Can I hear my computer if I stop using my headphones? I don't have any speakers hooked up to it. I seem to remember my very first computer having sound that I could hear even though I had no speakers hooked up to it, as far as I can remember anyway. I prefer to use headphones but they keep breaking on me. This is the second set in about 2 months. This one physically broke; the other set developed sound issues.

No, you need to have a device to generate the sound - AKA speakers. I use earbuds instead of headphones. I do have a speaker too - it is more of a soundbar, but generates some excellent sound. I think I only paid about $80 for it. I can also plug my earbuds into the speaker if I want.

I remember my very early computers generating sound without external aid .. and dreadful tinny sounding stuff it was, too !!

But at the time it was thought to be marvellous

Thanks Mad, for confirming that information that I seemed to remember. I once had a monitor that had a speaker which was pretty cool.

Drac, thank you. I couldn't for the life of me think where some sound might come from but I don't know where it comes from on a TV either, so... I have some old speakers hooked up to my Win 7 but I wouldn't even know how to buy speakers now. I have icky ears and don't care to put something inside them.

Anyway, I remembered last night that my brother always goes to Target on Tuesday so I left him a note and he found some cheap headphones for $10 which works for me.

My current ASUS gaming monitor has speakers - which are awful!

I vaguely remember an old Atari which played tinny sounds with the Frogger game.

Oldbroad, you can go to Amazon and enter computer speakers in the search to see what's out there. For $20 or $30 you can get speakers that sound leaps and bounds better than the old ones we paid a fortune for!

My Surround Sound Dell Speakers are pretty good. I think I bought them when I bought my XP computer back around 2004 or so.