Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: Delirium on February 26, 2006, 03:28:07 AM
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I've been looking for a new mic to replace my old one, problem is that almost all the current microphones have a single plug for the soundcard which support both audio and record on the plug.
This means, when I plug the microphone into my audio out plug, it plays the game sound instead, when I plug it into the record port on the sound card the headset portion of it records sound.
Is there a way to bypass it and make the microphone part of a headset JUST record and not use the audio part of the headset?
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On my system and all the systems I've ever owned, there is a socket at the back of the card for sound output (this is what you plug the speakers or earphone plug into) and a separate socket for the microphone plug; and for all headsets I've ever owned, there is a separate jack for the mic and the headset speakers.
If you want to get a new set of headphones with a very-good-quality mic, yet at a cheap price, I heartily recommend the Koss CS-100 headset. It's about $15 at buy.com. Plug the headphone jack into your sound-out socket on the back of your sound card and the mic jack into your microphone socket on the back of the sound card, and you should be all set.
If afterwards the mic volume seems really low (as if you have to shout into it to be heard), make sure in your settings you have turned on the "Microphone +20 db boost"in the Windows microphone volume-control advanced settings.
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I'll try and explain another way...
I'm really looking to pick up a throat mic (it'll make scenarios really fun) but all the throat mics I see are built for CBs, which means they have a single plug that controls both audio out and audio in... the plug is 'duplex' I guess you'd call it.
If I plug in a something like this into my sound card microphone port, I can't get just the mic to work, it ends up recording stuff via the earpeice it came with.
Is there anyway to bypass it? Any adaptors I don't know about?
Help is greatly appreciated!
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Hmm. I've never seen plugs like that. I don't think I can be of any help on this one.
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I'm going to guess that your easiest out here would be to identify the wires/contacts, buy a corresponding socket for that type, then splice in to an old patch cord or mic cord of a type that fits your soundcard inputs, effectively creating your own patch cord.
The second option, would be to lop the end off the mic set, and connect a plug of the correct type for your soundcard. No patch cord needed, but you'd be modifying your micset, which you might want to avoid, and you'd still have to identify the wires in the cable, and determine which wire connects to which component on the headset. (a little cheap DMM would be all you'd need for this) Radioshack and the like sell all sorts of plugs so that fabricating your own isn't too terribly difficult, and if you don't mind ugly, just lop some cables in two, and use some crimps or wirenuts to make the connections.
Have a particular model picked out? If you can post a link to it, or link a picture. If it's a weird plug layout, the above suggestion may be useless.