Audio Quality Drops With Another Program Open

[HateAudioIssues]

I'm using Windows 7. Audacity 2.0 of course.

I'm using turtle beach x11's. I recently reset my laptop due to a trojan. For some reason my recording differs from time to time when I have a program open. For example, Sony Vegas and ArcSoft Biz. This problem never occurred before.

To go further, I'll do a quick mic check, everything will be fine. But as soon as I open the program, my voice comes out terrible. The quality drop is very noticeable.

Example = Good audio (where I want to get back to) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Re0TGCc ... dded#t=16s

Example = Bad Audio http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... 7X0#t=684s

Any thoughts or fixes? I've tried giving audacity priority, resetting the drivers, disabling the stereo mix (didn't work), playing with the exclusive mode, nothing works. As soon as I open any of those two programs my recording dips.

Edit: Fixed the links

[steve]

Your two links are the same, but I think I know what you mean. The problem is simple, but unfortunately the solution is not so clear cut. When the other program is running, your computer is failing to deliver a continuous stream of audio data to the hard drive, so tiny bits of the audio are missing. This literally makes the sound "break up" and sound terrible. The solution may be as simple as defragmenting your hard drive (a fresh install of Windows will often produce a large amount of fragmentation), or you may just need to update your drivers. Ensure that Windows and all of the hardware drivers are fully updated, then defragment the hard drive and reboot. If the problem persists, see here for some other suggestions: http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Manag ... nd_Drivers

[steve]

There is some distortion in the "bad example". Something is being overloaded - either the recording level is too high, or you are too close to the microphone, or you're getting excited and talking too loud, or you have pushed up the level too high when editing, or .....
See the flat top to the waveform in the selected area - the top / bottom of the waveform is cut off:

tracks000.png (20.64 KiB) Viewed 1032 times

[HateAudioIssues]

Prior, I had my input volume set to 0.4, now I have it at 1.0 just simply because 0.4 since I removed the trojan is way too quiet.

And sorry I didn't understand the image, could you dumb down your suggestion to me?

[steve]

I have downloaded the Prison Island video and imported the audio into Audacity.
Zooming in really close at about 3 minutes 17 seconds:

firsttrack000.png (10.42 KiB) Viewed 1027 times

See how the waveform is so big that it does not fit in the track - the top and bottom of the largest peaks are being "chopped off" (clipped) and this causes audible distortion.

[HateAudioIssues]

So I tried lowering my input, issue came up again today if I open up Sony Vegas or Arcsoft Biz. Like I'll record 5 seconds, it'll be fine, then open up either program and the audio comes out a lot more hallow and drops the next 5 seconds. There must be a solution to this.

I tried moving the mic away from me, issue came up still.

[Gale Andrews]

You will need to try the list of suggestions in the link Steve gave http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Manag ... nd_Drivers .

What did you do when you reset the laptop? A System Restore? A reinstall of Windows may be a good idea (back up your data, but you should be able to reinstall Windows to keep your program and settings as per http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/34 ... stall.html ).



Gale

[HateAudioIssues]

You will need to try the list of suggestions in the link Steve gave http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Manag ... nd_Drivers .

What did you do when you reset the laptop? A System Restore? A reinstall of Windows may be a good idea (back up your data, but you should be able to reinstall Windows to keep your program and settings as per http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/34 ... stall.html ).



Gale

I used tweaking.com window's repair. I just updated my drivers and found the same issue was occurring again. I tried of solutions on that list none of them seem to work. I uninstalled and reinstalled audacity, problems still there. The recording is fine until the moment I pulled up one of those two programs.

[steve]

The recording is fine until the moment I pulled up one of those two programs.

So you're saying that it looks pretty clear that those two programs are causing the problem?
What programs are they?

[HateAudioIssues]

The recording is fine until the moment I pulled up one of those two programs.

So you're saying that it looks pretty clear that those two programs are causing the problem?
What programs are they?

Sony Vegas and ArcSoft Biz. I'm sure other programs with sound (perhaps even listening to a youtube video) would conflict with my mic input.