Category: Geeks r Us
Recently, my best friend bought me some c-media usb 7.1 channel usb sound cards with volume control, mic-in and headphones-in, from Ebay. It didn't say C-Media in the description, but that's what it says when I plug them in. They work fine on all of my computers, including my HP laptop running XP Pro. But when I plug them into my Thinkpad X60, also running Pro with Service Pack 3, I get an error message about the driver having a missing entry, and the device possibly being made for Windows 95/98. I went to device manager and tried to install from there. It said that there's a problem with the headset. Then, when I attempted to let it install, it gave me the finish button, as if the install was successful, but I still can't use the headset. I know that the usb ports on this machine are fine, as I've used them for other things, and the adapters are brand new. I have a generic sound card, with no volume control, that was falling apart. I put it together, and plugged it in, just to see what happened. It was immediately recognised by the X60, and the sound started coming through my headphones attached to it. I won't use it, since it buzzed when I put the microphone in, and I don't want to short anything out. But I can't understand why that one works and not the others. Just to be sure, I asked my friend to check the link on Ebay and it says no drivers are required for XP.
The machine came with Antivir. It was also set up strangely with regard to sound. Certain system sounds, such as startup and shut down of Windows, device connect/disconnect/fail, and the sound you get when exiting Notepad without saving, were set to off. I'm assuming that, since this is a business laptop, the previous owner needed to have a quite machine. I fixed the usb device sounds and the startup and shut down ones. But the latter two still aren't working. This is no big deal for me, but I figured I'd mention it incase it had any baring on this. Of course, I could easily use my headset with the regular 3.5mm jacks, but the usb adapter really improves the recording quality when I make videos with Debut. The standard plugs tend to fray on me, so I'd rather minimise the times they go in and out of the jacks.
I've been thinking this over. It's a software issue...well it's not an issue. You are trying to use old equipment with a new operating system. You can get plenty of updated usbb sound cards.
But these aren't old. I just got them from Ebay, brand new in the package. I've also used them on all of my XP machines, and this Thinkpad is running XP. I can't even say it's because it's Pro, since my HP is also running Pro and handles these fine. In the description for them, they even say that they don't require drivers for XP, but are seen as plug and play devices.
The problem is that maybe the XP is missing drivers. To fix it you'll have to get your XP disc and repair windows. That will reinstall any drivers that are missing and turn on any settings that are turned off.
Now the last issue is the USB port its self. A 2.0 would be best and the card may not work with anything less.
A cautionary word, make sure you have the Windows key to the machine you are repairing the Windows on just in case you are asked to put it in again. You'll find that on a sticker on the machine if it hasn't been removed. This is not usually an issue, but its just a good thing to have.
That is your fix.
Well, I've had quite the adventure with these usb sound cards tonight! I decided, out of desperation, to just go and download whatever C-Media usb headphone drivers I could find. The first one I got from a Google search was here.
http://drivers.softpedia.com/get/SOUND-CARD/CMedia/C-Media-CM106-Like-USB-Audio-Driver-61282013.shtml
I unpacked it and installed it. As soon as I plugged in one of my sound cards, it worked! So I decided to make some recordings just to test it. But I noticed, when I did, that there was a buzzing. So I then decided to test my microphones on all of my machines, to see if I would get the same result. I used the free version of Stepvoice Recorder, on my compact flash card. This is the same software that I always use for audio recordings.
http://stepvoice.com/index.shtml
The card was a 4gb Kingston, and was used with my pcmcia adapter on both the IBM Thinkpad X60 and the HP Ze5385us, both of which have Windows XP pro installed. On the desktop, with XP Home, I used my compact flash card reader. On the Mac, I recorded onto the drive with Quicktime Player. The microphones used were an ATR4650, from Audio Technica, and a GE Headset with Two Adapters. Basically, the 3.55 plug at the end goes into another 3.5mm jack, thereby giving a headphone and a microphone plug. For the record, when I say "my old one" I'm referring to my C-Media adapter that I had before my friend got me these three. It looks exactly the same as all the others, and the new ones were all bought from the same seller.
On the Mac and the X60, I heard the buzzzing. But for the Mac, that's standard, and the sound wasn't incredibly loud. Since the Mac can't handle a standard microphone plug, I couldn't test it, but the X60 buzzed with both the usb adapter and when using the regular jacks. The lapel microphone was really bad with the jack. I also tried the microphone on a cheap usb webcam and heard the buzzing there as well. It's worth noting that I hear nothing strange when using the built-in or sound card headphone jack without a microphone. At any rate, on the HP, I tried both ways, and the buzzing was completely absent. I couldn't get the microphone jack to work on the desktop, but I tried the usb adapter, via a usb hub, and as with the HP, aside from a bit of static, the recordings were clear. I also noticed that my old adapter is recognised as a C-Media USB headphone and the other is just called USB Headphone by the Mac. I tried using another new one with the X60 as well as my old one, but they weren't recognised, and I got the message that the usb device was malfunctioning. When I plugged in the new one with which I was doing the testing, again it worked fine. My other machines recognise these new ones without me having to install the driver. As for the buzzing, I thought that maybe i installed the wrong driver, but I heard it on the X60 even when I plugged the microphone into the normal jacks, and when I did the same with the HP, I heard nothing but a clear recording.
