Re: SoundMeister recording quality?

[mjmahon@aol.com (Michael J. Mahon)]

Rodney Hester asked:

>I just finished repairing my Econ SoundMeister card (one of the wires was
>disconnected), and now I am able to record via microphone in DigitalSession
>(I haven't tried line in yet).

Congratulations!

>However, the recording quality is _horrid_.  I'm not talking about mildly
>annoying here, I'm talking about unbelievably noisy and faint to the point
>of being rather difficult to make out what was said at all (if you didn't
>know in advance).
>
>I'm using a standard late-90s PC 'boom microphone' to do the recording, and
>even with sensitivity set to High in DigitalSession, the oscilloscope shows
>no more than maybe 1/4 of the total scope in amplitude when I yell into the
>mic.

Try another sound source.  It sounds like the mic output level is
way below the level that the card is expecting.  Is it a line-level
input, as opposed to a microphone-level input?

>I'm relatively certain the wire soldering job I did is adequate - wire
>current-carrying levels seem consistent across all three 'hot' wires (2
>stereo + mic) and I've resoldered without improvement.  Both the
>SoundMeister Control Panel and DigitalSession are set to record from
>microphone (instead of line in, which I believe controls an amplification
>circuit on the board?).

If the wires are not shorted or open, then they're fine.  Is there a
jumper on the card to select input level.  Microphones typically
require 10x-50x more voltage gain than line-level (about 1v p-p)
inputs.

-michael

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