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Comment by svnpenn | Hacker News Reader

ever tried to test microphone volume levels? every fucking time I have to search three different things before I can find it. I try "microphone", "audio", "volume", and its always the last one I try, and I can never remember for the next time.

Search is not a good UI, because you never get muscle memory with a search.

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Speaking of terrible audio UX, windows constantly breaks hardware settings for multi-channel ADCs by disabling all but one channel (seems to be after most updates). Fixing it requires about a dozen clicks through many esoteric nested menus, including having to click hyperlink style text hidden on the far upper right side of a window away from the buttons. There are several audio settings pages in windows, and some of them offer no path to fixing the setting. If it's possible to reach the necessary page by searching in the start menu i have yet to find it. It's been like this for 2 years. It's astounding that working professionals would pay money for this garbage.

> I have to search three different things before I can find it

I've had the same problem; Microsoft has been changing the keyword that triggers the audio input/output control panel, but the official and unchanging (so far) name of the panel is "Change system sounds" and "sys" in start menu search returns that as the 1st or second result.

> Search is not a good UI, because you never get muscle memory with a search.

I feel like I do though... I often get in a pattern of just searching for the same few characters I know will bring up the right thing. Though Windows has a habit of deciding to change around the ordering on you.

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