Unleash the potential of your headphones/speakers (ft. Linux & Easy Effects)

Prologue

Have you ever wondered why MacBook speakers sound so much better than those in other laptops, especially compared to the speakers of the 16-inch MacBook Pro with Apple Silicon? If you haven’t had a chance to hear them yet, my personal experience has been nothing but outrage at traditional laptop makers, as the speakers of the 16-inch MacBook Pro made other laptops feel irrelevant.

In the past, when I was evaluating my options for a new laptop, I thought about running Linux on an old(er) MacBook. I gave it a shot, and I immediately noticed how terrible the speakers sounded as soon as I booted from a live USB. I was confused — why do they sound so much worse than on macOS? That’s when I fell into the rabbit hole of audio effects.