Recording a clean voice track on Windows Official

Whether you are recording a walkthrough, a voice for a game, or a message for the forum, the same few steps separate a clear recording from a muddy one.

The room matters more than the microphone. Hard walls and bare floors reflect sound and make a voice hollow. Curtains, a carpet, a bookshelf, even a wardrobe with the door open, absorb reflections. Recording in a small room with soft furnishings usually beats an expensive microphone in a bare one.

Distance. Keep the microphone about a hand's width from your mouth and slightly to the side, so that your breath does not hit it directly. A pop filter, or a piece of foam, stops the bursts on p and b sounds.

Levels. Set the input level so that the loudest words peak well below the maximum; a recording that clips cannot be repaired, while a quiet one can be raised later. In Windows, Sound settings, Input, the meter shows the level while you talk.

Silence first. Record five seconds of nothing before you speak. Noise removal tools use that stretch to learn what the background sounds like.

Software. Audacity is free, works well with screen readers, and does everything a spoken recording needs: trimming, noise reduction, normalising and exporting to MP3 or OGG. Reaper is the choice for larger projects and is also very accessible with the OSARA extension.

Listen back on headphones. Speakers hide small problems; headphones show them.

Export at a sensible size. For speech, a 96 kbps MP3 or OGG is clear and small. The forum accepts both as attachments.

Post your recordings in Audio & Media, and ask here if something in the chain does not behave.