Noise background while dubbing

[compi]

Hi all

I've tried to record the speaker's text for a video by connecting a microphone directly with the microphone socket of my sound card. Sound simple, but in practice there is always this cracking/sizzling noise in the background, on both computers I've tried. I can't say it's particularly loud, but it's audible.

In an attempt to find out where this comes from I've recorded directly into my camcorder and subsequently transferred the recordings onto the PC. There is no such noise at all on these files. But this procedure is very inconvenient.

Do you always get these noises when recording directly onto the computer?

[anonymez]

Try lowering the volume a bit during recording.

[compi]

Tried that, but it only reduces the volume of the speaking, not the background noise, which seems to be independent of recording volume.

I've put a test recording online at:

https://www.bienentanz.com/videos/test.wav

[RFBurns]

Most common cause to this type of problem is the connection itself. The contacts in the mini-plug on the sound card get dirty causing intermittent contact, thus produces noises or scratchy sounding audio. Even the line-level input/output connections can develop the same symptoms.

A quick fix is to take a small sheet of fine grit sandpaper and gently wipe the microphone plug to remove any surface buildup of junk that would make the connection noisy. For the connector on the soundcard, using DeOxit-5, a contact cleaner, does an excellent job of removing any contact corrosion and provides a layer of protection against future buildup of junk on the connectors contacts.

A good test to determine if it is a contact problem in the connector is to plug in the mic, turn up the volume just enough so that feedback does not occur, and then rotate the mic plug while plugged into the sound card and listen as you rotate the plug for any noises. A visual aid to this can be your audio recording software program and its level indicators. The level indicators not only serve as a reference to your audio levels, but can also be a great "on-board" sound oscilliscope to visually see any noise or spikes. Just set the record program to "monitor" and crank up the mic level and sensitivity, then jiggle or turn the mic plug and watch the sound level meter on the program while listening for the noises.