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Adding headphone jack to PC speaker system

Tkopper

Sep 22, 2012
2
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Sep 22, 2012
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Hi I have a 30W "HK 395" 2.1 + sub speaker system. The right speaker, like most PC speaker systems has the power and volume knob (power/volume is one knob) except there is no headphone jack. My PC has a front panel HP jack but its a pain in the butt to control the volume via audio software on PC. My question is if its possible to wire a headphone jack to the system that I could control with the volume knob and just mount jack in the right speaker. My idea is to splice into the 1/8 audio plug (coming from the amp inside the sub woofer box leading to the right speaker) and wire onto a headphone jack. Sounds good to me, but I am weary about it having to much power and popping my spendy headphones. Anyway... advice, tips, ways to make this work would be excellent, Thanks, Tom.

*I am a great solderer so if I need to install transistors/resisters, etc, to make this work, I wont have any trouble doing so.

link to product I am trying to mod.
http://www.overstock.com/Electronic...eakers-and-Sub-Refurbished/61801/product.html
 

donkey

Feb 26, 2011
1,301
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Feb 26, 2011
Messages
1,301
doing your approach will most likely have 2 undesired effects,
1st it will be mono not stereo as its coming out of a side speaker not the sub where the amp is,
2nd is both your headphones and speakers will be on at the same time, thus making it useless to have the headphones.
if you want a dead simple way of doing this no soldering required, buy a set of 2.1 headphones and a headphone jack that looks like a double adaptor.
http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=PA3582 for example
that way you can turn your speakers on and off when you have the headphones on. get a good pair of headphones though one with volume control to help you out
 

CocaCola

Apr 7, 2012
3,635
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Apr 7, 2012
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3,635
3rd 30 Watts will likely toast your headsets and/or you will have nil volume control only at the low end...

The speakers should be using the line level output of the computer, the headphones will use the slightly amplified headphone output that will also mute the speakers when plugged in...

If you are using Windows, download and install this software, it will allow you to assign hotkeys so you can quickly adjust volume globally on the PC

http://www.softarium.com/soundvolumehotkeys/
 

Tkopper

Sep 22, 2012
2
Joined
Sep 22, 2012
Messages
2
Alrighty then! That software will get me by until I upgrade. Thank you CC, drinking ya right now lol. Found this system at a donation store for 10 bucks, just had a bad solder connection, Great! find :).


Yep, software is perfect, Thanks again CC.
 
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