Why can't I record 16khz sampling audio using my laptop?

Question

I want to know why my laptop can't record 16khz sampling audio.
The sampling rates I can have using my laptop are only limited to the higher sampling rate, e.g, 44khz, 48khz, 192khz, and so on...
I need to record 16khz sampling audio using my laptop.
Sound card in my laptop is Conexant 20671 SmartAudio HD

Although I can record 16khz sampling by Sound Forge 8.0, I am doubt whether the recorded audio is really 16khz sampling. Because the sound card can't record 16khz sampling, I think there may be some problems on the recording process.

Could you give me any hint why my sound card can't record 16khz?
and any method to identify whether the recorded audio by Sound Forge 8.0 is really 16khz?

Thanks.

Answer 1

There is no process for differentiating between downsampled audio from 48k to 16k and native 16k sampled audio, as 16k divides 48k evenly. Your sound card likely does not support natively sampling at these lower rates, but there should be no harm from downsampling the audio if you need 16k sampling for some reason, which is likely what Sound Forge is doing.