HP Sound needs a boost

I just got my new HP DV 4T. It works very nicely, but the on board sound is just OK. I have the volume control turned up all the way, but you need to be within about 10 feet to heard it well. Is that normal? Do I need some external speakers, or is there are way to boost up the sound?

 

If you can hear it well from 10 ft away that's very good for internal laptop speakers. If you need more then yes powered external speakers are in order.
Good luck.

 

Yeah if you want more it's worth buying some external speakers...

 

First thing you need to do is to make sure all of your drivers are updated to current revisions. Go to this link at HP if you haven't already done so:
HP Customer Care

Enter your system Product # from the label under your system the click on submit. That will take you to the support page for your particular system configuration. Once you enter your OS version, click on Software and Driver downloads. Scroll down until you find the IDT driver for your system. Check the date - it's likely a newer version.

The other way to do it is from your HP Update Manager. Click on Pearl (Vista Start Icon), Help & Support, Software, Drivers, and BIOS Updates, Get Updates from HP. The Update Manager will automatically connect to the HP site and update your drivers for you. Personally I don't use it because too many problems can happen with drivers - I alway want to know exactly what's being installed on my system, and you don't have that with an auto-update program.

Note that you should also check the Business Support area as well, and also other English language HP sites around the globe as they don't all update at the same time. You can sometimes find newer drivers for your system on other HP sites besides the US site.

Once your driver is updated, if you still have the same sound, that's what it is. You can always get a Creative USB or ExpressCard Soundblaster or X-Fi card to get better audio, but your internal speakers limit you. If you want better sound, then a 3D card and external speakers are your answer.

Creative just came out with a Flash Drive type USB sound card called X-Fi Go!. Plugs right into your USB port, runs about 40 bucks, has external mini-jacks as well. They also have some good upgrade options besides that.

 

I know what your talking about.. I noticed lower volume levels at times. Especially with some DVD's will come in pretty low. What I did was a search for ac3filter and opened that up. I think it was installed with my combined community codec pack which I highly recommend and prefer over the standard divx codec. Once you open up ac3filter you can adjust the gain up +20db which helped out allot.

If you don't have ac3filter installed or any codecs installed I would go to http://www.cccp-project.net/

Remember, this will probably only fix lower sounding ac3 soundtracks which are usually DVD's. But from my experience, these are the ones that experience lower volume levels. This will definitely give it a boost!