Hi! I bought an used iMac 233 mhz recently (glad of it) and I would like to record my old music tapes on hard disk due tuo converting them in MP3 format, and putting on CD.
The problem is: i link the tape player directly in the microphone port, using a simple cable, but the control panel Sound seems to ignore that (the only option for audio input remain internal CD); no solution closing other softwares or task using sounds, as help suggests - or should I 'close' the finder ??
Should I buy a special cable, or something like that?
Anyone can help me ?
Sorry for my spaghetti english (I'm from Florence, you know...).

Thank you,
Raniero.

Are you sure you are plugging cable into microphone input? I am pretty sure that imacs (especially older generations) come with built-in mics and don't think they have a mic input (i may be wrong) so I am guessing you are plugging into headphone output.

If it really is a mic input... then you will need an app that recognizes mic input. Simple Sound is the easiest since it comes with mac but records only system 7 sound files which will have to be converted with SoundApp or such. MetaSynth, SoundJam and a couple of other apps will record from mic input too. Make sure you have selected mic input in sound control panel as well. If none of these seem to work then you may have to buy a USB audio interface for $100 - $200 bucks.

Another thing to consider is that I think the line signal of the mic and line signal of cassette have very different levels which may also be causing a problem. Check the MacAddict site because they recently had an issue that covered someone who made imac a guitar recording machine.

I have an 'older' iMac with which I have used to record vinyl records. To do this I needed 1) recording software ( I used Coaster which is free), 2) a cable to plug into the external mic input.

To get this to work, I plugged the cable into the TAPE OUT of my stereo receiver and the other end into the iMac's ext mic input (as mentioned). This is necessary to get the proper signal into the computer as mentioned in the other reply here.

If I am reading you correctly, it sounds like your iMac only recognizes the CD as input. If this is the case, you have an operating system problem since your computer should recognize the internal mic, external mic, sound in, and CD as possible inputs. This problem has nothing to do with cables or recording software. It would probably be solved by restoring the MAC/OS. Note that if you choose to do this, make sure that whatever CD you have matches what is actually on your computer. For example, I have CD's for MAC/OS 8.5 but am running 8.6 which requires extra consideration.

Hope I haven't confused the issue...