Just wondering if anybody has any experience using the Sound Blaster Live! External USB, Audigy 2 ZS Notebook, Roku Soundbridge, or some other external PC sound card device.
This is my problem. My CD collection is ripped onto my laptop. When hooked up to my stereo going from 1/8" phono jack to my integrated amp's RCA input, I am:
1) missing the bottom octave of bass. Most music has nothing below 40 Hz anyway, but when I listen to my favorite tracks and it's not there, it totally changes my listening experience (when it's deep, it's Mariana Trench deep! Mmmmm...).
2) hearing hum and crackles from the phono jack for quieter songs at higher gain. If I wiggle the phono jack, I can make it worse.
My ideal sound card would reproduce the bottom octave of bass and have a very low noise floor. My integrated amp does not have optical or digital coaxial input.
I'm assuming my HP Pavilion laptop skimps on the analog output stage. I've ruled out the MP3 format as the problem, because I have the same problem playing a CD through the laptop. It doesn't appear to be my 15' RCA cable because I can attach other hi-fi components and not have noise problems (though the RCA output is usually at a higher gain). And it doesn't seem psycho-acoustic, because I can play an identical track A/B between my laptop and my Pioneer DVD player at matched volumes and detect the difference in bass 10 times out of 10 (midbass, midrange, and treble are identical as far as I can tell).
Suggestions?
