I have tried all ways to use MSN to talk to my friends over the internet but I still have problems. When I get into the program I can hear the other party speaking to me but they cannot hear me. I bought new earphones and microphone because my computer store said that this is the cause of the problem but it still does not work. Do you have any suggestions as to the cause and how to fix the problem?

When you are talking about MSN I am assuming that you are talking about the instant messenger program MSN Messenger. Now that we have that sorted, let’s get onto some reasons why this problem may be occurring.

Firstly, let’s check the obvious. Make sure that the microphone isn’t muted in MSN Messenger. You can check this in the ‘MSN Messenger Phone Window’. Also, make sure that the microphone isn’t muted in the Windows mixer. You can check this by double-clicking on the speaker icon in the system tray (next to the clock) and make sure that there isn’t a tick in the box ‘Mute’ for ‘Line in’ or ‘Microphone’. Also make sure that the sliders are set at least about half way up the volume control and are not all the way down.

If the problem still occurs, in MSN Messenger, go to the ‘Tools’ menu > ‘Audio Tuning Wizard’. Make sure that your sound card is selected as the sound device for playback and recording. If you are still having problems, let’s check that your microphone is actually working. Go into the ‘Start’ menu > ‘Programs’ > ‘Accessories’ > ‘Entertainment’ or ‘Multimedia’ and open ‘Sound Recorder’. Speak into the microphone and record your voice for about 10 seconds and then play it back. If you can hear yourself then we at least know that the microphone, and associated components, is working. However, if you don’t hear anything, make sure that the microphone is properly plugged in. Try connecting your microphone to another computer as well to check if it is the microphone at fault or your computer. If the microphone does work on the other computer(s) then the problem may be related to your sound card’s microphone input. In this case, all I can suggest is getting a new sound card or to take your computer to a computer repairer. Make sure to ask about the cost to quote on a repair because if the soundcard is the problem then the cost to repair it could be higher than the cost of a new soundcard! However, if you can hear yourself in the recording then read on!

In that case your soundcard may be half-duplex rather than full-duplex. If your sound card is half-duplex, this means that you cannot play while recording and likewise, you cannot record while playing. In laymen’s terms, the half-duplex soundcard can only handle one thing at a time (ie. it can playback sound [the other party] but it cannot transmit your voice). You can test this by going to the ‘Start’ menu > ‘Programs’ > ‘Accessories’ > ‘Entertainment’ or ‘Multimedia’ opening ‘Sound Recorder’. Then open Sound Recorder again so you now have two instances running. Try recording your voice in one of the instances of Sound Recorder. At the same time, play a file in the other instance of Sound Recorder. If you can do both at the same time then your sound card is full-duplex. If you cannot do both, then it is half-duplex which is your problem. If this is the case you will probably need to buy a full-duplex sound card.

However, if your soundcard is full-duplex and everything else is ok, it may be a problem with MSN Messenger itself. In this case, try another similar internet phone application such as BuddyPhone (www.buddyphone.com)