B3Burner
Dominant 7th #9
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Registered: 10-2003
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
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Recording through the line in (mic in) of a laptop to the c-drive
I want to record music from my audio tape deck onto my computer c-drive, running a line from the 1/4" headphone out of the tape deck, to the 1/8" microphone in of the laptop.
I have downloaded a toolbar recorder to do this, and through preliminary testing, it seems to work well. The songs are getting transferred from my cassette tapes to my c-drive.
However, here's the problem.
I can't hear the audio output from the tapedeck, so I don't know when to start and stop the computer recorder!
As soon as I plug the 1/4" end of the line into the headphone jack of the tapedeck, it kills audio to the stereo speakers in the livingroom, so there goes that source as a monitor.
And now the point of this whole post: When I try to monitor the audio coming into the laptop microphone inputs, via the headphone jack in the laptop, the laptop won't let me.
Does anyone know:
Is there a way to turn on the headphone-out jack of a laptop so you can monitor the audio coming in through the microphone-in jack in real time?
I'm running a COMPAQ Presario C306US Notebook PC (laptop), and find it astonishing this day in age that the brilliant minds that build computers, wouldn't have thought to allow one to monitor the mic-input live with the headphones.
Has anyone else here run into a similar situation, and if so, do you know how to tweak the audio properties inside the computer to allow the headphones to monitor the microphone input in realtime?
Thanks, I know this is sorta' technical for the forum, but thought it might be worth a try. I've done all sorts of Google searches for this subject, and have just run into a lot of deadends.
(P.S.-- Before you all ask why I don't just buy a CD burner and hook it up to my tape deck, consider the fact that I'm on a budget and am trying to do this as cheap as possible with the existing materials I already own.)
Last edited by B3Burner, 24/11/2007, 7:41
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John O'Flaherty
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24/11/2007, 7:33
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ClevelandSteamer
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Registered: 01-2004
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Re: Recording through the line in (mic in) of a laptop to the c-drive
It probably depends on the software being used. You might try a neat DAW called Reaper:
http://reaper.fm/
It's free and "uncrippled." I've not tried recording tapes and such with it, but I use it to put down demos, and I listen to my guitar live, so I think it should be possible to listen to tapes live.
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Feltch2Forever lives!
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24/11/2007, 17:29
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B3Burner
Dominant 7th #9
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Registered: 10-2003
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
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Re: Recording through the line in (mic in) of a laptop to the c-drive
Thanks, I'll check it out.
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John O'Flaherty
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24/11/2007, 19:05
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BlackerThanNight
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Registered: 11-2003
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Re: Recording through the line in (mic in) of a laptop to the c-drive
I'd have thought that whatever is comming out the headphone socket won't be the correct impedance to go back into the computer and the sound will either be very weak or more likely distorted. Usually there is a lot more noise comming from a headphone socket. Maybe there's no alternative but I'd have though it wasn't the best way to do it. I'd have thought htat now it would be very easy and very cheap to find and buy an old cassete deck, such as would have ben used on any decent home stereo music system. That type of deck will have proper amp and phones ouputs for both using with your computer and monitoring what's going on. Personally that's what I'd buy if I was lookign to make a decent recording of my old tapes to computer. I'd guess it might cost maybe $50 and you can sell it again when you're done.
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25/11/2007, 10:18
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B3Burner
Dominant 7th #9
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Registered: 10-2003
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
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Re: Recording through the line in (mic in) of a laptop to the c-drive
Well I'm happy to report that I found the problem and I can lay the issue to rest.
In the audio input advanced menu on the computer, the virtual fader for monitoring the mic input had been turned off, so I had no way of knowing it existed before. When I turned it on, I saw it had been muted.
So I unmuted it, and now I can control the volume level of the input monitor and now monitor my input through the headphones in real time.
I should have known it was something simple that I was just overlooking-- i.e.-- the problem was sorta' hidden.
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John O'Flaherty
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9/12/2007, 22:52
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