..and by YOUR world, i mean the "audiophility", of course. to which i am new. and overwhelmed by the huge quantity of info and variety of products. i know my way round with instruments and their amplification, on-stage and a bit of studio. but hi-fi is the "other art"..
so..i am new to your community and glad to have finally found the `entry level`. ive been surfin the web for days, looking to solve my problem, but its simply too complex for me, for now.
my problem: i habe a sony vaio notebook (vgn-fe28h) and somehow managed to damage my sound output connector-> i cannot listen to music through ext. speakers or headphones anymore. for two weeks now, i've been suffering the excruciating pain of being tortured by the sound of notebook speakers. i cant take it anymore.
this is why i have decided it's the right time to advance to the next level and enter the (pre) hi-fi world.
i am looking for an external USB sound card (or PCMCIA?), priced around max 150 euro. no games, no dvds, some movies but fully concentrated on music. my library is all mp3 and yes, i know im missing the quality of real audio CDs but thats life..now, although im not a pro, i have my doubts about, lets say, creative's EAX and xMod and the entire artificial enhancing thing. this is why im peeking over to the big brother: (almost) pro tools, unknown to the regular home user, offered by a huge variety of brands ive never heard of, but of which even I can tell that theyre offering high quality, just by sweeping over the prices..
im running a simple 2.1 system, which i intend getting rid of sometime in the future, in exchange for some entry-level full range speakers. i'll return asking for directions on this subject... 
but please help me get on this train by suggesting some sound cards which will bring me my music back, in a quality i never heard before! 
for example ive been reading a lot of positive comments on the ECHO indigo IO (~170
..and by YOUR world, i mean the "audiophility", of course. to which i am new. and overwhelmed by the huge quantity of info and variety of products. i know my way round with instruments and their amplification, on-stage and a bit of studio. but hi-fi is the "other art"..
so..i am new to your community and glad to have finally found the `entry level`. ive been surfin the web for days, looking to solve my problem, but its simply too complex for me, for now.
my problem: i habe a sony vaio notebook (vgn-fe28h) and somehow managed to damage my sound output connector-> i cannot listen to music through ext. speakers or headphones anymore. for two weeks now, i've been suffering the excruciating pain of being tortured by the sound of notebook speakers. i cant take it anymore.
this is why i have decided it's the right time to advance to the next level and enter the (pre) hi-fi world.
i am looking for an external USB sound card (or PCMCIA?), priced around max 150 euro. no games, no dvds, some movies but fully concentrated on music. my library is all mp3 and yes, i know im missing the quality of real audio CDs but thats life..now, although im not a pro, i have my doubts about, lets say, creative's EAX and xMod and the entire artificial enhancing thing. this is why im peeking over to the big brother: (almost) pro tools, unknown to the regular home user, offered by a huge variety of brands ive never heard of, but of which even I can tell that theyre offering high quality, just by sweeping over the prices..
im running a simple 2.1 system, which i intend getting rid of sometime in the future, in exchange for some entry-level full range speakers. i'll return asking for directions on this subject...
but please help me get on this train by suggesting some sound cards which will bring me my music back, in a quality i never heard before!
for example ive been reading a lot of positive comments on the ECHO indigo IO (~170