[xriddler]

So I've been running my B&W p7s through my Toshiba Satelite A660-135 laptop for a few months and thought to invest and get my head wet with a dac to try and hear some improvements. So i grabbed the D1 since it was on sale for $130. But Comparing the D1 and my laptop I cant hear any difference at all. Could it be that my laptop has an equivalent sound quality to the D1? My laptop does have Harman/kardon speakers onboard maybe it has somekind of audio improvements I dont know about? Is there anyway to figure out what dac/amp components my laptop has? 

 

[milosingh]

The difference between competent dacs is very little, and often not audible by the majority. So I wouldn't be surprised.

 

[milosingh]

  The difference between competent dacs is very little, and often not audible by the majority. So I wouldn't be surprised.

You could better an iphone dac or asus stx or odac level dac, but not by much and not for so little money.

 

[BigTerminator]

You should hear a difference. My Essence ST made my cheapo Logitech PC speakers sound 10 times better. On board is sooo bad that anything remotely better should make a difference. I did find however that my Essence ST did not do much for my Sennheiser Amperiors as much as it did for my speakers. That is why I am into speakers rather than headphones. I think portable/mobile use headphones do not really benefit from amping or even better DAC's. I would suggest you sell your headphones and get some open backed audiophile headphones that have a decently high ohm rating. 

 

[milosingh]

Your onboard sound was crap. Not all onboard sound are the same. If he has Harman onboard that might be better perhaps.

 

[BigTerminator]

All onboard sound is crap. 

 

[milosingh]

Your opinion doesn't count towards anything unless you have heard all possible onboard soundcards. You may have heard realtec, but you haven't heard the ops laptop config.

 

[blackmarket]

  All onboard sound is crap. 

Not true. I actually used to have a Toshiba laptop with harmon/kardon branding on it and the speakers were actually really good considering they were laptop speakers. Much better than a lot of those cheap 2.0 speakers. The headphone out was also pretty good as well. Decently amped, could drive my HE-400 and sounded fairly good. I have a Xonar ST as well and while the difference is apparent, I don't think the Toshiba laptop sounded bad at all.