Audio-In Not Loud Enough?

Hey, i recently decided to do some recording with GarageBand, and i noticed that you have to be pretty close to the computer to get decent quality. So i pluged in my old Sony Microphone, and tried to do some recording. I noticed after playing back what i've recorded, the sound was very quiet.

I opened up System Preferences and put the record volume on to max, and did the same on the GarageBand Preferences, but it's still way too quiet. I plugged the Mic into the my Windows XP PC, and the sound was the perfect volume.

Does anyone know what the problem is? Is there something wrong with my Macbook? Or are there programs that will "amp" the sound? Do I need a USB Microphone?

Thanks in advance for your help.
PS. I'm a new mac user so i could just be missing something obvious. Thanks.

The input on the Macbook is a line in, not a mic in.

The difference is the amplification... so you can either buy an usb mic in such as griffin's iMic, or get a powered microfon. (with an internal battery)

Ahh, i was wondering what all those mic products were about. Thank you very much.

No problem... for simple guitar recording you might want to give the internal microphone a shot as well...

It isn't brilliant, but it's enough for rough demos...

microphones

Aptmunich said:

The difference is the amplification...... or get a powered microfon. (with an internal battery)

Click to expand...

Hi there Aptmunich

I have a sony electret condenser microphone ECM-MS907 which is battery powered and the sound is still much too low. I even tried getting an adapter to USB (one for the Singstar Playstation game) and still to no avail.

As this microphone was pretty expensive and works just fine with the minidisc player I originally got it for, I find it frustrating that I'm going to have to buy new kit but I'm running out of ideas. I even tried running it through a preamp and into the line in.

any other ideas?
much appreciated!