A Way to Connect Headphones Without a Headphone Jack

An increasing number of televisions these days are forgoing the old 3.5mm stereo jack which you may have used to directly connect stereo headphones. There are times when you can’t have the volume up too loud and being able to use headphones makes watching television a little more practical compared to having the inbuilt speakers or home theatre system at a whisper (like when people are sleeping in the house).

So, what do you do if there isn’t a 3.5mm stereo jack?

One thing you can look for are RCA output connectors coloured yellow (video, white (left audio) and red (right audio). If your television has these outputs (rather than inputs) then you should be able to use a 3.5mm stereo to RCA cable like this to do the job. Mind you, you make need another adapter to change the gender of the 3.5mm connector.

The other option is to use the digital or optical audio output from the television and use a digital to analogue convertor (DAC) to then provide a 3.5mm stereo connector such as this one I bought off eBay. This is a nifty little convertor as it will also run off USB power which can be obtained from most modern televisions. Just plug in your optical cable and your headphones into the DAC and you should be cooking with gas!

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