Poor quality sound on Cosmos II 17.3" laptop built in microphone.

[Richard911]

Hi all

I recently purchased a Cosmos II 17.3" laptop with Win7.

The built in microphone has fairly poor quality sound. When its used with skype the sound is distant and indistinct.

I wanted to check I'm using the best available drivers and settings.

When I click start, computer, manage, device manager, sound video and game controllers. I see :-

Bluetooth Audio Device
NVIDIA Virtual audio device (Wave Extensible) (WDM)
VIA High Definition Audio

Which of these is the built in microphone ?
What driver should it have (provider, date, version) ?


When I click start, control panel, hardware and sound, sound, recording, microphone, properties, levels.

I see Microphone set to 100 and Microphone Boost set to +30.dB.

When I click Advanced I see.

2 channel, 24 bit, 48000 Hz (studio Quality)

Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device is enabled.
Give exclusive mode applications priority is enabled.

Should I change the above settings or are they as good as they can be ?

Are there any other settings that are important ?

Thanks

Richard

 

[mantadog]

The microphone boost usually results in a fair bit of noise being added to the input, I would reduce that to 0dB regardless of the issue your having now.

I highly doubt its a driver issue, have you got something like an external headset plugged in that also has a built in microphone. If so you might be getting picked up on by that rather than the built in one.

If not, open up your VIA software and have a poke about in that to see if you can find anything relating to the microphone volume as it might be that the windows settings are being overridden by the VIA software.

Might be worth checking that a fragment of debris isn't blocking the microphone holes in the chassis itself if the above doesn't work.

 

[Richard911]

There was no external headset plugged in.

The VIA software is in step with the windows control panel settings. I think they are tracking each other.

I tried vacuuming the microphone hole in case there was a blockage. I think this has helped a bit but its a hard to be sure.

I tried plugging in an old headset that has a microphone and this is better than the laptop's built in microphone. This is a livable solution however I would have preferred the convenience of using the laptop's built in microphone.

Thanks
Richard

 

[mantadog]

Hmm, it is possible that it is damaged I guess. If the external one works fine then I wouldn't say its a software configuration issue. If vacuuming it helped a little then it is possible something is in the hole. If its not right then you can always give PCS a call and see if they can send you a replacement, or get a RMA arranged.