Even before the release of our first podcast, I ran into technical problems with my microphone.  I simply could not get my front microphone plug to work.  That’s why I had to end that installment with a clip from the old Batman show.  Parts 2 and 3 have languished while I’ve tried to resolve this issue.  I finally dragged my desk away from the wall, climbed back there and re-plugged all of the audio plugs while my wife ran the SoundMax menu confirming which plug is being plugged in.

I think what happened is that the pink (microphone) plug was being erroneously used in the back end, and when there’s something plugged in the rear microphone jack, the front one is ignored.  So I pushed the desk back against the wall, tried the front microphone jack, and voila, I can finally record!

Except, now there’s no audio to my headphones.  Oh, and no sound to any of my surround sound speakers, just the front ones.  Agh.

Tonight, I finally got it to work?  Want to know how?   This will totally make sense.  I researched the problem and discovered…I swear, this is so logical, I don’t know how I couldn’t figure it out myself…I discovered…

…that if you want to use the headphone jack on the front of the computer, you should NOT…that is, NOT…have selected “Independent Front Headphones” in the SoundMax options menu.  If you select the option to use Independent Front Microphones, this has the effect of muting the sound from the jack in the front.  And I only find this out when I Google for the answer and find someone else detailing the same problem:

Selecting the option SoundMAX Control Panel | Preferences | Independent Front Headphones sounds like it would work, but all this seems to do is mute the output on the front jacks.

Tonight, I turned off the “Independent Front Headphones”… which has the effect of allowing me to use Independent Front Headphones.  Good job, SoundMax!

Tomorrow, I’ll put the finishing touches on the next podcast.  Again, apologies to Erik Burnham for the delays.