Hello,

1. It sounds like you are doing things well by following the manual to record your voice responses, so I am wondering if you may be having a mic problem. When you open and play your .wav file, does time elapse but there is no sound? You may need to adjust the sensitivity of your mic (MediaLab\Utilities\SoundCheck). If just a file is being created as a placeholder, but nothing is in the file and no time is passing when you play it, you may not have your mic set up properly. Try doing a recording outside of MediaLab to see if everything is functioning properly.

2. Are you putting your d-180 parameter in the .que file or the .exp file? Using the countdown timer is something that goes with questionnaire files, not the item types, so it will be a parameter in the .exp file. You'll want to have your voice recording questionnaire as a .que file, then use that .que file in an experiment. In the newly created experiment, highlight the row with the voice recording questionnaire, click Details on the right-hand navigation bar, and add the parameter (d-180).

3. I think you might be in the experiment editor, which is why when you select Options you can see many font choices, but no colors. If you're trying to change the overall look of how your questionnaires are presented, open MediaLab and select "Preferences" and then "Edit Preferences." You should now see a tab called "Fonts & Colours." If you want to just change the look of a questionnaire or two, think about using $quickstyle.

Hope this helps. If the sound is still a problem zip a file of your .que and .exp files over and I'll take a look.