So over the weekend I purchased an iMic so that I could get an external mic to work with my Mac. My line in has never worked and I don’t know if it is my Mac or if I need to buy a particular mic. I keep meaning to take the thing to the Mac Store but I am guessing it isn’t under warranty anymore. Anyway. I bought a little iMic so I could record podcasts and was having the worse time with getting it to work without hearing static. Then I found this really helpful post which told me my problem was a combination of Audacity and my incorrect settings. So now I’ve solved the microphone problem. Although I’d still like to know why my input jack won’t work! Even if I get that fixed though, I’m glad I bought the iMic because I can use it and the software to transfer some old college choir tapes. I also discovered that I can get audio from my PC to my Mac using the cables that came with the iMic. So now I’m trying to figure out if there is a way to record myself Skype interviewing someone and how exactly to do this. I saw a post about this a while back and will have to try it out sometime when I get some free time.
Update:
After playing around some more I discovered that my line-in isn’t broken. I just don’t have a microphone that will work with that line in. My stereo plug works there though and I can transfer sound from one computer to another with this plug. Hmm… glad I bought the iMic because I can’t seem to find a mic that will work in the line in. Oh well, as long as I can create podcasts and screencasts I’m happy. Off to see if I can record Skype calls.
The mike problem may be a level mismatch: Many, probably most mikes require microphone preamps (just as most phono cartridges, for those who know what phonographs are, require preamps). “Line in” is for line-level sources (e.g., sound card output, CD players, etc.).
Although I don’t know, I wouldn’t be surprised if mikes that *do* work in line inputs have built-in preamps within the mike itself.
I just started doing some podcasts from my site, and I’m using Skype to record interviews. I use HotRecorder, then HotRecorder’s converter (with the paid edition) to save the file as .wav or .ogg. I can then open and edit the file in Audacity and save it as an MP3 as the final step. I am having some difficulties, though — sometimes my question is overlapping with the end of the interviewee’s answer, and then there will be several seconds of silence. I’m experimenting with recording in stereo rather than mono (HotRecorder gives you a choice), and then that recording has two tracks, one for each person, so I can edit each one separately. If you come up with a better solution, please let me know!
I just got my iMic recently, and downloaded ‘Audacity’ as instructed. I’m want to use it to convert my cassette music collection to CDs.
So far, I got everything going good except for one problem; how can I record a whole (side of) a cassette, then divide it into separate tracks before burning to CD?
My PC is running Windows xp, including sound recorder, Windows Media player, & Cyberline Power2go burning software.