2013-03-13

How to show Stereo Mix in Windows 7 for Alienware M11x R2

When you want to record the system sounds directly (not from the microphone) in Windows 7, you need to have "Stereo Mix" in your list of recording devices (right click on the speaker icon on the task bar and choose "Recording devices"). A great application* of this is to record VoIP calls** such as those done on Skype or Google Talk/Google Voice
*You will need a good audio recording application such as Audacity (free).
**Check out this page before recording phone calls to learn about how legal that actually is where you live: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_recording_laws#United_States

To display the Stereo Mix "device" in an Alienware M11x R2 you need to reinstall the original driver from the manufacturer, since Windows probably already updated the driver to its own version which doesn't support this functionality.

You can get the file here: http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/product/alienware-m11x-r2#anchorProductAudio, the current version distributed by DELL is 6.0.1.6083. Over here it seems you can also find older and newer versions directly from Realtek: http://www.realtek.cz/realtek-download.php?realtek=ALC665&system=6 *
*I didn't need to do that, 6.0.1.6083 worked.

This is how your Recoding devices list will look like after reinstalling and restarting Windows*:
*Actually you first need to right click the list, make sure the disabled devices are being displayed, and then right Stereo Mix to Enable it first.


Now Stereo Mix should be listed when selecting a recording device in your audio software :) Happy recording!

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