System recognizes signal, Audacity does not

[stee1962]

Hello...

I'm trying to get my father set up so he can record some old analog tapes onto his computer. He's got an old iMac running OS X 10.2.8. We successfully installed Audacity 1.2.6. Unfortunately, when I lined his cassette deck into the mic input, Audacity didn't recognize the signal even though we could see the waveforms in his system sound pref panel. Seems like if the system is reading it, Audacity should be as well, yes?

Please advise!

Thanks,

Steve D.

[kozikowski]

Yes, but only after you also set it up in the Audacity Preference Panels.

Audacity > Preferences > Audio I/O > Input.

Also in that same panel, you must select Stereo and not Mono.

Audacity > Preferences > Quality

That one should be changed from 32-floating to 16 and 44100 sample rate. Restart Audacity to make sure the settings stick.

That's not to say this still can't get messed up. Does he have Vonage or Skype? You may not be able to run either of those and Audacity. They take over the sound pathways and to heck with everybody else.

The later Macs also had a second sound panel.

Go > Utilities > Audio Midi Setup.

Koz

[kozikowski]

<<<I lined his cassette deck into the mic input>>>

Probably not. Macs for a good long time have had Stereo Line-In on the side or back, not Mono Mic-In. Circle with two black arrows? That's the Line-In -- which is a good thing in your case.

Koz

[stee1962]

Thanks, Koz, I'll have him try this out.

Cheers,

Steve D.