Vista - why cant I hear sound I record?

Ive just got a new laptop... windows vista basic but it comes with a webcam, and an internal microphone. When I record sound it saves the file, but I cant play it back in windows media player. I dont know if its not recording or not playing back (the thingy moves along, it looks like it playing but no sound). I have looked on a lot of help forums and done all the things to check the right devices are selected and not muted - why wont it work??

Also I was hoping to use it to do web blogs but it seems the camera and mic are separate - do I have to set both recording separately or is there a way to do both at once?

please help
Beth

What laptop is it?
Have you updated your drivers for your mic.

You can use your webcam and mic at the same time. It matters what you want to do with it

The reason you're not hearing anything is probably because no sound got recorded.

Check your recording devices settings menu and try boosting the recording volume.
Also enable microphone boost.

In the recording devices window right next to your microphone you should be a 'volume' bar that moves up if your microphone is recording loud sounds.

Talk into your microphone and see if it moves, if it doesnt, tap on your microphone with your finger and see if it moves. Tweak the recording volume settings and microphone boost to a point where the recorded volume bar goes to about 30 - 50% when you are talking into it normally.

It might also be that the recording device set as 'default' and thus is used for the recording program you use is in fact not your microphone but something else that shows up in the recording devices list but isnt actually connected/used.