Off-Speaker Sound Recording

Howdy,

Truth to be told, I haven't read ALL of the
posts on the subject just yet, but from what
I've gathered so far (both in here and on the
Internet in general) it seems that, on a
Windows 7 laptop (where I've installed
my CS v2.7), the "Record Speakers" option
seems to require the user to modify the O.S.
sound-card configuration so that the "What I hear"
or similar setting is to be made active / available.

Unfortunately - I do NOT seem to have such
a setting (or anything similar) whatsoever,
even though I DO have a sound card (as
I can play MP3 music files, for example).

So when I want to record music or sound
that is playing through the speakers,
it seems that the "lesser attractive" option
might be - to an extent - to use the other
menu command available - which is -
"record off microphone" - even though
the whole point is to AVOID the need for
a microphone altogether - yet the "Recorder"
project DOES seem to be able to pick up the
playing sound, when recording a video - only
with much less quality - as the playback sounds
like what might be heard as of some sort of a
low-powered radio transmission...

Any ideas on how to improve sound quality?

Thanks
Johny