hello, group. jim wishner here, in minnesota. i have an audio problem i've been unable to solve, and wonder if someone can offer some insight...

i head a small state radio news bureau, and record interviews and voice tracks on a 16-track board. the audio is fed into a computer, then uploaded via FTP to a central computer to be put on a web site or distributed to stations.  

we had been using a windows 98 machine, using cool edit 1.2, feeding the board into the line in of a soundblaster card. sounded great.

a month ago, we switched to a windows XP pro machine. same version of cool edit 1.2. the audio, also going into "line in" of another soundblaster card, was clipped at the top and bottom. highs and lows were cut off. we couldn't get full audio range.the audio was flattened.

but the "microphone in" jack doesn't do that when we feed audio to that. it's full range.

we reloaded cool edit. even upgraded to pro. still happens. and it clips the audio when we experimented using the modest recorder that comes with windows. 

we've hooked the old 98 system back up to see if something happened to the sound board or one of the connections. it worked fine.

we tried the sound card in the 98 system in the new, XP system. same thing. the audio cut off about six DB below zero, clipping the highs and lows.

this is not a volume or recording/properties input problem from the control panel. those settings are correct, and wouldn't cut off audio at a certain range.

so, it's not our studio board. it's not the sound card. it's not a "volume input" adjustment. and it only happens on the line-in input of the sound cards. and it happens on at least three audio record programs.

we're stumped, and have now hooked the 98 machine back up until we can get a handle on it.

our best guess is there is some setting in XP pro that affects the audio line input and limits it's frequency range. we think all other possible sources have been eliminated.

the MB is an intel D865PERLL with a pentium 4. the current sound card is a sound blaster audigy 2. the other one we tried 

any help would be greatly appreciated.

best regards, from the home of bullwinkle and paul bunyon, and 19 casinos.

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