Headphones or sound card problem?

[alman9898]

recently, when I plug my headphones directly into my soundcard, I get a very low volume (or a sound that sounds like an echo, or the instrumentals will be much louder than the vocals), but when I plug the headphones into a speaker (which is plugged into the sound card), I get higher volume.

the only problem is there seems to be erratic changes in volume -- that is, it goes from sounding normal, to sounding like background sound, to normal, etc.

any insight as to why?

[shadowarmy75]

I would suggest a sound card driver update. Even if i doesn't fix it, once you do, the new drivers should make it sound better anyway.