Hissing Samson Mic on Garageband

[mulli]

Hey guys

Im having problems whilst recording on Garageband here are my specs:
Im using
A new Mac (desktop) running snow leopard
A Samson condensor mic, plugged into my Nio Fx Rack which is usb connected to my mac
the Nio rack has an inbuilt soundcard/asio drivers

I never had this problem when first recording, however now it seems that to get any sort of volume out of my vocals, my input gain has to be turned up full, and then there is a hiss everytime there is any silence between vocals.

Even during vocals it sounds a bit muffled...i dunno why it started all of a sudden

I tried using the "s" reduction tool on garageband, but as i said before the vocals are so soft even if i turn up the levels on GB.

Please help!!!!

Thanks

Mulli

 

[mamster2]

You need to isolate the problem to the Nio box, the mic, or the Mac. What happens when you monitor using the headphone output on the Nio?

I.e., plug the Nio into the Mac, but just for power. (Or plug it into the wall using a USB charger.) Plug in the Samson and a pair of headphones, and see if it sounds okay. If you still have to crank it up until it hisses, the problem has nothing to do with the Mac; you have either a broken mic or a broken interface.

Do you have or can you borrow another mic? If so, that's the next step: try a different mic. If the Nio works with a different mic, your Samson is busted. If the Nio works fine with any mic, there's an issue on the software side. But that seems like the least likely possibility.

Got it?