

Note (2):
If your mixer looks completely different from the one in the pictures (previous link), please post a screenshot if possible.