Corsair HS50 microphone issues

[1sascha]

On 3/16/2021 at 1:12 AM, Lraveli said:

The problem is on the project of this headset really. The speaker is too loud and the cushions do not isolate well so the sound produced by the speakers is captured by the mic.

I disagree WRT the cushions or the speakers. Those are excellent, IMO, as is the entire product - with the exception of the mic, it seems.

 

I've set up and used a ton of headsets in my time, but I'm at my wits end with this one. I did all the usual stuff like make sure the jacks I plug into are active, check recording levels in Windows, check mute-mic button, check boom's connection to the earpiece, etc, etc. I also found a tip on Corsair's website about reducing the audio quality preset for the mic to DVD-quality. Which also didn't help.

 

Here's what's happening with the HS50 on my system:

 

 

Note that I've put both the recording level and the mic boost to their maximum - something that would've gotten me banned from Roger Wilco/Teamspeak/Discord with any of the other headsets I've used in the past. Because it would've ruptured the eardrums on everyone who was in the chat with me. With the Corsair however... well, you can see the recording levels in Audacity. With these settings I chose those curves should be off the chart.

 

It does record my voice, so I know the connections are good and the audio-bits in Windows are - for the most part - configured properly. And audio playback/the headphone part are truly excellent. But using the mic to record my voice, it sounds like someone had activated a pretty powerful mute-button on the mic. And yes: I did double-check the mute-button on the left earpiece. When I push it, no audio is getting recorded, so at least that bit works as it should.

 

This happens on my desktop (Win 11, super-fresh install with up-to-date audio drivers), using the supplied Y-cable on either the front I/O panel's jacks or on the mainboard jacks in the rear. On my Win 10 Lenovo laptop with its "Connexant smart audio HD" solution (my desktop uses Realtek) I can get useable recording levels with much lower mic settings (IIRC 65 on the mic, +20 on the boost). The laptop has a two-in-one audio jack, so no Y-cable required.

 

What am I doing wrong on my desktop?

 

 

EDIT: No idea why any of this happened, but I somehow managed to fix it. Went to the MSI support-page, got the latest Realtek drivers for my board, installed them and now the mic behaves as expected. No idea why this was neccessary, since I thought I had all drivers up to date via Windows Update and the MSI suite, but I guess I was wrong.

 

S.