The microphone is a fairly straightforward peripheral to set up and use, but there are some situations where it can stop working for no apparent reason. In this article we explain the best tricks you can use to solve the problem that the microphone does not work on your Windows 10 PC .
Check that the microphone is not muted
If the microphone has stopped working with your Windows 10 PC, the first thing you should do is access the operating system settings, to check that the use of this peripheral is not disabled.
To do this, you only need to access the Windows 10 "Settings" application .
Within the configuration application, you need to go to the " Privacy " section, and then enter the " Microphone " section. Once inside, you must find the option "Microphone access for this device is activated" and check that it is enabled.
Check the applications access to the microphone
Windows 10 also includes a very interesting configuration module, which allows us to select which applications we think can access the microphone , and which ones we don't want.
For this we need to access the same configuration window, which we used in the previous step. If you scroll down, you will see a list of the applications you have installed on your Windows 10 PC. Next to it you will find a button that you can use to define if you want them to be able to access the microphone or not.
It is important to note that this option is only available for applications that are installed from the Windows store. This means that it is not available for traditional applications, which are installed using an .exe file.
The microphone may be disabled from the device manager
Another possibility is that the microphone is disabled from the Windows 10 device manager. This is possible on both laptop and desktop computers. You can access the Windows 10 Device Manager, in a very simple way, using the search engine that is included in the Start menu.
Once inside the Windows 10 Device Manager, look for your microphone and check that it is not disabled. In case it is disabled, you just have to click on it with the right mouse button, and click on "Enable device".
Update the audio drivers
Updating your sound card drivers can also fix some microphone-related problems. Windows Update takes care of keeping the drivers up to date in many cases. You can also go to the official website of your sound card manufacturer, and find the latest available version of the driver in the support section.
Check the default microphone
A fairly common problem is that we have the microphone integrated in our laptop selected as the default, and we are trying to use an external USB microphone, or the one included in a headset.
Therefore, it is very important that you make sure that the microphone you want to use is selected as the default. This can also be done in a very simple way from the Windows 10 "Settings" application.
In this case you need to go to the "System" section, and then click on "Sound". Finally, you just have to select the microphone you want to use in " Input devices ".
Here ends our article on how to fix the main problems with the microphone in Windows 10, we hope it will be very useful for you.