Line out on laptop?

[guzziguy]

Hi,

I just heard that my HeadFive is being shipped today. This will be for work. Normally, I just plug in my headphones into the headphone out jack. Is there a way to bypass the laptop's amplifier and get a line out?

For reference, my laptop is an IBM T42. Does laptop brand make a difference as someday I'll probably want to do the same thing with my personal Dell Inspiron 8600?

Thanks in advance for your advice.

Regards,

-ken

 

[c0mfortably_numb]

I have a IBM T23 (but Im not hooking my headfive to that), the Laptop's don't have an amplifier, but they do have an internal sound card. You will need to get an RCA to I believe Jan is using 1/4" jacks (can someone confirm this?) If you want to bypass your laptop's internal sound , and I can see why

You can get an external dac (if you have USB 2.0) There is a decent one one on the cheap the Silverstone EB01 with that you will just need a simple rca to rca audio cable such as Blue Jean's audio cable

Or you can go extrernal sound route either a PCMCIA soundcard such as the Echo DJ or get a USB sound Card You will need an RCA to 1/4" with an external card.

All laptops are pretty much the same, meaning they all use an internal sound card, so you should be able to use what ever solution you decide to go with IECMCIA or USB, or internal sound (which I would not recomend) should work as well with your Dell.

Also I'm not sure if you are aware or not, but the Amp's do not ship with power cords, at that price I'm not complaining, make sure you have a spare PC power cable to hook up to the amp, and make sure to check the voltage selction switch (either 110 or 220 depending on country) when you get it

 

[guzziguy]

Thanks for the response. I'm not ready to get an external dac or pcmcia sound card, so I guess that I'll just have to go with the internal sound card and earphone out. If it isn't satisfactory, I'll consider the other options.

I already have acquired a 1/8" to rca cable, a dock for my Ipod and a power cable. All I really need now is a 1/8" to 1/4" adaptor as all my headphones have 1/8" jacks. Do you have any recommendations?

Boy am I looking forward to getting the HeadFive.

 

[c0mfortably_numb]

I would try to find something like what grado makes, they have a 1/4" to 1/8" but it's on a cable you your not stressing the jack....

I wasn't able to find one, so I don't know if they excist or not....For now you can just get a mini to quarter from headphone.com for like $5

 

[Graz]

Plugging the headphone output of your laptop into your amp is probably not gonna be a good thing long term. As its not a line-level out, you'll have to play around with the volume setting & make sure not to drive an overly strong signal into your amp. Also, notebook headphone jacks tend to be a little on the noisy side...some are pretty good, but it's hit or miss for sure. Any noise present coming out of the jack will get amplified by your headfive...not a good thing. If you're planning to stick with your notebook as your source for the long term, imo you should really look into some kind of external sound card, like an m-audio Transit or something along those lines...

Peace,

Graz

 

[c0mfortably_numb]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Graz Also, notebook headphone jacks tend to be a little on the noisy side...some are pretty good, but it's hit or miss for sure. Any noise present coming out of the jack will get amplified by your headfive...not a good thing

Yes this is true and I was going to say that, but IBM actually have clean output...maynot be the best sound card (usally crystal and I think 16bit) but they are heaps better then allot I herd. The worst headphone out for a latop goes to Compaq Armada M700, all you could hear was static, even here the hard drive motor spin up and down lol....

Probally the best solution would be an external DAC as with my computer as source I am sick of trying to keep my EMU secondary soundcard working right. There is an application that has to be started befor you attempt to use it, but it really bogged my boot times, so I created a shortcut to the process and after windows loads I load it, ugh but if you forget

pure headache, have to go to the device manager disable and reenable, in Foobar have to remove ASIO, Add ASIO, Select ASIO....If I didn't need the first sound card for DVD watching and the ocassional game here and there I would just yank it out.

 

[jmb239]

Mac laptops have optical and analog line-out as a standard feature.

 

[RockinOut]

Wonderful replies from everyone, indeed.

My opinion:
http://www4.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=184644

 

[MASantos]

THere is a group buy going on for a DIY USB dac that should cost around 40$ for parts cost.

You could ask someone to build you one.

 

[guzziguy]

Another approach I may take is to either find or buy a cheap portable CD player and use it as the source instead of a laptop. I've never heard how good a USB dac is, from reading here it seems that it is limited by the USB connection. Would using the line out of a portable player be equal or better than an inexpensive USB dac?

