Microphone delay when recording in Windows 7

Thanks Agrippa,

Yes I have the IDT chip in my Dell Studio laptop but it also comes with a SoundblasterX-Fi MB *software* program to enhance it so this should work.  I will surely give this a try and see what happens after I load Vista on the other partition.  And again, my mic works but it has about a 500ms delay through the playback which is what this thread started out as....the W7 latency.  My IDT driver version is 6.10.0.6267 from 1/21/2010.  Thanks again and I'll let you know how it goes.

Jandash, I paste my solution for Vista I have posted elsewhere. But you need to have IDT for this to work. Do you? Let me know if your computer doesn't have the DisableMicInFromRender key when you browse the registry as I explain below. KEEP IN MIND THIS DOES NOT WORK FOR W7 -There are no solutions for W7 with IDT.

EDIT: Jandash, I read in your earlier post you have a Soundblaster card and not IDT HD? Then perhaps it could work with only downgrading to Vista. However, I do not know, I am only versed in the horrible world of IDT.

HOW TO ENABLE INPUT MONITOR FOR HP VISTA SYSTEMS WITH IDT SOUNDBOARDS (atleast on my HP Pavilion Dv7 Vista64 with IDT HD Audio card):

Read this carefully, since if you do not do as I did exactly there will be problems.

::::1:::: Open regedit and search for DisableMicInFromRender. Change it from 01 to 00. Or you can browse to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class{4D36E96C-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\0007\Settings\filter\Speaker1\ 

DisableMicInFromRender hex:01 change to hex:00. 

RESTART COMPUTER.

::::2:::: NOW you have to downgrade your IDT drivers to IDT ID92HD71B7 Audio Driver. Go to:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/genericSoftwareDownloadIndex?cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&softwareitem=ob-6...

and download the file sp39330.exe. I do assume you have the driver called sp41398.exe installed now. Do not install yet. Firstly, completely remove your old IDT drivers (do not blame me if something goes wrong, I am merely trying to help when Microsoft, IDT and HP does not give a s___). After this I think it is best to restart computer to be on the safe side. 

THEN INSTALL THE sp39330.exe! AND RESTART AGAIN!

( For you others I found a forum thread with other Generic drivers you might want to look up if you do not have HP and IDT, scroll down and you find the links:

http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=33686&p=203452 )

::::3:::: Go to Sound settings, go to playback\levels and you should now find the Mic volume option there, and perhaps muted. Unmute, raise the volume to max. (And check in Recording-settings that you have the mic turned on aswell.

::::4. Now here is the tricky part. It do work in mysterious ways, and it is very strange indeed. THIS IS IMPORTANT! I first did not get it to work, but I right clicked on the system tray, the IDT setting button. Right click on it, and choose the middle option. I do not know what it is called in English, but in Swedish it is called "à ppna minipanel för musikl". I guess it would be called something like "Open mini..." What it is is a small window called IDT HD Sound, and you can adjust your sound there.

WHEN OPENING it, my Input Monitor Mic started to spark AND IT WORKED! When I close it, the microphone stops working, but when I open it, it starts again! And sometimes when I restart computer it does not start at once. Then I have to do the Special move:

----Special move (Hopefully it works without this step for you)----

READ THIS: If it does not spark to life, THERE IS ONE IMPORTANT STEP TO DO IF YOU CLICK AROUND AND IT DOES NOT START WORKING!

Go to playback-settings in the system tray/Speakers/Advanced and uncheck the button in the "Exclusive mode" called "Give program that require exclusive mode lower priority" or something like that.

Then it mysteriously starts working, if it does not, go to Recording setting aswell and do the same thing there and press OK. And remember to keep the small IDT window open. Keep in mind it is not the big settings window. Rather weird I must say!

I really do not understand why it works like this, that one have to do weird stuff to make it work. Perhaps even some steps I described can be omitted but I can not figure out which step it is. IT IS REALLY WEIRD that you have to "trigger" the mic to work by doing some strange "Exclusive mode" setting and keep the small IDT window open.

Also, sometimes it keeps klicking on and off with intervals of maybe 1 minute. Perhaps some elite computer geek can explain this too me? 

However, when you get the Input Monitor to start working it works until you restart, and after a while you start get the hang of how to make it spark to life. Perhaps you do not even need this last jerking around to get it to work. I hope so, just try to open the last small IDT window and perhaps that might work without these strange poking around I have to do to get it to work (sometime).

Keep in mind to keep the mic running so you hear when it sparks to life.

Agrippah, That would be great actually as I do have a full load of Vista Ultimate 64 bit I can use if you have a solution for this.   Please let me know and thank very much you for that in advance.  I hope I can get it working properly again. I wasn't aware that Vista had the same issues as W7.  In my ASUS with Vista and an Nvidia card, I don't remember latency being an issue but do remember it being glitchy.  I look forward to your response.

Ok sooooooo.........what if you don't have Realtek audio.  Is it the same for all system configurations and audio set ups for Windows 7, specifically ATI Mobile Radeon 4650, IDT Codec, and Soundblaster X-Fi MB???  I am ready to partition the hard drive and go XP in it but want one last attempt at some sort of good answer.

Well, with IDT there is no solution sadly. I know this for a fact. Just downgrade to XP, it is the only solution unless IDT release new drivers. With Realtek however, there is a solution. What you could do aswell is downgrade to Vista, because I have written a long thorough explanation of how to do it on Vista. Let me know if you want it.