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"Makes no sense at all." Same here. It's very strange. It seems to me people can get used to anything—and that they have done so. The atrocious speaker/sound

"Makes no sense at all." Same here. It's very strange. It seems to me people can get used to anything—and that they have done so. The atrocious speaker/sound systems in today's laptops are so bad that if retrofitted to ancient monophonic AM radios of the 1930s and '40s then those radios wouldn't have sold. The fact that so many are prepared to accept such atrocious audio means there's no longer any choice for anyone like me who'd pay more for good audio—simply no manufacturer makes a laptop with good audio these days. BTW, I did play piano a litte once so I've a bit of an understanding of what they're supposed to sound like.

Joeri 4y ago
simply no manufacturer makes a laptop with good audio these days Have you listened to the current 16 inch macbook pro? I think modern apple laptops can compare themselves in audio quality to any laptop from the past.
- hilbert42 4y ago
  No, and I'm prepared to accept that there are exceptions (but even then, they must have limits as the physics of acoustics demands compromises when limited to the restrictive size of laptops). What I should have said is that whilst the electrical signal from the DAC is usually excellent (far better than almost any analog-only system), it's interface with the acoustic world (the speakers and their acoustic environment, baffling, enclosures etc.) is mostly terrible and at best only a poor compromise. It simply isn't possible with traditional speaker technology to provide an optimal environment inside a laptop. If it were then speaker manufacturers would have miniaturized their huge enclosures years ago. My complaint is that most laptop manufacturers don't even try to work within those restrictive bounds and that makes things much worse. The matter of having insufficient gain has little or nothing to do with the actual quality of the signal coming from the audio amplifier output, again it's usually quite excellent if one connects to headphones or to an external HiFi system. ____ BTW, I never said laptops had good audio (acoustic sound as opposed to electrical output). As far as I'm concerned their acoustics are all lousy when compared with a decent HiFi system. Sorry, I wrongly assumed that all readers were skilled in electronics and thus would have made a clear distinction between the quality of the audio signal within the electronics and that which actually emanates from the speakers. In fact, the electrical audio signals are nearly always several orders of magnitude better than what speakers can actually reproduce. Electronics people usually take that for granted.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
midoridensha 4y ago
Has any laptop ever had decent sound? There's not exactly a lot of space there to put in a proper speaker, so it's really amazing the sound is as good as it is. Also, modern form factors and aesthetics prohibit placing speakers next to the screen, where they'd be pointed at the user's ears. If you want good sound from a laptop, the answer is pretty simple: 1) plug in some decent headphones, or 2) plug in some real speakers. You can get a pretty decent set of "PC speakers" consisting of satellite speakers and a subwoofer for not much money. You're not really supposed to listen to the laptop speakers if you care about sound and you're not traveling.
- barkingcat 4y ago
  Try the macbook pro 16 speakers. They are decent-ish I find it funny that a lot of HN posts will expound in expletives about how a certain tech product is the best in class for example, how great macbook pro speakers are and then another poster will say that no laptop has ever had decent speakers… Also, in one post “this dolby surround atmos reproduces everything about the concert, with hundreds of musicians it’s like I’m there” and then in the next post “speakers will never reproduce even the sound of one acoustic piano that’s been mistreated and mistuned, the piano will still sound better and the speaker will never replicate the magic of acoustic instruments” and then in the very next post start quoting how the Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem proves that nobody ever needs anything over 44khz to reproduce exactly the sound of all acoustic instruments that ever existed. The story, as always, is more complex than any of these hot takes, and tech folks usually refuse to accept that there are multiple factors at play.
  - AlecSchueler 4y ago
    Best in class doesn't have to mean they're good, if they whole class was abysmal to begin with.
    - midoridensha 4y ago
      Who's the best-in-class dictator? Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, or Franco?
samatman 4y ago
The speakers on my laptop sound objectively better than my old combo tape deck and radio from the late 80s, it's not even close actually. Whether this is true of laptops that aren't 15/16" MBPs is a different question. Does it sound as good as wooden cabinet speaker? Obviously it doesn't. But it sounds better than AM radio is able to, presuming the audio file is of high enough bitrate.
xeromal 4y ago
Not talking about pianos at all, but if you're interested in a solid laptop sound system, my dell XPS 15 has ridiculously good sound. It's not as good as my DAC + Sennheiser headphone set up, but it is randomly great. It's not overly bassy or tinny. It just has a depth to it I haven't heard on laptop speakers before. Highly recommended.

