External speakers for Laptop

Hello Folks,
Wonder if anyone can help, I have a Toshiba Satellite laptop and want to attach external speakers for better quality for listening to music. Tried to use speaker system from my Dell PC but couldn't get them to work, they work great on desktop, does anybody have any advice please?:confused

Cheers
Louise

 

Are the Dell speakers powered externally?

 

Yes Tater the speakers are powered externally

 

Hmm, not sure then. I thought that might be the problem.
I'm sure you've tried raising the laptop volume level correct? If you have, I'm out of ideas.

 

JB HiFi have a range of external speakers, go to their webpage and they have a set on special for a lappie. Otherwise go in and look around, I have a set I plug into the earphone jack and they are ok, but the ones in their catalogue would be a lot better