USB microphone detected but not working/ factory reset

[mozar]

Hello,
I feel really stupid right now. I plugged in a usb microphone into my acer windows 10 laptop. I also plugged in a speaker at the same time. I got a prompt that said what is this and thinking it was talking about the speaker I clicked speaker. I couldn't figure out how to change the setting from speaker to microphone. Eventually the laptop recognized the microphone as both a speaker and a microphone. I don't know why.

So it's good that it recognizes it as a microphone but there is no input. No sound is picked up. I tried uninstalling it, reinstalling it, rebooting the computer, and the computer keeps recognizing it as both a microphone and a speaker but no sound is registered. The bars will go up if I unplug the microphone though.

Then I did a "reset" which is similar to a factory recovery and wiped all of my settings supposedly but I still get the same thing. I'm at a loss of what to do. It's not the microphone, it works with my other laptop.

[Miss Piggy]

Is this recent enough that you could restore your computer to, say, last week's recovery files? (Sorry, I know for sure that's the wrong terminology, but I'm hoping you get what I mean. Maybe a true expert can better explain what I mean if it's not clear.)

[mozar]

I tried a semi-factory reset but that didn't work. Thanks though.

[Dave1442397]

Try this:

REMOVE INSTALLED DEVICES
If you no longer need to use a device, you can remove it. When you do so, your Windows 10 computer can’t interact with the device until you connect and install it again. Here’s how to remove connected devices from Windows 10:

Open Settings.

Click Devices.

The settings for devices appear.

Click the device type you want to remove (Connected Devices, Bluetooth, or Printers & Scanners).

The list of devices appears.

Click the device that you want to remove to select it.

Click Remove Device.

Click Yes to confirm that you want to remove this device.

Close Settings.

[mozar]

This appears to be a little bit different different than uninstalling it so I'll try it.

[Goldielocks]

I had to install updated drivers for Windows to get my audio / mic set up to work.   Check for updates.

[mozar]

I did end up buying a whole new setup.