How to improve audio on a Thinkpad T530 under Ubuntu?

[wrybread]

The sound playing through the speakers on my T530 is really high tinny and soft in Ubuntu. I had the same issue under Windows until I installed the driver for it, which made the speakers sound great.

I'm wondering if there's some trick to get the same quality in Ubuntu?

[wrybread]

For anyone else who comes down this path:

- go to System Settings -> Sound and check the box labelled "allow sound to go above 100%" (wording approximate). That fixes the low sound levels

- on the same panel, for "output", switch to "analog surround 4.0 output". That fixes the quality so it sounds as good as from Windows.