Question Looking for a dirt cheap DAC for 80 Ohms HyperX Cloud II / 2 headset

[TheyTukMyJub]

Lot's of interference in my gaming laptop and the included HyperX 7.1 adapter sounds makes the mic sound like absolute crap (i know it is the adapter because mic sounds fantastic on 3.5mm port, but my ears get ruined by the gpus coilwhine). So I want to buy a cheap DAC. Dirt cheap, around 10-20 bucks.

I tried two cheaper 2$ bucks DACs from AliExpress and while the audio was ok-ish, the mic had interference. The other one had just general poor sound. But I'm not enough of an audiophile to spend more than 30 bucks on it.

 

[Ralston18]

Make and model gaming laptop? Specs?

Where did you get the headset? Does it "sound better" when used on other audio devices that have acceptable sound?

 

[TheyTukMyJub]

It's a CLEVO type NH55EPY so a Ryzen 5 5600H and then a 3060 laptop graphicss card.

I bought the headset new in the store. I did make a mistake: the impedance is 60 Ohms, not 80.

Yes I tested it on another device and the mic sounds much much better and more clear in a 3.5mm port directly without the HyperX 7.1 adapter. But it sounds the same with the adapter in that device. It's almost a retro phone type sound. But there's 0 noise or static in the background, it's genuinely the mic quality that just sounds bad. Despite already having selected the highest possible setting in Windows.

Sadly I can't use the 3.5mm headset port in my laptop due to the coil whine.

 

[TheyTukMyJub]

Make and model gaming laptop? Specs?

Where did you get the headset? Does it "sound better" when used on other audio devices that have acceptable sound?

After some more snooping around, apparently the USB audio dongle applies some type of digital noise cancelling compression to the mic. Sadly there's no way to turn that off. So I want to find a cheap <20 dongle to replace that