Audition CS5.5 not recognizing my microphone

Question

I am using a Mackie 402-VLZ3 and Audition CS5.5 on my Acer Aspire 5736Z.  When ever I try to record my laptop microphone picks it up instead of my condenser mic.  I've went to control panel,  manage audio devises, but only the laptop mic shows up. HELP!

Answer 1

Well, if you want the truth about Behringer... yes their stuff is cheap and cheerful. How do they do this? Usually by compromising on the 'expensive' bits - no, not the electronics but the hardware. Generally it's pots (controls) switches and connectors that suffer most - but this device has only connectors, and as long as you don't pull them in and out too much, and take care when you do, it will be fine.
But the digital noise thing is different, and it all goes back to the laptop power supply. This problem has everything to do with grounding and earth coupling issues, and generally never occurs with the laptop running on batteries. Also, you can't guarantee that it's going to happen - some people never have trouble with this at all. People invariably blame the last thing they plug in - and if it's a sound device of some sort, then obviously it's that, right? Er, no... it's a system problem, almost invariably related to induced ground noise. It's the fact that the sound device has joined the laptop and something else that's grounded (your mixer, perhaps, in this case) that's causing it. It can be complicated to sort out, and the only way to do it effectively is to put isolation transformers between the output of the mixer and the sound device - this invariably cures it, because it isolates the two things that aren't getting on.
So yes, if that happens you have to purchase a couple of isolating transformers, but these are generally pretty cheap. Also you should note that this can happen with expensive sound devices as well...