Setting up 2 external display to Notebook

Have tried all morning setting this up but failed because GPU can only support 2 display (including the laptop display).

Also, tried solving notebook HDMI to LCD TV loss signal problem. It seems like the notebook boot up and LCD turn on have to sunchronize same time if not ou will have loss of signal resulting in blank screen.

No such issue for VGA.

Mission & Monitor Audio Speakers

Got myself a pair of Mission 762 many years ago and re-cone once. Strong solid bass and good mids. More of the warm type. This speaker must be close to 20 years old now.

Recently added a pair of MA BX2 because of great reviews at WhatHifi. Went to audition and was impressed by the clarity and spaciousness of the sound. Furthermore, it is value for money.

Since Marantz amplifier have 4 channels so i pair it with MA and Mission.

The resulting SQ is a fuller sound stage, clarity (from MA), good mids and bass (from Mission).

Mission is sitting on a floor stand and MA is sitting on top of Mission.

Compaq Presario CQ35

Got it at a promotion. Great specifications but the OS is dated (Vista32 instead of W7 64).

1. Processor Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU P8800 @ 2.66GHz 
2. Memory (RAM) 4.00 GB
3. Graphics NVIDIA GeForce G 105M 
4. Gaming graphics 1775 MB Total available graphics memory 
5. 64 Bit capable
6. Single HDMI & 3 USB ports.

If i could rewind back, would have got a standalone PC with 2 GPU and PCI soundcard.

More hardware upgrades are possible and easier too.

DAC SoundCard

Using USB X-Fi as DAC. Not ideal but due to budget constraint it is best for now. Read from alot of forums and from trials and errors, decided to use only Vista drivers because sound is much better then manufacturer drivers.

Creative CD installation comes with alot of sound effects and these are not installed because they are not needed.

The aim is to get bit perfect to the DAC and from DAC to analogue speakers.

Next upgrade would be getting a Arcam rDAC but it cost more than approximately 8 times of X-fi.Am not sure whether the performance and SQ will improve by 8 folds.

Still thinking.

Media Players and Music Files

Ripped all CDs to WAV files using either iTunes or WMP. Foobar player is use to play WAV files while WinAmp is use to listen to internet streaming radio, like Shoutcast.

Have made some inprovements to foobar by downloading components (Asio drivers) and using it as an output. Asio is a great driver and immediately you can hear the difference in SQ.

For WinAmp, installed plugin for kernel streaming. It uses WASAPI to direct the source of the audio to DAC. In short to be bit perfect. Again, SQ improves.

Do not use equalizers because I want to achieve sound purities. Equalizer will sample the audio input and thus will not be pure source.

Both are worth to try since it is FREE and if you do not like the sound, you can change the output to the default.

There are lots of other media player out there, such as iTunes and Windows Media Player. Personally, I only use them to rip the CDs into WAV. They are much better in tagging the albums i feel.

Tweaked Vista

The following tweaks:

1. Downgraded graphics from Vista Aero to Standard (Aero is a resouce hog). 
2. Power option change to high performance. 
3. Reduce start up programs like Windows LIVE. Stop uncessary services running upon start up, like printers. 
4. Disabled indexing.
5. Sound scheme is no sound.
6. Allow application to have exclusive control of the sound device.
7. Give exclusive control priority.
8. Screen saver none.
9. Set processor scheduling to "Background services"
10. Enable DMA (Direct memory access) on each IDE channel

All these minor tweaks will speed up OS response and hopefully improves the SQ.

Downloaded Sysinternals Utilities Suite @ http://technet.microsoft.com/. It can monitor and tweak OS at registry levels. Very useful tools set.

The Setup

Compaq Presario CQ35 (Notebook) -> Windows Vista 32 Bit -> 4GB RAM -> FooBar2000 (output ASIO4ALL for WAV) / WinAmp (output Kernel Streaming for Internet Radio) / WMP / iTunes (Ripping CDs into WAV) -> Creative USB X-Fi -> Marantz PM6003 Amplifier -> Monitor Audio BX2 (Channel A) + Mission 762 (Channel B).

The Journey Mission

The purpose of this blog is to document my journey to audio nirvana.

Audio nirvana can be achieved with quality music playback using computer hardware combining traditional stereo amplifier and speakers.

In this blog, I will share my experiences and findings, the good and the bad.