Picked up a cute little usb soundcard from Maplin the other day. It's built in to an enclosure that looks like a valve. Got a right angled fitting so it stands up. Lights up like a valve too.  Love it.  Anyway it solves the problem of no mic socket on the lap top and has allowed me to use data mode decoding software in parallel with the PCR-1000.

This Windows 8 is not as friendly to my software as XP I notice. Neither SDR Console or HDSDR are happy (Both lose audio contact with the dongle for some reason) and even  Ham Radio Deluxe crashes quite often.  The original Icom software works fine though.  Maybe the computer spec is not up to it. Haven't bothered setting up the IC-718 and Rigblaster to try tx'ng with the lappy yet.  Waiting for the right mood hi..