Digital Bits Technology Column QnA

Question:

I connect the lines to my computer line in and the headphone of the cassette. I hit record on the PC and play on the cassette. Audacity doesn’t record what is on the tape, but I can hear what Im doing in the back ground and hear myself talk. what am I doing wrong? 

Answer:

It appears like you’ve got everything working, except Audacity is trying to record from your computer microphone, instead of the “LIN IN” jack. You need to tell Audacity to record from that plug. To do so, go to Audacity’s Edit menu, and choose Preferences. Look at the “Recording” area, and you’ll see a dropdown box for “Device“.

This is the device that Audacity records from. Change this dropdown. You should have additional options. In your case, I think one option will be your PC’s built-in microphone (this is probably already selected). You should have at least one other choice, and this other choice will be your PC’s “LIN IN” jack.

Select that LIN IN input and try the recording again.

Other articles related to this topic:

• Echo when recording cassette in Audacity
• Cassette to Audacity recording problem with heavy static
• Audacity recording is too quiet
• Will plugging in a stereo to a computer’s MIC jack damage the microphone?
• No sound when recording cassette to MP3