 

[c0mfortably_numb]

Quote:

Originally Posted by guzziguy Would using the line out of a portable player be equal or better than an inexpensive USB dac?

If you get a classic like the Sony D33

It will be a whole lot better the a laptop's sound..

 

[RockinOut]

Quote:

Originally Posted by guzziguy Another approach I may take is to either find or buy a cheap portable CD player and use it as the source instead of a laptop. I've never heard how good a USB dac is, from reading here it seems that it is limited by the USB connection. Would using the line out of a portable player be equal or better than an inexpensive USB dac?

Be careful, it depends on what "cheap portable CD player" it is.

Some hiss and sound like an empty can. You'd be better saving your money on a nice dinner or towards something better.

USB has some problems but it works great given it's limitations and the fact that almost all laptops have no optical outs yet almost all have USB nowadays.

I really like USB, it's flexible, and sounds great.

I think it's a shame that so many people are disregarding USB DACs without even trying it. Yeah optical is nice, but USB has it's place, and I feel it's getting to much of a bad wrap around here especially for newbies.

There loss I guess.

Total Bithead, Aria, etc.

Silverstone EB01 is $100. From what I've read doesn't "need" amp as volume is adjusted from software. Not bit-perfect, but still better than factory sound.

You won't know till you try. Just make sure you can return whatever you get.

Good Luck.

 

[ComfyCan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RockinOut Be careful, it depends on what "cheap portable CD player" it is. Some hiss and sound like an empty can. You'd be better saving your money on a nice dinner or towards something better. USB has some problems but it works great given it's limitations and the fact that almost all laptops have no optical outs yet almost all have USB nowadays. I really like USB, it's flexible, and sounds great. I think it's a shame that so many people are disregarding USB DACs without even trying it. Yeah optical is nice, but USB has it's place, and I feel it's getting to much of a bad wrap around here especially for newbies. There loss I guess. Total Bithead, Aria, etc. Silverstone EB01 is $100. From what I've read doesn't "need" amp as volume is adjusted from software. Not bit-perfect, but still better than factory sound. You won't know till you try. Just make sure you can return whatever you get. Good Luck.

I agree totally; there is absolutely nothing wrong with USB; at least I know the Total Bithead sounds very good.

There are so many threads about optical, in preference to USB, due to the quest for perfection that so many headfi folk share (including me).

This leaves a false impression that "dirty" usb sounds bad--it doesn't, at least when you are using a decent USB compatible DAC and/or AMP.

Optical out to a standalone DAC sounds better,yes, but it's more of a really nice tweak than an "order of magnitude" difference.

The optical-out threads get a lot of attention because it's tricky on a laptop (unless you have a new Mac); it's not plug and play like a usb dac/amp, and there are the inevitable related issues of ASIO configuration, dealing with resampling if you're using a creative card's optical out, etc. that further complicate the picture. They complicate the picture quite a bit if you don't have a technical background.

My current laptop setup sounds better than straight USB, but it looks crazy and it's unweildly as hell; I've got usb running to a transit with an optical cable running to a dac with an analog cable running to an amp. It looks like a bomb.

I'm happy, because I'm obsessed, and I probably won't stop here--I'll keep fiddling with it forever. The point is that none of this was necessary to get excellant sound--I know this objectively; The Total Bithead sounded quite good, and took all of about 30 seconds to get it up and running. The microstack via usb sounded really, REALLY good, and if I were sane I'd have stopped there. But somebody posted that optical was better, so I was off to the races. They were right; it was better, but it doesn't change the fact that USB was 100 times more convenient and sounded at least 90% as good as optical; maybe even 95% as good.

So, if you're afraid of USB, DON'T BE, it's fine--really--and if it's not, you can always read, obsess, read, post, obsess, purchase, return, upgrade......... (like me

)

 

[guzziguy]

I decided to ask Dr. Meier if it was okay to use a headphone out. He said that there should be no problem and gave me some suggested volume settings to get "best" SQ. This is for work and I don't do critical listening there. I'll try this and not worry about spending more money until I can't stand the SQ any longer!

Thanks again for your suggestions. I learned a lot.

 

[Daroid]

Let's start a club T42

.. no seriously: There are not many choices to get a line-out output from the T4x laptops - let alone a digital output. IBM have 2 docks and 2 port replicators available in different sizes, i think all of them has line-out (but no s/pdif)

Actually the headphone output is (surprisingly) good for integrated sound, it surely was much better than onboard sound on (most) desktops, and has a black backround (no hiss)