I’d try it and see before you shell out on any equipment. Some laptops work fine, no noise at all (in fact, I’d say the majority). Some have horrendous PSU noise though or create ground loops when you hook them up to other mains-powered equipment like a hifi amp. That ground loop isolator is designed to fix a specific problem – if that problem doesn’t exist in your system then you won’t need it.

If you’re looking for the best sound quality it might not be a bad idea to buy an external soundcard of some sort (e.g. Focusrite Saffire 6 USB Audio Interface | DV247 – much cheaper ones do exist) as the built-in outputs on a lot of laptops sound pretty awful.

As for normalising your MP3s, I can’t speak for Windows Media Player, but iTunes has a function called ‘Soundcheck’ that supposedly adjusts the levels of your tunes so they all sound the same loudness, you just turn it on and forget about it (never tried it though, I’ve never felt the need). Btw iTunes is a horrible program so I wouldn’t recommend it, but maybe your media player has a similar function?

@cheeseweasel 454807 wrote:

I’d try it and see before you shell out on any equipment. Some laptops work fine, no noise at all (in fact, I’d say the majority). Some have horrendous PSU noise though or create ground loops when you hook them up to other mains-powered equipment like a hifi amp. That ground loop isolator is designed to fix a specific problem – if that problem doesn’t exist in your system then you won’t need it.

my HP compaq is fine – the 2006 era Toshiba is fucking horrendous. There is not just a ground loop but a dirty mains PSU inducing harmonics of 50Hz all the way into the audio freqencies, modulated by induced RF from the CPU. The ground loop remover does away with some of them but not the lower frequency ones.

I found some German spectrum analyser software (originally intended for decoding radio signals and bat calls) on it and if I can be arsed might even put up a screen print and also what the PSU itself (without a load!) is chucking out.

I have never seen PSU noise as bad as that in 20 years. That said the audio quality is still usable provided you send it to separate speakers – and the noise isn’t that bad (but audible). its audio has been relegated to being used for phone intercepts and basic checking that the soundtrack of a capured video exists (if needed) rather than music.

you’re only allowed to play rap music.

@HSB 454832 wrote:

how much would I be looking for a sound card that would do the job do you reckon? actually I am unsure I have room for a sound-card my graphics card takes up shed loads of space 🙁

can you get external ones?

there are loads connected on USB, anything from £8 (suprisingly good quality for the price) to several hundred quid (pro audio stuff)

I’ve not read all the advise – as the only thing I have to say is

DONT let drunk friends any where near it!!!!
we usually make a ‘playlist’ for our parties and hook up the lap top to my stereo,
one party some drunk friends messed about and went off the play list and turned the volume up and blew the speakers totally

I was only glad it was 3am so the party wasnt to ruined!!!

I’ve got a older version of one of them (a mate lent it to me as it was bundled with a keyboard and he didn’t use it as he already had a way better soundcard). its what I was using for the input of the audio measurement (as I don’t have anything else with line level input).

Not a bad piece of kit for the price but I haven’t tried the digital version – TBH I’ve not got all that much SPDIF kit anyway. If noise / interference is somehow getting in at an analogue stage of the circuit before its being converted to SPDIF you will still be plagued by it

One caveat about these cards is the drivers are custom and they lock the card into the USB port you have connected it to, you cannot swap it around or connect anything else in there without uninstalling the drivers or the card will not work correctly for both input and output.

Incidentally I might be mixing you up with someone else but I’d always got the impression you played music or have done (possibly guitar) and were quite good at it and if so it might be worth getting a pro-quality sound card…

All I can say is your Dad’s a brave man for letting a load of ravers chimp around with his posh hifi!

Yeah, buy it. It’s only £20. You always have the analogue outputs to fall back on if you can’t get the digital one working anyway.

didn’t realise they were only £20.. if you have plenty of spare USB ports worth getting (might get one for work when we set up our new training room)

Drinkers are equally bad for turning up the levels if left to it – TBH if I was HSB’s dad I’d just buy them a cheaper (but powerful enough) hi fi for a
wedding present!

beware that the PC soundcard output can be noisy as well (daftfader is facing this problem). Especially if you use one of them graphics cards with that appears to be a small radiator on them to remove heat from the GPU..

you may be better off for audio using the laptop, that outboard sound card and also the ground loop isolator on the input (especially if your dad wants to digitise his LP’s as he’s presumably going to be using his existing turntable and the REC OUT sockets from the amplifier), and this is exactly where all the noise will get in without it.

UNBRANDED|A-1095|GROUND LOOP ISOLATOR. | CPC

CPC make a more expensive one at £12 but not sure if its worth the extra money (your Dad might, as it sounds like he’s heavily into his hi fi/music)

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I can’t believe just how bad the built-in output on this new laptop sounds! Just a really weasely, thin sound with no real depth and no bass. Although I rarely used it, the onboard sound on my Mac was well better. Need to find some PC drivers for my MBox sharpish…