#Record Your First Meeting

Learn to start, monitor, and stop your first recording with audio level controls and real-time feedback.

#Pre-Flight Checklist

Before you hit record, ensure:

• ✓ Clearminutes is installed and the onboarding wizard is complete
• ✓ Whisper model is downloaded (check Settings → Transcription)
• ✓ Microphone permission is granted
• ✓ macOS only: Screen recording permission is granted (Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen Recording)
• ✓ You've tested your microphone and speakers (optional but recommended)

#Start Recording

#Step 1: Open the Recording Panel

1. Click the Record button in the top-right corner of the Clearminutes window
   • [SCREENSHOT: Main window with Record button highlighted]
2. The recording panel slides open from the right side, showing audio source and meeting details sections

#Step 2: Choose Audio Sources

In the recording panel, you'll see dropdowns for microphone and system audio:

Microphone Dropdown:

1. Click the microphone icon or dropdown labeled "Microphone"
2. Select from available options:
   • Default microphone (usually your built-in or primary USB mic)
   • Named USB microphones if you have them connected
   • Recommended: Use your primary microphone — the one closest to you
3. After selection, a small meter shows incoming audio (green = good, red = too loud, grey = silent)

[SCREENSHOT: Microphone dropdown with device list and audio meter]

System Audio Dropdown (Optional):

System audio captures what's playing through your speakers — Zoom, Teams, Spotify, YouTube, etc. This is optional.

1. Click the speaker icon or dropdown labeled "System Audio"
2. Select an option:
   • None — Don't record system audio (only capture your microphone)
   • Built-in Speaker — On macOS, the system audio output (requires screen recording permission already granted)
   • WASAPI Loopback — On Windows, captures audio from all applications

[SCREENSHOT: System audio dropdown showing options]

Platform-Specific Notes:

macOS:

• System audio uses a Core Audio tap (no virtual device required)
• If you see "Permission Denied" or the dropdown shows no option, you haven't granted screen recording permission yet
• Solution: See Installation & First Launch

Windows:

• WASAPI Loopback is pre-configured — select it from the dropdown
• If it doesn't appear, your audio drivers may not support loopback (rare)
• Workaround: Use only microphone audio, or update audio drivers
• Advanced: See Configure Audio for manual loopback setup

#Step 3: Name Your Meeting (Optional)

1. Click the text field labeled "Meeting name" or "Untitled Meeting"
2. Type a name: "Q4 Planning", "1-on-1 with Alex", "Board Meeting", etc.
3. Press Enter to confirm
   • If you don't name it, Clearminutes auto-names it with the date and time

[SCREENSHOT: Meeting name input field]

#Step 4: Adjust Audio Levels (Optional)

Before you hit record, verify audio levels are correct:

Microphone Meter:

• You should see a green meter bouncing as you speak
• If the meter is completely grey and you can hear yourself, increase microphone gain (see next section)
• If the meter is constantly red or peaking, your mic is too loud — either speak quieter or reduce gain in Settings → Audio → Microphone Gain

System Audio Meter:

• If you selected system audio, you'll see a separate meter for it
• It should bounce when audio is playing from your speakers
• If it's silent when audio is playing, check that the right output device is selected

[SCREENSHOT: Recording panel with both microphone and system audio meters]

#Start Recording

1. Review your setup: microphone selected, system audio (if needed) selected, meeting name entered
2. Click the Start Recording button (large, red/accent color button at the bottom of the panel)
3. A Recording in Progress indicator appears:
   • Shows elapsed time: 0:00, 0:05, 0:10, etc.
   • Audio meters continue to bounce in real-time
   • Stop, pause/resume buttons are available

[SCREENSHOT: Recording in progress state with timer]

#During Recording

#Monitoring Audio Levels

While recording, the audio meters show:

• Green zone: Good! Audio is being captured at healthy levels
• Yellow zone: Audio is getting loud. Check mic gain or move your microphone away slightly
• Red zone: Audio is clipping (distorting). This damages quality. Turn down gain or move mic away

If Your Microphone Is Too Quiet:

1. Click Settings (⌘, or gear icon)
2. Go to Audio section
3. Find Microphone Gain slider (0–200%)
4. Increase it in steps: 120%, 140%, 160% (don't exceed 180% — too much noise at higher levels)
5. Return to your meeting and check the meter

If Your System Audio Is Too Quiet:

1. In the recording panel, right-click on the system audio meter
2. Select Adjust volume (if available) or
3. Go to Settings → Audio and look for system audio gain control
4. Increase and return to your meeting to verify

#Real-Time Transcription Status

As you record, Clearminutes begins transcribing in real-time using Whisper:

• You won't see words appearing on-screen during recording (transcription happens post-recording by default, but real-time transcription is possible with smaller models)
• The app processes audio in the background and queues it for transcription
• Processing speed depends on your model and hardware (see GPU Acceleration)

#Pause and Resume

1. Click Pause button during recording
   • The timer pauses
   • Audio is NOT captured while paused
   • The meeting continues (you just won't capture audio)
2. Click Resume to continue recording from where you paused
3. The timer continues from the paused time

#Common During-Recording Scenarios

Someone joined late / got disconnected:

• Just keep recording. You can edit or add context in the transcript later.

