No Gain Control on Microphone Input

[JohnMorley]

I am trying to do a simple recording of voice only, using a Logitech USB headset. All works fine except that I appear to have no gain control over the incoming signal from the microphone. When I move the "Input Volume" slider next to the microphone icon, it appears to have no effect on what the UV meter shows or on what is being recorded.

I have searched the wiki, other posts on this forum, and FAQs, without being able to find any information on whether there is some sort of auto gain control that has taken over and how I can turn it off.

Any help will be appreciated.

I am using a MacBook, Intel Core Duo, OS 10.4.11.

version of Audacity is 1.3.6 (Unicode).

[steve]

If the slider in Audacity has no effect, you need to look to the computer sound system controls. The recording and playback level controls are just short cuts to the sound system controls, but depending on the hardware and the sound card drivers, they are not always able to have any effect, in which case you need to use the computer sound system controls instead.

[JohnMorley]

Thanks Steve,

It seems pretty limited, but I guess that's what I get until I invest in some more fancy gear or software. I appreciate your help.
--
John Morley

[kozikowski]

Are you in Apple > System Preferences > Hardware > Sound > Input?

Does your headset show up on the device listings? I have been able to get good if not great results on my USB devices by changing the volume there instead of Audacity.

I've never been able to get anybody to tell me if that slider affects the driver and thus the actual device, or it's an Apple input volume scaling process. They're really different.

I did write down the last time I did this...

http://kozco.com/tech/audacity/USB_Microphone.html

Koz