External Microphone sounds so bad. Was completely fine on my last laptop

[jsnk]

Hi there,

I have a Samson Q2U and worked completely fine on my old Acer laptop.

I now have a Flow x16 (2023). Tried to record through OBS studio with the same setting as my last laptop but it sounds horrible.

Audio was muffled and sounded like a cheap webcam microphone.

I read a few posts online and some said installing Sonic Studio helped, but then other problem arised such as BIOS suddenly opened and not able to record screen when Sonic Studio was on.

There were quite a few negative comments about sonic studio and also I'm not sure if installing it would actually help.

I checked and updated both Realtek and Samson Q2U drivers to the latest one. Tried optimising OBS studio filters - eg tuning noise reduction but still sounded really bad and nothing like using it with my old laptop.

Any advice on what I can do next?

 

[Lawrence_SoCal]

My standard advice - first check (troubleshoot) video (and (in your case) audio sources OUTSIDE of OBS Studio completely
Use native Operating System applications (Windows Recorder?) and check audio quality there.
You may be dealing with a crappy consumer audio interface, or the physical interface may be defective, or simply incompatible with your mic/cabling

So my approach would be to make absolutely sure the audio quality the Operating System 'sees/hears' is as you expect, and if not, resolve before involving OBS Studio. Beware OBS Studio locking device sources, so when I say outside OBS Studio, I mean OBS Studio not running, not simply in the background (minimized)