Dark, What USB microphone is this? Also, have you gone into the communications tab of your sound settings and setting the radio button there to "do nothing"? That setting shouldn't affect recording, only playback, Its goal is to reduce sound volume when in a VOIP call so that the call is louder than your system, but I've had bad experience with it and I don't like having audio levels change anyway, so I turn it off.
I have never, ever had a plug-and-play device have the issues you describe. Not even on Win10. Perhaps you are misunderstanding something and the device isn't truly plug-and-play. From what I understand, plug-and-play devices don't need any special drivers, they can work fine, and or are designed, for Windows generic USB host drivers. If the device says something about downloading drivers, it's possible it might be grabbing its own third-party drivers from an external source. If that's the case, then any problems you have are likely down to the third party driver and its compatibility with your system. Unfortunately if there is a problem, there's not much you can do unless that driver gets fixed.
I had this experience when I got a Yeti Pro microphone, which needed its own drivers. These drivers had to be manually installed. It worked fine for a while, but suffered from some glitches. Given the fact that this is supposed to be a fairly good mic with high resolution recording, and that was the reason it needed its own driver in the first place, I found these glitches unacceptable. After unplugging, re-plugging, and trying a myriad of things to troubleshoot, it stopped working completely. I reported this to the manufacturer, in this case Blue Microphones, and from what I remember, they more or less said that their drivers have only been verified up to XP. I was on Win7 at the time. I had to return it for a refund.
I've found the easiest way to test for problems is to use the "listen to this device feature" of Windows. If you go to the same place where you set your headset microphone level, there is a listen tab in that dialog as well. Check the listen to this device box and then in the list, you can select what device the audio will be sent through. You should probably pick your speakers here. Then hit apply and if all is well, you should hear your headset microphone over your speakers. 99 percent of the time, this is what I use to diagnose audio problems. Either that or my preferred audio editor like Gold Wave, Reaper, etc. But anything will work so long as it can record and play, and isn't overly fussy about working with audio devices.
Skype can be a bit of a pain about audio devices, especially in situations where you're trying to use stereo mix over Skype, which I often do when trying to show somebody something. There are ways around it but it's tricky. For microphone use, I've yet to have issue. It is a little finicky at times when trying to configure audio devices, but I can help you with that if needed. It's not hard.
Hope you eventually figure it out. Maybe it's worth contacting the manufacturer if you continue to have problems. I know it might just be a waste of time in the end but it's worth a try, especially if you're getting frustrated because simply nothing seems to work.
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