Microphone Problems

Hey. Problems with the microphone im afriad. when i use
it, it' recording level is really low. i have to
practically eat it to make sure my friends can hear me.
I'ved used it at a friends computer and it worked fine.
I've been onto the control panel and checked all the
volume levels etc. Turned on voice recognition and
attempted to see if it would automatically configure it
so it pick up my voice better. Nothing seems to work. im
wandering if i t could be a problem with the sound card
volume levels. Are there even sound card volume levels?
can anyone help?