Newbie desparation help: laptop+mixer+TONS of line noise

[odie812]

Hi all,

I'm relatively new to recording that is more advanced than, oh say, recording on a minidisc, so please bear with me.

I just got a Dell Inspiron 9300, and with it I got the Creative Audigy ZS PCMCIA card. I'm really digging the optical in/out with my stereo receiver set up. But here's the deal, I'm a musician, and I need to make recordings of recitals/lessons/concerts/demos fairly often, so I bought these items to record with:

http://www.behringer.com/B-2PRO/index.cfm?lang=ENG

http://www.behringer.com/UB1204FX/index.cfm?lang=ENG

I have a dual-1/4" male to dual-RCA cable running from the mixer to a RCA-to-1/8" stereo adapter, which is connected to the analog-in on the Audigy PCMCIA card.

I was using Sound Forge, and experienced a tremendous squeal and popping static on every recording I made. I found that when I plugged my headphones into the mixer's output, the sound was crystal clear, but when I plugged into the laptop's output, there was the noise. The noise was worse with the mic jack than with the line-in, so I was using line-in, and muted every other output. Still, I got the unwanted noise in the worst way.

I'm almost to the point of returning this stuff. I can't tell if the problem is software or hardware-related. This is a pretty good sound card, I don't see why it would do this poorly a job with recording. I am able to pass my MP3 player playback through the 9300 and into my receiver with no problem, so why's it giving me a hard time with the recording? What am I not doing properly?

Any ideas?

My tremendous thanks,

Odie

 

[odie812]

An update:

The good news is that I think I found the problem. When I run the laptop off of AC power, the noise is there, but when I run off of the battery, the sound disappears. So it appears that there is a grounding problem somewhere.

So, that said, how in the hell do I fix this?!

 

[ssscientist]

The fault is probably in your house wiring --- if possible test this theory by going to a friends house or your workplace and plugging you gear in there. Then you'll know (unless you've done a whole bunch of wiring yourself) that you need to hire an electrician to come in and ground the wiring - at least to the room you use as a studio.