Joeri 4y ago

simply no manufacturer makes a laptop with good audio these days Have you listened to the current 16 inch macbook pro? I think modern apple laptops can compare themselves in audio quality to any laptop from the past.

hilbert42 4y ago
No, and I'm prepared to accept that there are exceptions (but even then, they must have limits as the physics of acoustics demands compromises when limited to the restrictive size of laptops). What I should have said is that whilst the electrical signal from the DAC is usually excellent (far better than almost any analog-only system), it's interface with the acoustic world (the speakers and their acoustic environment, baffling, enclosures etc.) is mostly terrible and at best only a poor compromise. It simply isn't possible with traditional speaker technology to provide an optimal environment inside a laptop. If it were then speaker manufacturers would have miniaturized their huge enclosures years ago. My complaint is that most laptop manufacturers don't even try to work within those restrictive bounds and that makes things much worse. The matter of having insufficient gain has little or nothing to do with the actual quality of the signal coming from the audio amplifier output, again it's usually quite excellent if one connects to headphones or to an external HiFi system. ____ BTW, I never said laptops had good audio (acoustic sound as opposed to electrical output). As far as I'm concerned their acoustics are all lousy when compared with a decent HiFi system. Sorry, I wrongly assumed that all readers were skilled in electronics and thus would have made a clear distinction between the quality of the audio signal within the electronics and that which actually emanates from the speakers. In fact, the electrical audio signals are nearly always several orders of magnitude better than what speakers can actually reproduce. Electronics people usually take that for granted.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

midoridensha 4y ago

Has any laptop ever had decent sound? There's not exactly a lot of space there to put in a proper speaker, so it's really amazing the sound is as good as it is. Also, modern form factors and aesthetics prohibit placing speakers next to the screen, where they'd be pointed at the user's ears. If you want good sound from a laptop, the answer is pretty simple: 1) plug in some decent headphones, or 2) plug in some real speakers. You can get a pretty decent set of "PC speakers" consisting of satellite speakers and a subwoofer for not much money. You're not really supposed to listen to the laptop speakers if you care about sound and you're not traveling.

barkingcat 4y ago
Try the macbook pro 16 speakers. They are decent-ish I find it funny that a lot of HN posts will expound in expletives about how a certain tech product is the best in class for example, how great macbook pro speakers are and then another poster will say that no laptop has ever had decent speakers… Also, in one post “this dolby surround atmos reproduces everything about the concert, with hundreds of musicians it’s like I’m there” and then in the next post “speakers will never reproduce even the sound of one acoustic piano that’s been mistreated and mistuned, the piano will still sound better and the speaker will never replicate the magic of acoustic instruments” and then in the very next post start quoting how the Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem proves that nobody ever needs anything over 44khz to reproduce exactly the sound of all acoustic instruments that ever existed. The story, as always, is more complex than any of these hot takes, and tech folks usually refuse to accept that there are multiple factors at play.
- AlecSchueler 4y ago
  Best in class doesn't have to mean they're good, if they whole class was abysmal to begin with.
  - midoridensha 4y ago
    Who's the best-in-class dictator? Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, or Franco?

samatman 4y ago

The speakers on my laptop sound objectively better than my old combo tape deck and radio from the late 80s, it's not even close actually. Whether this is true of laptops that aren't 15/16" MBPs is a different question. Does it sound as good as wooden cabinet speaker? Obviously it doesn't. But it sounds better than AM radio is able to, presuming the audio file is of high enough bitrate.

xeromal 4y ago

Not talking about pianos at all, but if you're interested in a solid laptop sound system, my dell XPS 15 has ridiculously good sound. It's not as good as my DAC + Sennheiser headphone set up, but it is randomly great. It's not overly bassy or tinny. It just has a depth to it I haven't heard on laptop speakers before. Highly recommended.