a laptop sound card upgrade?

Hear me out before you think about commenting.
Ive got my LG R405 here, and i really like it, i added line out to it and use my sub with it.
its all good, but some songs (whether the sub is plugged in or not) make my sound card cut out. (IE it'll make some white noise then stop producing sound) i have to skip the song before my sound will come back online.

I was wondering what could i do to fix this? im guessing its something with the capacitors, being SMD caps, they might not be able to let the sound control chip handle the big changes in sound frequencies or something, im not too sure.
dont try and tell me its impossible to resolve this issue. it is not a software problem, it is a hardware problem. i need to upgrade something, be it the capacitors, or maybe the amount of current supplied to the sound driver chip.

if its capacitors, where should i be upgrading them? on the outputs or the input voltage?

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lemonie3 years ago
If you genuinely believe the hardware is defective: replace the card.

Your problem sounds like you're overloading the card, so you should replace it. Or alternatively add another amplifier between the line-out and the sub'.

Fiddling with bits on what you've got is the wrong approach.

SM - means that the component is not mounted with legs/pins into the board, they sit on the surface. Capacitors are generally not SM- and replacing them won't up your power output.

zack247 (author)  lemonie3 years ago
the sound card is soldered onto the mainboard, but im not looking for more power, nor did i say it was defective.

i was asking how i can maybe make it more capable of doing its job.
it doesnt matter what the volume level is at, some of the songs just make it stop working.

im fully aware that SM means its soldered on the surface of the board though.
lemonie zack2473 years ago

I've never seen a card soldered onto a mainboard - is that "on board" sound where it's part of the mainboard?
Your messages are confusing, you say "it is a hardware problem" and you want to fiddle with hardware. Then you're not looking for more output and it's just certain tracks - i.e. it's not hardware, or is it?

I think your problem is in the line-out-sub arrangement, some tracks may be worse than others but hardware doesn't have taste in music.

What exactly have you got connected to line-out?


zack247 (author)  lemonie3 years ago
itll happen whether i have my sub connected to line out or not.
laptops have the soundcard as part of the mainboard,
what im looking for is a better capability to handle the outputs so the sound doesnt fizzle out.

on another note, if i set my bass frequencies to run louder, the fizzling occurs more often.
lemonie zack2473 years ago
Have you checked the Windows Master volume panel for levels that are whacked-up to the top?

nurdee13 years ago
Here is a neat little thing you can plug into a usb port and it will give you a headphone output and a microphone input.

Vyger3 years ago
Did you check to see if its the songs that are bad? They might be defective MP3's
zack247 (author)  Vyger3 years ago
ive tried several different files of one of the songs, but it always makes it fizzle out.
frollard3 years ago
Correct me if I'm wrong but is your 'sound card' not integrated to the motherboard? If so, you can't just replace the card.

I've never heard of a card failing on a song-by-song basis, makes me think software issue (despite your insistence).

You can however pick up an inexpensive usb sound card. Their quality varies from total crap to really good.
Also available are peripheral sound cards that fit in the pcmcia mini slot.

Your sound output pins only supply line level signal, only slightly amplified, so since its not directly driving a speaker (except headphones sometimes) then it isn't NEEDING much current. That's the beauty of line-level/headphone level outputs.