Y cable!

[failurbydesign]

I need a Y cable, with the | female End, with the V part being male, but the catch is that its for my stereo, so the female end needs to allow a headphone jack, while the V end has two male headphone jack!

Just like this but standard head jack size

its being split into two different player...so it cant split l&r, it needs to be the same

 

[Aprox]

Closest I could quickly find was this.

http://www.audiogear.com/cgi-bin/shopper.cgi?key=ADPT2RCMQSF&preadd=action

Perhaps you could get a 1/8" to 1/4" adapter?


Edit:

Found this too.

http://www.audiogear.com/cgi-bin/shopper.cgi?key=AdptMSFLRRCAM&preadd=action


Edit again...

I just realized, you need mono 1/8" to two Mono Male RCA jacks, correct?

 

[failurbydesign]

IDk.....HA....i think its a 3.5mm..idk what fractions that it, but two different audio sources to one set of speakers...if that helps..but no rca, all headphone jacks!

 

[LeeJend]

You are so hosed...

I found a few that went the other direction and one that was the right direction but only mono, but nothing going female to male in stereo 1/4 size. There are almost no 1/4 size cables any more, everything was RCA Phono or 3.5mm.

Your best bet will be to get a 3.5mm Y cable and 3, 3.5mm to 1/4 inch adapters which is ugly and won't be very sturdy. The 3 adapters will triple the price. Figure about $20-25 total. Radio shack may have everything you need.

 

[failurbydesign]

thats what i though, a crappy rigged version will do

 

[Aprox]

Another possible solution would be to get a 3.5mm female to RCA male Y adapter (Stereo) because they are easily found and find an inline stereo to mono 3.5mm adapter (female/male) and install it before the Y.


Such as this one, although I found find a better quality one.

http://www.amazon.com/3-5MM-Mini-Stereo-Mono-Adapter/dp/B0009A3IUU

 

[failurbydesign]

why mono?

 

[Aprox]

its being split into two different player...so it cant split l&r, it needs to be the same

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but you are saying you need mono to each device correct? Are you connecting a digital signal by chance?

 

[failurbydesign]

ok this is the setup:

Internal Sound card------
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~>My Speakers
Usb Sound card----------

 

[Aprox]

Hmm, perhaps I'm still not understanding but why are you using two sound cards hooked up to one set of speakers?

 

[failurbydesign]

two operating systems, but thats not the issue; just how i can make it work! HA!

 

[Aprox]

The only reason I ask is because if I can understand the why, maybe I can suggest an alternative.

The way you are trying to go, its either going to be really shoddy or unreliable with probable loss in fidelity due to the lack of proper adapters and such.

 

[failurbydesign]

ha i know, but i need it to work somehow

 

[JPRuss]

You could just by the male/female ends at any electronics store and wire one up for yourself. Shouldn't be too difficult.

Depending on how you wire it It might sound pretty weird of both devices try to send audio at the same time.

 

[roirraW "edor" ehT]

Sounds like fbd was describing one o/s using one sound card while the other o/s uses the other. I've actually had the same situation once in the past year (dual boot x86 and x64 and no x64 drivers for the one sound card).

Even if both devices don't get used at the same time, there's some electrical issues that will come into affect by having all three items connected together at the same time, even if only two of them will be "active" at any one time. The reason is that the electrical output by the sound card being used will be sent not just to the speakers but also to the other sound card. The internal wiring of the other sound card will affect the electrical characteristics of the signal and what ultimately reaches the speakers.

On the one hand, this could just be a technicality and you may not have any perceived difference to your ears. On the other hand and possibly extreme, you could end up damaging both sound cards and the speakers.

The only 100% safe solution would be a switch which would determine which sound card is physically connected to the speakers at any one time. The switch would take the place of the Y cable as well because all of that wiring would be internal. However, said switch would probably have RCA jacks so you would be in the same boat and would either have to build your own cables or use sets of adapters to achieve the right connections.

I have such a switch that would work in that situation, with RCA jacks that is. It's something like this. The specifications say that

Works both forward and reverse directions - 4 in and 1 out or 1 input and 4 outputs (only 1 output active at a time) going to one of 4 devices

This is actually true of most if not all of these types devices as I've used mine both directions, but most of these devices don't actually tell you that it will work. This was just the cheapest such device on NewEgg.

