I’m posting this in the hopes that it’ll get indexed by Google and help save other people the multitude of hours I spent trying to solve this problem.

I have a Dell laptop with a SigmaTel sound card in a Windows Vista environment. After spending two consecutive nights researching why I couldn’t record internal / stereo mix sound, I finally found that it’s because the system simply isn’t wired to do it. The blame seems to fall squarely on Dell.

Regardless, there’s a simple $17.95 program called Total Recorder that bypasses all the problems and lets you record audio generated from a website, MP3 program or other source that uses your computer’s internal speakers. Here’s the link: http://www.totalrecorder.com/productfr_tr.htm

That’s it. I installed the program, ran the setup wizard (PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE INSTRUCTIONS) and was able to record internal audio immediately.

I hope this helps somebody else out.