Need help setting up mic

Recently bought the antlion modmic 4.0 to use with my Sennhiesser 558 headphones. When i go to plug in the mic to the motherboard it wont even register in my settings that anything is even plugged it. Same thing happens when i plug it into the front panel mic jack. Tried the mic on my mac to make sure it worked and it indeed works. My next course of action was to buy a cheap(6$) USB sound card that had both a headphone and mic jack on it. The mic works when plugged up to the USB sound card. Only problem is the mic sounds like i am talking into a fishbowl or cup. A very muffled sound. This mic is not of potato quality and i feel like i am doing something wrong on my part. A friend tells me i should go buy a decent sound card for like 30-50$. I have a 50$ best buy gift card so i am not to worried about spending the money. 

 

I guess i really just need a second opinion on what to do next. Should i buy a better sound card? Is the cheap 6$ usb sound card causing my mic to sound like a potato quality?

 

This is a custom built PC i just put together about a month ago. I have been using a USB headset by razer which had an awesome mic but terrible sound quality

Specs:

I7 4790k

GTX 980 SC EVGA

GaG1 sniper z97 Gigabyte

16gb G. skill sniper

Corsair h100I

240gb SSD intel

WD 1tb Black 

750 EVGA supernova G+

I have had a similar problem when I updated some components. My Pc wasn't recognizing my headset through the 3.5mm and I had to route them through my Zoom H4n in the USB. The solution that worked for me, though I cant guarantee it'll work, is to go into your BIOS settings, and see if your Audio settings were switched. For some reason, it'll sometimes change.