Forum for Geeks

Hey guys. Tonight's podcast was rough. Dean with start skipping/breaking up/sounding like a robot, and it doesn't matter which machine I use to record. He hears me crystal clear. It eventually clears up, but I'd love to find out what's wrong.

I have all internet off except skype. Dean's wife will be surfing on her laptop. Maybe I should ask him if she was downloading something?

Any advice to get a clearer podcast? Would the type of microphone Dean uses matter?

Thanks for any help!!

We have continuous problems with anyone on a wireless connection. Hardwire to that router whenever possible!!

All of the above.

It's not just what you're doing, it's what the other party is doing as well. Make sure he reboots first, there's little to no traffic over the router (Netflix, for example) and goes wired whenever possible.

There are some optimizations you can do with Skype as well. For one there is a port setting that Skype uses, make sure that port is open and being forwarded to the address of the machine you're skyping on. This sounds more complicated than it is, but it involves going to your router's configuration page, and knowing what IP your computer is using. All parties on Skype should do this.

On my old PC, if I did ANYTHING else on the skype computer I'd get a drop. Open a webpage, browse a folder, anything. It got to the point that I used a laptop for everything else I needed in the show so the Skype PC would be free. My new PC can handle the work now, so I don't do that as much.

Good luck

We do use a wireless router. I'm wired. Wife isn't. She was using a headphone jack to listen in to us, but that made no difference. If her surfing while we podcast is a problem, then all we can do is find a day when she won't be home to record, which is tough, since she works retail and has varying days off.

Well, now I'm looking into using audacity to record, and I have it so it will record YouTube audio, but it won't record the skype test call:(

Any ideas?

Audacity will only record from one input source. So it's either the mic (you) or the internal sound (Skype). The best way to record Skype in Audacity is to use a mixer that will allow what's called "mix minus" where it mixes your voice and Skype and sends it all to Audacity, but takes out (here's the "minus") the Skype part to send back to Skype itself, so the callers only hear you and not their echo.

That's also not the cheap way, obviously. BUT, you can get a decent USB mixer for around $100. I have an analog mixer I got on eBay two years ago for around $180, down from $300 new.

Can the actual recorder cause the problems?