The reason why I'm going through all of this trouble is that I'm considering buying a microphone from
http://www.soundprofessionals.com
This one is $59,, a far cry from the $10 and $19 spent on the other mics. If I get a usb one, it will use a C-Media driver. If I get the regular one, it will either be plugged into the standard jack or will be plugged into an external sound card. But given that the buzzing occurs in both places on the Thinkpad, I really don't want to spend such a large amount of money on a microphone only to hear that.
forereel, the Thinkpad X60 doesn't have a built-in disk drive. So I would need to get an external one. That said, it does have a recovery partition, if that wasn't removed, and I know that the sticker is still on the machine. The ports are also usb 2.0. The machine itself was made in 2006.
Amazon has some great external drives. You reinstall or repair your Windows maybe you find you have less issues plus everything will be fresh and on and all drivers will be included so you don't have to go looking for ones that will create the settings.
Was this sound card new? I forgot to ask that question?
If not new, well...
I'd say this. If you are going to be buying used machines an external drive might be a good thing just to have around for many reasons.
Yes, these usb sound cards were all new. they came last week. Even the "old" one is only a few months old. But these are extremely cheap, at a few dollars a piece, so that could be part of it. Still, why do they work on all of my other machines and not on this one?
From what I remember reading, the copy of XP on here is a fresh install. I really should check for that recovery partition, though, just to be safe. When you say drive, do you mean hard drive or cd rom drive? I already have everything saved to my cards, so am not worried about that, though to be fair, I saved my documents, music, etc. and didn't do a regular backup of the system, with drivers etc. I really don't need more than 60gb, 80gb at the most for a full hard drive, and most that I've seen are large in capacity and a bit expensive for me. Plus, they're not as reliable as cards. I bought one once and it broke on me.
CD/DVD drive. About 30 dollars or so. Disc drive. You can install programs on machines that don't have them.
USB sound cards are not expensive, but new is best. You don't know what might have happend to a used one, but in this case that is not your issue. I've told you what I'd do if it were me, so. Smile.
Well, the sound's there, even when I use the built-in jacks on the computer. Just very odd. Anyway, thanks for your suggestion. Yes, the cd rom drives are very cheap. I could probably get a new one from Ebay for $20 or so, and as you said, they're good to have in any case.
Yes, but if you want it to work correctly and have the control you know you can have you'll need all the resorces Windows provides you on your other computers. The only way to get that without to much work is to freshen up.
Just because you read that Windows was installed fresh doesn't mean it was installed fresh and not changed to suit the last owners purperposes.
Today, I decided to download the trial version of Stepvoice Recorder, to see about the improvements made from the free one. Aside from a few odd key combinations, and the fact that I can't continue recording on the same file after stopping, it really does have a better sound quality. At any rate, I did a few tests with it and my microphones, along with Debut Video Capture Software. I didn't have the camera available, so set it to screen capture, since these were just for testing. None of the recordings had the buzzing sound, even though I was recording straight from the computer jacks. I then tried the old version of Stepvoice, making sure to match the settings that I used with the new one, and again, the recordings were clear. I then had to go inside, since the battery was getting low. So I decided to try the new recorder with a usb device plugged in, and I got buzzing. But the same thing happened when the device was removed. Finally, I unplugged the ac adapter and made a new recording, and it was clean. I plugged in the usb camera, and it made no difference. So it looks like I solved the problem! For some reason, the adapter is being recorded, along with the sounds for plugging and unplugging usb devices and NVDA speaking. These are all quite low, but they're still audible. Even when I turn the volume on my headset completely down, it records these things. But when I record from the built-in mic, they're not picked up, except by the speaker, if I'm not using plain headphones. I checked the settings in the control pannel, and they're all fine. So I'm not sure what's going on, but at least I don't have to worry about a usb microphone making those annoying sounds! Whether it would be recognised, even though it's plug and play with XP, is another matter. Maybe, just to be safe, I'll get one with normal plugs.
I removed Antivir and installed Microsoft Security Essentials. as soon as that was done, the Navigational Sounds ad-on for Firefox started working, and I'm now getting the sound when I try to exit Notepad without saving a file. But the Windows start-up and exit sounds aren't there, even though I made sure they were set up in the sound scheme and was able to toggle them with the play/stop button. I actually like the quiet start-up and shut down, but do find that curious.
This is not related to my problem, but I had to share. I just discovered that NCH, the same company that makes Debut, also makes a sound recorder called Recordpad. The full prices is $60, a far cry from $14 for Stepvoice Recorder, but this one produces extremely high quality recordings and a large selection of bitrates. I'm happy with either 32kbps or 64kbps. Plus, it uses the same easy hotkeys as Debut. So I think I've just found myself a new recorder! *smile* Hopefully, I can continue using this free version.
http://www.nch.com.au/recordpad/index.html
Yea!
That's for sure! This was driving me nuts! *smile*