Audio quality suddenly drops (noise):

• Try closing other apps, moving your microphone, or if it's a one-time noise, keep going. Whisper is good at handling background noise.

You said something by accident and want to re-say it:

• Keep recording. You can edit the transcript afterward or re-record if needed.

Your phone rang or someone interrupted:

• Pause if needed. It's fine to have the interruption in the recording — you can remove it from the transcript later.

#Stop Recording

#Step 1: Click Stop

1. Click the Stop button in the recording panel
   • [SCREENSHOT: Stop button during active recording]
2. A confirmation dialog may appear asking: "Stop recording and process?" → Click Confirm or Yes
3. The recording panel closes

#Step 2: Processing Begins

After you stop, Clearminutes processes the meeting:

1. Audio Save (1–2 seconds): The raw audio is saved to disk
2. Transcription (depends on model and hardware):
   • Whisper transcribes the audio to text
   • Time varies by model size and your hardware:
     • tiny/base: 15–30 seconds per 30-minute recording
     • small: 30–60 seconds per 30-minute recording
     • medium: 1–2 minutes per 30-minute recording
     • large-v3: 2–5 minutes per 30-minute recording
     • large-v3-turbo: 30–90 seconds per 30-minute recording
   • With GPU acceleration (Metal/CUDA), processing is 5–10× faster
3. Summary (if enabled):
   • Your summary model generates a summary from the transcript
   • Time varies by model (Gemma 2B: 30–60 seconds per 30-min meeting; Claude: 5–15 seconds)

A progress notification appears showing transcription and summary generation:

[SCREENSHOT: Processing notification in bottom-right corner]

#Step 3: View Your Meeting

Once processing is complete:

1. A notification appears: "Meeting processed: [Meeting name]"
2. Click the notification to jump to the meeting detail view
3. Or, click Meetings (sidebar) → Find your meeting in the list

[SCREENSHOT: Processed meeting notification]

The meeting detail view shows:

• Transcript panel on the left with timestamps and speaker segments
• Summary panel on the right (if auto-summary is enabled)
• Both are live and editable

See View Transcripts & Summaries for details on navigating your first transcript.

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#Import an Audio File (Pro)

If you have a pre-recorded meeting (from a phone, another app, or a colleague), you can import it into Clearminutes:

1. Click Import (in the meetings list or toolbar)
2. Select an audio file (MP3, M4A, WAV, FLAC, OGG)
3. Clearminutes transcribes and summarises it just like a live recording
4. The imported meeting appears in your meetings list with full transcript and summary

Supported formats: MP3, M4A, WAV, FLAC, OGG, and most common audio formats.

Tip: Import works best with clear, single-track recordings. Meetings with multiple speakers benefit from diarization (also a Pro feature).

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#Troubleshooting Your First Recording

#"Microphone not detected"

1. Ensure your microphone is plugged in and recognized by your OS
2. On macOS: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Microphone — is Clearminutes listed? If not, click + and add it
3. On Windows: Settings → Privacy → Microphone — Toggle "Allow apps to access your microphone" ON
4. Try restarting Clearminutes or rebooting your machine

See Recording Issues for more help.

#"No system audio captured"

macOS:

• Ensure screen recording permission is granted: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen Recording → verify Clearminutes is listed
• Try disconnecting and reconnecting your audio output device
• Restart Clearminutes

Windows:

• Ensure WASAPI Loopback is selected in the system audio dropdown
• If it's not available, your audio drivers may not support it — use microphone-only recording
• Update your audio drivers

#"Recording stops unexpectedly"

1. Check available disk space — you need at least 1 GB free
2. Check available RAM: Clearminutes needs 2–4 GB while recording
3. Close other apps and try again
4. See Recording Issues for detailed troubleshooting

#"Transcript is empty or garbled"

1. Check that your Whisper model downloaded successfully: Settings → Transcription
2. Verify microphone captured audio: Playback the recording file (stored in Settings → Storage location)
3. Try a different model (see Transcription Problems)

#Performance Tips

• Close browser tabs before important meetings. Browsers use significant RAM
• Disable screen screen savers to avoid CPU spikes during processing
• Use a smaller model (base or small) if large-v3 is too slow
• Enable GPU acceleration if available (Metal on macOS, CUDA on NVIDIA): See GPU Acceleration
• Reduce microphone gain if audio is noisy (below 120% is usually better for quality)

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#Related

• View Transcripts & Summaries →
• Troubleshoot Recording Issues →
• Choose the Right Model →