Microphone distorting

Hi, I've just recently installed a new sound card, a Creative Audigy 4, which might have something to do with this problem. I'm not too sure where to look for advice.

Now, when I record vocals for my projects, the mic distorts on all the loud (even slightly loud) notes. It shows up as being well within the limits (you know, the wave form you can see), so it shouldn't be distorting in theory. I've put the mic input level down, but it still does it. I'm using the same mic as I did before the new card. I've tried another mic, but it distorts with that as well. The only other variable, apart from the new sound card, is that I'm using a different cable from mic to PC.

Any advice on what's causing this and how to solve it would be much appreciated. Thanks!

i don't see it as the cable - that should show up constantly, not just instances of increased power. i don't know the card myself, so maybe settings on it??? but i really am going blind there my friend.

otherwise pull the card, use the old one just to see if it stays or goes with the new card, could be a component issue on the card itself processing the audio from analog to digital....off the wall question - this happens even after the computer is all nice and warmed up? i've heard the A/D converters sometimes need about 30 minutes to warm up before trying to use for recording to avoid issues with converting from analog to digital.

Hmm, let me try and answer these questions one by one...
- It's a fairly cheap AKG mic
- To enhance its quality, it goes into a Korg effects unit thing, which then goes to the mic input of the sound card. I've always used this, and the settings on it are the same as before; it used to work fine.
- It's not set to 'what u hear,' and is set to the mic input for vocals
- The input recording level is actually way down, to avoid the background noise. So much so that I practically have to duplicate the vocal tracks by copying/pasting to make them audible.
- Unfortunately, I sent my PC away for a new hard drive a while ago, and I had the repair guy put the new card in. Trouble is, he threw away the old one, so I can't go back to that. I'm not sure whether he did any wave profiling, but he's pretty reliable, and I know he'll have disabled the old card.
- It's not an external card.
- Yeah, it happens all the time, no matter how long the PC's been on for.

One thing; a friend told me it was a bad idea to have the Korg effects processor going into the mic input of the sound card (as it damages the card), and I should put it into the line in instead. Do you reckon that might have anything to do with it?

Thanks for the replies.

I don't know if running through the Korg would cause damage - if the levels were high - yeah, I could see this causing some damage. You say the mic level is way down...to the point you are having to copy or double the track for something audible enought o work with.

An idea - since you are running through the Korg, switch to line in and try recording some vocals - since you are processing the sound via an external device it should be treated as a line in now. Maybe that will eliminate the problem. I don't know the specifics, but a line in and mic in should be different impedances, which may be the root of your problem, what used to work no longer does and now we need to change????