Audacity Forum

Irish wrote:This post, http://forum.audacityteam.org/viewtopic ... sta#p78822 from another thread, may throw some light on the situation.

It appears that Vista sets the input from USB devices to mono by default, and you may have to go into the Control Panel to change it to stereo.

PO'L

Thats all set up correctly aswell. Any other ideas?

Rockguitarist88 wrote:I use Audacity, and M-Audio podcast factory with windows Vista. Ive NEVER had a problem with recording with my mic til a few months ago..
I always record in stereo, ...the settings are all set to stereo. However the stereo is only recording on the left side. When i monitor the input, it only registers on the left side. ive replaced cable and mic, and still will only record on left side.
...
why is audacity doing this?

okay.... technically it is not stereo unless you use two mikes and bring them in as inputs into two separate channels. it seems that you have one mike and want to playback on both channels on your stereo. if you only have one mike you can only record on one channel or one side of a stereo pair. i am not sure what you think audacity is doing. if you can record one channel you can duplicate it and have two channel "stereo". need more details of how you tried to do that to see why it didnt work for you.

@Whomper, The M-Audio has a Mono/Stereo switch, and if this is set to Stereo, the mic input should be duplicated on both output channels.

@Rockguitarist88, Have you tried using the RCA outputs on the M-Audio, and connecting into the Line-In on the PC, instead of the USB connection? That should tell you if Audacity is correctly set up and recording in stereo.

PO'L

Irish wrote:@Whomper, The M-Audio has a Mono/Stereo switch, and if this is set to Stereo, the mic input should be duplicated on both output channels.

@Rockguitarist88, Have you tried using the RCA outputs on the M-Audio, and connecting into the Line-In on the PC, instead of the USB connection? That should tell you if Audacity is correctly set up and recording in stereo.

PO'L

Well the RCA outputs are precisely that, there outputs to connect to your stereo, not for connecting to a line in, as they are a playback output not recording.
I had tried that in anycase and no, doesnt work.

Rockguitarist88 wrote: I havent changed a thing, i...,its still happenining so its DEFINITELY Audacity. When i click on the monitor input the left one will go up and down , even if my mic ISN'T plugged in. ... Audacity must have done an update or something that is making it do it to certain pc's or something. Maybe someone can tell me another FREE recording software i can try out that is just as simple as Audacity? Ive looked and there all complex, i just want record and stop, simple like Audacity. Ive emailed the Audacity help team and they havent bothered emailing me back, i know its defintely audacity, but i dont know what, its doing my head in

woweee.... thatsa lotta questions
are you sure you did not change anything???
how about vista? microslop loves to change things and not tell you.
what about other programs in your pc? they can affect audacity.
my pc does the same thing. record with nothing there and i still get noise. and since the pc card is broken its only on one channel too.
wikipedia will give a list of free software. maybe krystol or kristal
not sure how easy it is but it is free. want to pay a little to avoid the hassles then superscope novation(?) is the program to buy.
audacity does NOT do updates unless you did it yourself. the team is busy fixing bugs and writing new features. the forum is yuor best chance for help. you know it is definitely audacity (shhhh.... this is a BIG secret -- there is a conspiracy to mess with users heads by making audacity randomly update stuff and fail to work).
there are many other forums for pc problems and music/recording related pc problems that may be more helpful if you ever think it might not be audacity at fault. in the meantime tell us the entire set up make model serial number, software releases, pc , opsys, and all the settings on all boxes as well as audacity and the pc drivers and options pages. maybe we can better diagnose the problem then.

Irish wrote:@Whomper, The M-Audio has a Mono/Stereo switch, and if this is set to Stereo, the mic input should be duplicated on both output channels.
PO'L

maybe. I would presume that too. but perhaps it is not working that way any more. especially with his recording when no inputs are active. anyway he is positive it is audacity's fault. personally i am betting on vista or pilot error. can't wait to see what the answer really is.

