Best laptop sound cards?

[imported_sanjuro]

1. I'm looking to buy a laptop, and listening to music will be one of the main things I use it for. I really like listening to music while surfing the net. I want it to at least match the sound quality of my MP3 player/portable amp/Ety's set-up. I will most likely buy a pre-built machine, since there seem to be better deals for those, and customization sites (like Dell, HP, etc.) don't allow you to choose your sound card anyway. Customization is very limited.

2. Can you change the sound card on the laptop by yourself?

3. Also, one last question. I use my portable amp through a line out on my MP3 player. Do laptops have line outs on them? That's what I need.

By the way, I'm looking to spend no more than $700 on this laptop.

Thank you very much.

 

[Brainonska511]

1) Don't buy any software emulators (which is what Dell offers with that Audigy nonsense). Creative makes a USB sound card, but it is nothing spectacular. Integrated sound chips have come a long way since the late '90s and early '00s. You can always get something with an SPDIF output and hook the computer up to a receiver if you want good sound processing.

2) No. It is integrated into the board.

3) The headphone jack is the only output on almost all laptops (can't think of any that have a dedicated "line-out").

 

[imported_sanjuro]

I wonder if it is even possible to hook a portable amp up to a laptop then. Maybe I could connect it through the USB port somehow. I'll have to do some research on that.

Do you know any brands for sound cards that are good? This way I know what to look for when buying my laptop.

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: sanjuro
I wonder if it is even possible to hook a portable amp up to a laptop then. Maybe I could connect it through the USB port somehow. I'll have to do some research on that.

Do you know any brands for sound cards that are good? This way I know what to look for when buying my laptop.

There aren't really any choices when buying a laptop. It is basically whatever is attached to the motherboard. A handful use RealTek chips while most of the others (especially Intel branded notebooks) use Intel's HD Audio chip. Either way, your best bet is to find something that can do digital out and then hook it into a receiver which can process the sound instead of forcing the computer to do it. There are very few external sound cards, and those that exist are not that good or are really expensive. Also, at a $700 budget, I don't expect you getting much choice beyond some basic Dell.

 

[themisfit610]

You can get audio to your headphone amp two ways, one by using the headphone out (which should automatically output a line level signal if you hook it up to a line level device), or by using a dedicated DAC that connects either via SPDIF or USB to your computer, and does the digital to analog conversion by itself, outputting a 1/8" Stereo or 2x RCA line level signal. The former will work, maybe not perfectly. The latter is very expensive, but will sound very good The Emu 0404 is a popular starter DAC.

~MiSfit

 

[Rockinacoustic]

Whatever happened to this? It seemed like a promising product but I haven't heard much about it since release.

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: Rockinacoustic
Whatever happened to this? It seemed like a promising product but I haven't heard much about it since release.

It's not that good. It lacks EAX support since it is basically an X-Fi Music (a neutered card) in ExpressCard format. Unfortunately, they didn't make it like the Audigy 2 ZS PCMCIA card, which was a full fledged sound card with EAX support for the PCMCIA slot.