Headset mic difficulties

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Sventity

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Hi folks. I'm new to posting here, but have been coming for help for a while now. Unfortunately I've encountered a problem I haven't been able to solve and I'm hoping somone here is able to shed some light on my problem.

I recently bought an Altec Lansing headset to use for online gaming, but for some reason the mic does not work on my computer. I know the headset mic works, though, because I've tried it on other computers with the same OS and it works perfectly. It's not the headset, so I went to the volume control of my computer to see if that is where the problem was. Before you ask, all the volume controls are set correctly. The mic is not muted and is selected for recording. The mic volume is set all the way up with the mic boost. I've run hardware diagnostics and it says everything is working fine. I've also tried another brand of headset with a mic (similarly priced and of similar quality) and the mic did not work with my comp either. To clarify, on both headsets the headphones work just fine.

Becoming fed up with the situation, I started trying other recording devices on my computer, such as a professional mic with adapters. That didn't work either (I'm using the Widnow's Sound Recorder to test). So I plugged in another set of headphones into the mic port and attempted to talk through the speakers in the headphones. That worked... and it worked with every set of headphones I tried, including the headsets with problematic mics. So from my end, I know it's not the headset, as it works on other computers, and I do have a way to get sound to record on my computer, but it's not ideal. I'm stumped as to what the problem is, so i hope someone can help me out.

I have onboard sound (Vinyl AC'97 Audio) and am running Windows XP. Thanks for any help in advance.

By the way, the mic IS plugged into the right port. I've checked that MANY times. ;)

Thanks again.
 
Did the headset come with a installation cd? Did you look in the "Sounds and multimedia" icon and then on the "audio tab"? Is your onboard audio selected for sound recording? Let me know what you see there.
 
No it did not come with an installation CD. On the other comps I tried it with it was plug and play. And yes, my onboard sound is selected for recording as well as playback.

Something occurred to me though. A while back I replaced my monitor. The previous one I owned had a mic mounted on the monitor, and I used it once or twice. Could that have changed certain settings that I haven't accessed yet? The new monitor has no mic. Thanks
 
Heyyo,

Have you tried just using line in instead? of course you won't be able to fine tune as well as the mic plug due to no mic boost, but at least that should work.

Now, something occured to me, built in soundboard. I remember they usually only have 3 jacks, and to set stuff like 4.1 sound you had to occupy other jacks, Check the sound manager program that is made for the onboard sound, as it might be setup as 4.1 sound or someother multi-speaker setup which could explain why the mic won't work.

Another potential problem could be that the jack is now damaged or failed on its own.
 
Well I've tried the line in as the recorder as well, but I can't get any device to transmit sound into the computer through it. As far as accessing a sound manager program and manipulating the sound channel (5.1, 4.1, etc.) I have been unable to find this setting. I've looked through all the volume controls and hardware options I can find and am unable to locate that information. If you could point me to where that info is kept, please let me know =)
 
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