Rockguitarist88 wrote:I...
I always record in stereo,...
so i think ok, ill record in mono, duplicate it and select one to go on left channel and one on right channel, this doesnt work either.
...?

okay...
i just did it.
recorded mono track. duplicated it. combined two tracks to stereo.
total time 17 seconds. including recording a noise sample to make a track to diddle.

what version of audacity are you using.
give DETAILED description of every thing you did to try to do it.
it might be a vista problem. but i am thinking you did something wrong or omitted somethign that was needed.

I did exactly what i said. Id record a breif segment in mono as i cant do stereo, ill duplicate it, have one in left pan the other in right pan. lovely jubbely, but if i only want it to come out of the right speaker, panning all too right or just playing the right pan segment, it still plays out of the left speaker, not as loud as the right, but stil none the less, it comes out of it.

When i was able to record in Stereo and i panned left and right, it actually did that.

Ive also recorded a segment, split it into 2 tracks, and panned them left and right, but same problem as duplicating.

I agree vista and microsoft are shite, however like i have previously stated, it doesnt even work properly on friends pcs who are on xp.

Ive looked at krystal but woah far too complex. Thats why i love audacity (when it works correctly) so nice and simple. I reckon it must be a bug

whomper wrote:

Rockguitarist88 wrote: I havent changed a thing, i...,its still happenining so its DEFINITELY Audacity. When i click on the monitor input the left one will go up and down , even if my mic ISN'T plugged in. ... Audacity must have done an update or something that is making it do it to certain pc's or something. Maybe someone can tell me another FREE recording software i can try out that is just as simple as Audacity? Ive looked and there all complex, i just want record and stop, simple like Audacity. Ive emailed the Audacity help team and they havent bothered emailing me back, i know its defintely audacity, but i dont know what, its doing my head in

woweee.... thatsa lotta questions
are you sure you did not change anything???
how about vista? microslop loves to change things and not tell you.
what about other programs in your pc? they can affect audacity.
my pc does the same thing. record with nothing there and i still get noise. and since the pc card is broken its only on one channel too.
wikipedia will give a list of free software. maybe krystol or kristal
not sure how easy it is but it is free. want to pay a little to avoid the hassles then superscope novation(?) is the program to buy.
audacity does NOT do updates unless you did it yourself. the team is busy fixing bugs and writing new features. the forum is yuor best chance for help. you know it is definitely audacity (shhhh.... this is a BIG secret -- there is a conspiracy to mess with users heads by making audacity randomly update stuff and fail to work).
there are many other forums for pc problems and music/recording related pc problems that may be more helpful if you ever think it might not be audacity at fault. in the meantime tell us the entire set up make model serial number, software releases, pc , opsys, and all the settings on all boxes as well as audacity and the pc drivers and options pages. maybe we can better diagnose the problem then.

No i hadnt changed a thing, like i said i didnt use it for a while. Ive checked all the drivers, there allu updated and correct. However we find a way of making it work in stereo properly then i shall let everyone know, as other people are having the same problems and i know how stressfull it is.

<<<@Whomper, The M-Audio has a Mono/Stereo switch, and if this is set to Stereo, the mic input should be duplicated on both output channels.>>>

I would guess no (not having read the instructions). If it's set to Stereo, you can pick which side the microphone appears on. If it's set to mono, the unit automatically sends two-track mono. I know equipment that works like that.

<<<Well the RCA outputs are precisely that, there outputs to connect to your stereo, not for connecting to a line in, as they are a playback output not recording.
I had tried that in anycase and no, doesnt work.>>>

You need to start getting compulsive about this. We can't do anything with global adjectives. Exactly what didn't work? Did you not get a recording at all and did you disconnect the USB when you tried?

And yes, you can record from the RCAs very successfully if you need to, but generally, it's better to keep it digital. Fewer distortions and errors.

You must have missed a step when you "converted" the mono track to stereo by duplicating and pasting. If you do that successfully, you get a stereo track identical to the one you used to get and the panning controls work just fine.

Did you miss the step when you married the two independent tracks back to stereo? You didn't say you did that in you post.

Koz