Newbie question about testing microphone

Hokuspokus · Post by **Hokuspokus** » October 24th, 2007, 11:07 pm

Sorry for this silly question but I am technical blond.

I have installed audacit and wanted to test my old headset. It is no usb but has two longish small thingies at the end. In German they are called Klinkstecker.

Audacity seems to record but there is no input. Maybe the headset is just broken. But before I go and buy a new one I would like to test it.

Does anybody know a simple method to test if the microphone still works, is there perhaps a windows on board tool or something?

When I used it last time it worked fine but that was quite a while ago.

Peter Why · Post by **Peter Why** » October 24th, 2007, 11:31 pm

In Windows, Accessories/Entertainment/Sound Recorder will allow you to see whether you are getting anything from your microphone

In Settings/Control Panel/Sounds and Audio Devices, Audio tab, pressing the Volume button under Sound Recording allows you to set the input volume of your microphone to maximum.

Then, in Audacity one of the tool bars has two volume slider and a pull-down. Microphone should be visible in the pull-down.

If these don't help, do ask again.

Peter

erichamion · Post by **erichamion** » October 25th, 2007, 6:03 am

Peter covered several items, and there are a few more simple things to check.

As Peter mentioned, Audacity has two volume sliders - one for playing and one for the microphone. Occasionally the mic volume will set itself to 0, so look at it after you start recording. If it's all the way down, you can move it up without stopping the recording.

The two jacks on the headset are for different purposes. One is for the headphones, and one is for the mic. Usually they're color coded, and the mic jack will be red or pink. Are these in the correct ports on the computer? If you get sound out of the headphones, that means at least one is correct; but the mic jack could still be in either the microphone-in port (where it should be) or the line-in (where it should not be). I know I've had things in the wrong port before, in spite of all the color-coding and labeling.

Is there a volume knob or a switch on the cord to control the mic? My headseat has a volume knob for the headphones (which does not affect the mic) and an on-off switch for the mic.

Hokuspokus · Post by **Hokuspokus** » October 26th, 2007, 4:44 am

Thank you, Peter Why and erichamion. It finaly works!

I'm not quite sure what the problem was.
The jacks were in the correct ports.
I found the windows recorder and from there I found where to do all this audio adjustments. I tried this and that and finaly it works.
Seems, my headset doesn't go together with the speakers I normally use.

Now I'm off to do the first recordings