I took my laptop/HDD/DAC over to a friend's house about a week ago and, of course (hehe), he very much liked what he heard. He's only dabbled in ripping files and mainly just for his ipod.
Anyway, the reason for this thread is...
I've always had to lift the ground on the laptop (hey it hasn't fried yet, crossed fingers) or I get all the HDD/laptop noise coming through the speakers... this is even with the laptop plugged into a different circuit on going to the main box!! (stereo on an overbuilt subpanel from the main) or even it I plug it into circuits on the subpanel itself. If I lift the ground on the pc... absolute silence from the pc... has worked for me.
Over at my friend's house he has one of these:
PS Audio Premier Power Plant
http://www.psaudio.com/products/premier_power_plant.aspIf I just plugged the laptop into an outlet grounded in his listening room, the pc noise came through. If I plugged the grounded pc into the Premier ... silence. I decided to keep an eye out for a used one, and I just found one for $1250. (ouch, but better than the new 2200. asking price). Wish me luck, but thought I'd bring it up for anyone fighting pc noise bleeding into the system.