I need a bit of help with Skype and Win 7

I finally managed to get my brothers PC put together, installed some software on it, and was taking it for a test run with a few games, making sure everything was working properly.

Ran into an issue with Skype though and can't seem to find a solution online, or at least, None of the ones I found did anything.

Skype Automatically adjusts microphone volume. You can choose to turn this off in the options, but doing so, for me at least does nothing. Skype will still automatically adjust microphone volume, especially so when there might be a noise in the background it can hear when you're not talking(mine specifically is the traffic outside). So whoever is on the other end of the call is going omg turn down your mic, you're too loud etc etc.

Pretty much every post I've come across online about this issue says, Un-check the box, which I've done. They also say to remove exclusive mode/give application priority in the microphone properties, which I've also done.

It's still doing it however, and I'm wondering if there's something more to this. My friends PC also does this, and would like to be able to give him a fix. It's quite annoying when you're playing Civilization 5, and might be listening to music, and Skype automatically adjusts the volume to stupidly loud levels to catch that background noise.

Has anyone else ever run into this issue, and if so, do you know any fixes aside from the ones I, and many others have tried? I'd be asking on the Skype community forums, but no one seems to know an actual fix for this.

I've been searching in Google for over 2 hours now trying to find a suggestion that's not 'remove exclusive mode' or 'un-check the box' because neither is working. I've even gone into the shared.xml to edit the HTML settings, but it all looks perfectly fine when I do, no need to edit.. Something else is causing this issue.

I doubt it will fix the problem but have tried to a) uninstall and reinstall skye (power your pc down after installation and install after powering it on), b) to uninstall your mic/audio driver and reinstall. If it is an external mic, try to find drivers from company website.

Also have you tried other mics with skye?

And to double check, is skype sending a loud message to your friends speakers or are or does skype raise volume and pick up your music in the background or?

Uninstalling and reinstalling Skype does nothing, problem still persists. Regardless of how it's done.

I've uninstalled and reinstalled my Audio Drivers, on both the USB soundcard and the onboard soundcard, Doesn't change anything.

It's a 3.5mm jack microphone, it's high quality, and so is my friends. I haven't used a different microphone as this is the only one I have, but there's no reason using a different 3.5mm jack microphone would make any difference, if it was a USB microphone yes.

It's auto adjusting the volume to pick up background noise, as in. If I stop talking I can see it automatically adjust up to 100% to pick up the traffic noise. EVEN though the options for this are off. It's also a Skype only problem, no other program does this, not even other programs that allow you to make Skype calls.(Trillian, Pidgin, etc) Which is why it's so aggravating in the first place.

I'm just wondering if there's a setting SOMEWHERE that's saying 'ignore whatever settings are in Skype, and just auto adjust mic volume anyways'. It seems this is a fairly common problem, and is a persistent one, at least if you google for it. Some people just get the issue and it never goes away. Regardless of installs/uninstalls/drivers/settings etc.

Is this a new issue? Maybe update your current pc's version of skype and see if it happens, Possibly a temp bug.

It's not a new issue, i've had it happen before on multiple computers, but it's normally corrected itself after a skype update, or even windows update, then it no longer did it.

It's a random problem and like I said, others have the same issue. Changing settings or reinstalling drivers doesn't seem to do anything. Seems to be an issue with skype itself.

I'm just wondering how I can deny skype any and all access to controlling volume of mic/speakers. Taking exclusive mode away does nothing, there's gotta be something else I can do.

I have no other ideas. I would just tell you that you can adjust individual volumes, and maybe have your friends turn down their volumes so your mic does not talk so loud and they you can still hear the game/ music, etc.

kyij said:

I have no other ideas. I would just tell you that you can adjust individual volumes, and maybe have your friends turn down their volumes so your mic does not talk so loud and they you can still hear the game/ music, etc.

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That's just the thing.

Since skype is automatically adjusting the volume of the microphone, it doesn't really matter what I do on my side.

I can turn down music, or I can close the window. But if the microphone picks up a noise in the background when I'm not talking. It cranks up the volume of the mic regardless. I hate to say this, but I think I'll have to find an alternative to skype for all 3 of us to use, especially if it's going to cause this issue.

I haven't experienced any issues with Skype increasing the mic volume, but I have experienced Windows reducing all other sounds when it detects that a communications device is in use. Both of those would make the mic louder than other sounds. This doesn't sound like your problem if you are 100% sure it's the mic volume increasing and not other sounds decreasing. I'll post the fix to that just in case...

This is the default in Windows 7, and you just have to check "Do nothing" to stop Windows from reducing volume of everything but the mic. Other than this, I've never had issues with Skype and Windows 7.