Observer
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2010
- Posts
- 20
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- 0
Hello Folks,
Lots to read and lots to learn. A search didn't quite answer my question, so hoping asking in this forum is OK.
My laptop appears to have a rather poor 3.5mm headphone ports, which I've used to listen to music and movies. There is a noticeable "hiss" (that I can hear) regardless of content material (.WAV from CD, MP3), players (ie: VLC or Windows Media Player), which is likely hardware limitation.
In my quest for better performance, I've come to the conclusion that a nice set of cans powered from an external (portable or desktop is still yet to be determined) amplifier, and a very nice to have feature would be an integrated DAC. It seems there are a few players in this arena, so it's just a matter of seeing which suits me best, that will likely satisfy my objective for the time being.
A particular use case that I'm not sure could be handled (or perhaps it can) would be watching a movie from the laptop, and having just the audio stream via USB to the yet to be identified external DAC/Amplifier, which I would plug my headphones into. Can this be done? Taking things a bit further, I do have an HDMI output, so would it be possible to send just the audio component to the external DAC/Amplifier, and still have the video on my laptop? This second question would be more useful for applications like watching a Blu-Ray on a PS3, and maybe having a "Y" connector? (One going to the flatscreen with volume turned off, and the other end going to the external DAC/Amplifier, so I could listen via headphones?)
Thanks
Lots to read and lots to learn. A search didn't quite answer my question, so hoping asking in this forum is OK.
My laptop appears to have a rather poor 3.5mm headphone ports, which I've used to listen to music and movies. There is a noticeable "hiss" (that I can hear) regardless of content material (.WAV from CD, MP3), players (ie: VLC or Windows Media Player), which is likely hardware limitation.
In my quest for better performance, I've come to the conclusion that a nice set of cans powered from an external (portable or desktop is still yet to be determined) amplifier, and a very nice to have feature would be an integrated DAC. It seems there are a few players in this arena, so it's just a matter of seeing which suits me best, that will likely satisfy my objective for the time being.
A particular use case that I'm not sure could be handled (or perhaps it can) would be watching a movie from the laptop, and having just the audio stream via USB to the yet to be identified external DAC/Amplifier, which I would plug my headphones into. Can this be done? Taking things a bit further, I do have an HDMI output, so would it be possible to send just the audio component to the external DAC/Amplifier, and still have the video on my laptop? This second question would be more useful for applications like watching a Blu-Ray on a PS3, and maybe having a "Y" connector? (One going to the flatscreen with volume turned off, and the other end going to the external DAC/Amplifier, so I could listen via headphones?)
Thanks