Buzzing while recording sound/video

[Dave B]

Hi all,

I've got a problem when recording any sound through either the mic or line-in input on my computer.

Computer specs are:
VIA Motherboard with Duron 700
VIA 686 on board sound card
Geforce2 MX Graphics Card.
128MB RAM
Pinnacle PCTV Rave TV card

The sound records OK but is accompanied by a buzzing and noticible distortion. I have tried virtually all the sound recording levels (upto 44000Khz, 172k per sec etc) and I get this distortion on every one of them.

I read some similar posts here and tried reducing latency in the bios from 32 to 0 and twiddling with the recording input knobs till I can twiddle no more - all to no avail.

I run a triple boot WinME/Win2K/Linux system so before I did anything serious to my WinME environment (where I was experiencing problems) I tried it in Win2000 - it worked, no buzzing, no crackling, nothing.

So... why is WinME distorting my sound files and Win2000 isn't? I have only installed the capture card drivers in WinME but since the PCTV Rave can't capture sound, this shouldn't affect anything.

Can anyone help?

Dave B

[Dave B]

Well, after one of the most unproductive days of my life, I have fixed this problem. Anyone with a VIA motherboard from last year and running WinME must upgrade there sound drivers to the latest AC'97 jobbies from http://www.viahardware.com.

Obviously the WinME drivers shipped with the motherboard were the Win95/98 ones and caused the strange buzzing problems.

I hope this helps someone.

Dave B

[Known]

Is it chroma noise or just a general buzz?

[Dave B]

It was a background buzz and virtually all the audio was slightly distorted aswell.

What was funny is that the line-in input sounded absolutely fine through the speakers but recording the sound seemed to introduce this problem.

It wasn't chroma noise... I've had problems (not on the computer) with that before and this was different.

Dave B