The conditions (implicit or explicit) under which exposure to L2 input takes place and thelevel of awareness raised while processing input may be strongly related to the learning process.This study investigates how intake was affected both by awareness and by the conditions underwhich a problem-solving task was performed. Spanish conditional sentences were presented tolearners through five different degrees of explicitness, which were the result of combining thefactors [±formal instruction] and [±directions to search for rules]. Intake wasmeasured through a multiple-choice recognition test administered immediately after theexperimental task. Level of awareness was assessed by means of think-aloud protocols collectedduring input processing. Results indicate that (a) the degrees of explicitness had a differentialeffect on intake, (b) the higher the level of awareness demonstrated, the stronger the effect onintake, and (c) the conditions under which the task was administered influenced the wayinformation was processed.