Sony voice recoder: Everything works except Recod feature?

[lbbss]

I have a Sony voice Digital recorder ICD-B25. I tried using a phone
recording cable on it, and after that the record feature did not work.
This cable has a phone jack on one side and a regular male jack to
fit in the mic input. I bought the cable on ebay and the ad mentioned
you can use it with a micro cassette recorder. I asked the seller if
it can be used on a digital recorder, he said he does not know. Is
it possible that this cable wrecked my recorder? anything else I can
try? thanks for your input.

 

[lbbss]

btw: it has voice activation feature (only recodes when there is sound
coming in, other wise it pauses). So when I record it is always
pausing. If I turn off voice activation, it shows that it is
recording, but when I listen to the recording, it sound like quiet
white noise.
So I deduct that since the voice activation does not ever get ingage,
it means the mic is not picking up any sound (that applies to both
external mic or built in mic). recorder is 1 year old.

lbbss