Microphones drop out at random or are not detected
For the last few months I have had nothing but trouble with microphones in Zoom. I do not host meetings, but am a regular participant. I have now tried two webcams, two external microphones and good quality USB hub and various cables but the problems persist.
If I am lucky, Zoom sometimes recognizes the microphone, but drops it after a few minutes. Sometimes I can switch to System default and back to the microphone and it fixes the issue. other times I have to restart the application and even reboot the machine. The majority of times, the microphones are not detected at all.
The equipment I have purchased and used so far:
Logitech Pro 9000
Logitech C930
Editors Keys Microphone
Rode NT-USB microphone
Startech USB Hub (externally powered to eliminate power issue)
The problems have been persistent of the the last year or more and as can be seen, I have invested considerably in equipment to resolve the problem.
I am running Zoom version 5.11.3 on Linux Mint 20.3.
I have tried accessing support through the chat bot, but it doesn't recognize Rode as a brand and tells me that my account is not eligible for support but does not provide any further information as to why that is the case or how I might access support.
Any insights would be appreciated to help me resolve this problem.
The most recent equipment (Logitech C930 + Rode NT-USB) seem to work just fine in other applications.