If you want to skip ahead, dear reader, the answer is down there.
It is infuriating to have a technical issue that you know you’ve fixed previously, but when you search the ‘net for the solution you know exists, all you get are results for the incorrect fix. I am posting this to document the problem I had yesterday and the real fix for it, in the hope that it might save someone else in the future, or even me if it comes up again and I forget what the fix is.
This past weekend I upgraded my computer, going from an Intel Core i7-7700 to a modern AMD Ryzen 7 7800x3D because gaming. Because I was doing a CPU swap I wanted a nice fresh install of Windows 10 instead of porting over all the cruft of my previous installation. I wrote a step-by-step for the whole thing just to help my neurodivergent brain, and I will post that at some point now that it’s done.
But because it’s a fresh install, I ran in to a problem that I’ve had before. When I put my headphones on to play the game that prompted all this nerdery, Dragon Age The Veilguard, I could hear my microphone playing in my headphones. In audio terms I was monitoring my mic.
I went to Start > Settings > System > Sound, clicked on Sound Control Panel, and went to the Recording tab. I selected my microphone (Yeti Classic) and clicked Properties. And lo and behold, the “Listen to this device” box was unchecked. That means it shouldn’t be coming through my headphones. There must be some other fix.
So off I went to generically google the solution. And I found page after page after page of people saying the solution was to uncheck the “Listen to this device” box. But it’s already unchecked! I even found people, like me, asking what to do if the box is already unchecked. And the answers wandered off in the direction of reinstalling the audio drivers or using Microsoft’s useless troubleshooters. That ain’t it, chief.
The answer, dear reader, is this:
The Real Answer to Not Monitor Your Mic
You have to check the “Listen to this device” box, click Apply, then uncheck it again, and click Apply again.
Yes, you have to turn it on and off again. That did the trick. I don’t remember how I came up with this the last time it plagued me, or if there was a page that mentions this annoying bug that has fallen out of the top 20 or 30 search results (thanks, Google), but now it’s documented.
I had so much frustration with this. I want to spare you, the reader, any future frustration. Maybe this is only in Windows 10, so it will eventually stop being a thing when support ends for Win10 in a year. But at least now, I’ve done my duty and shared it. Now go share this so others can find it. Thanks for listening.