Then you would need (from my understanding), three sets of cable/adapters. Two with 1/4" male headphone jack with the other end being RCA male jacks (two for each headphone jack). The remaining cable would need two RCA male jacks to (from your description) one 1/4" female headphone jack.

Yet another solution is this, which uses actual wires so you wouldn't have to worry about the RCA jack end (look at the picture of the back). Just buy two or three headphone extension cables and cut the ends off you don't need. Or if you just buy two you could cut them exactly in half and turn one extension cable into one male end and one female end. All depending on how long you need the cables to be to reach where you would place the switch.

Hope this helps.

 

[JPRuss]

Just curious on the electrical issues you mention.

What if the resistance of the wire going to the sound cards was higher then the wire going to the speakers? Would you still have the signal passing to the 2nd sound card?

Also, could you not just plug the speaker out of one sound card into the line in of the other sound card? Would this not work as well?

 

[roirraW "edor" ehT]

Just curious on the electrical issues you mention.

What if the resistance of the wire going to the sound cards was higher then the wire going to the speakers? Would you still have the signal passing to the 2nd sound card?

Yes, it would still pass to the second sound card, it's only the amount it might which would change. All that's essentially being done is putting the second sound card plus the wiring in a parallel resistance with the speakers. There's too many variables to say what would happen without knowing the particular electrical properties of the speakers and the sound cards. Which is to say it's too complicated for me to figure out for sure what would happen without just trying it. No matter what, it's definitely not going to be technically kosher, and IMHO it's not worth the chance of damage to your sound cards and speakers to try it without a switch. I'd say it's easily a 50/50 chance that something could get huffed, even if it doesn't happen right away that doesn't mean that damage might not occur over time.

The only way to be technically correct is to have a switch, or to manually unplug and plug the wires which is of course what he wants to avoid.

Let's say that the speakers are 4 ohms. Perhaps the other sound card's headphone or line out is also 4 ohms. Two 4 ohm resistors in parallel equals 2 ohms. Essentially you would then have the first sound card outputting to a 2 ohm device rather than a 4 ohm one. Half the resistance, therefore twice the amperage at the same voltage. More amperage than what the device is rated for = bad.

Also, could you not just plug the speaker out of one sound card into the line in of the other sound card? Would this not work as well?

If he were going to do that, he might as well just only use the one sound card, which might not be an option. I don't know if he's having compatibility problems between the two operating systems and his two sound cards or what since he hasn't said. Maybe the one o/s doesn't have drivers for his USB sound card.

 

[JPRuss]

Thanks !

I forgot to consider the resitance of the connected device in addition to the wire !

Which, incidently, also explains why I can't hook 2 computers up to the same monitor without a KVM, I've often wondered about that, especially since most TV's accept multiple inputs these days.

 

[roirraW "edor" ehT]

Thanks !
I forgot to consider the resitance of the connected device in addition to the wire !

YW!

Which, incidently, also explains why I can't hook 2 computers up to the same monitor without a KVM, I've often wondered about that, especially since most TV's accept multiple inputs these days.

I remember being tempted to try that before, a long time ago. :nervous: I have a few KVM switches now, though....and three or four running computers in my living room (was four until last week), three monitors, one big TV...a lot of cables running under carpet. No wonder it gets so hot in here.

And mentioning the old used equipment in the living room that I don't have in the pile of others in the basement for testing purposes, plus the one to three computers belonging to other people I may be working on at any one time. Coffee table with old NICs, video and sound cards, and modems. Now I remember why I'm stressed... LOL!

 

[LeeJend]

There is a chance that tieing the two outputs together could damage one or both sound cards. Now that I have that info I would go with wroirra suggection and get an auto detecting switch. I'll see what I can find affordable.

Manual switched 2 in, 1 out. $23 a little steep for manual and you will still nee a1/4 to 3,.5 adapter for the headset and cables for the stereo cards.
http://electronicsusa.com/mk1and2.html

http://electronicsusa.com/mk7.html

The search for an auto switch goes on, slightly hampered by the constant blackouts form this electrical storm...