HP laptops - IDT audio chip problems.

My friends have enlisted my assistance with finding a decent laptop for college, and two of the laptops that I've ended up recommending, explicitly for their hardware's versatility, are HP laptops. One is a dv6 with 6GB DDR3, and an AMD A6 with Radeon HD 6310 graphics. The other recommendation is a more recent one I'm quite proud of, another dv6 with an A10, and midrange Radeon graphics, I forget the exact model. Both laptops are very good for the most part, and the latter gets exceptional battery life for how capable it is with gaming.

However, more recently, problems have arisen from both the laptops, owing mostly to complaints about the audio not working. I've found both these laptops are equipped with the IDT audio chips, which are set up in a way that completely baffles me. The speakers and headphones jack are treated in Windows as completely separate audio devices; this results in conflicts and many programs not playing sound.

To get an eye in on just how much of a hassle this audio chip is to use, I got my hands on an HP Mini 210. I decided the audio chip renders the laptop nearly unusable. I like to listen to music a lot, as well as browse the web and play video games, so I'm constantly alt-tabbing and switching back and forth. This sort of multitasking easily exposes the IDT chip's problems.

The ultimate solution I've given my friends is to get Plantronics Gamecom 780s, which are premium Gaming headsets that are close to the end of their marketing cycle, so they're going for cheap. But what makes them the solution is that instead of plugging into a headphone jack, the Gamecom uses a USB connector, because it is effectively an audio card in itself. Setting the Gamecom as the default audio device on the HP(I've tried this on their HPs with my Gamecom 780) completely eliminates the IDT's problems, because it doesn't even use the IDT chip. Although you don't get to use the laptop's speakers.

I'd like to ask if this still affects a lot of HP laptops, if other HP users are having the same problems as us, and if there are other solutions to it.