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Topic: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only? (Read 2871 times) previous topic - next topic
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San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Hi all

I'm looking for a cheap portable player and have the San Disk Clip in mind, the sport (but not the bluetooth one) and the jam.  From what I can see though, neither have a line out option.  Could anyone confirm whether that's the case please? 

I'll use it mostly in the car, so line out is important.  If there's no LO, how would it sound going into a stereo from the headphone socket. 

Also interested to hear if anyone has other players they would recommend that are similar...  The main criteria is:

-  Low price (under £50 is ideal)
-  Reliability
-  Line out
-  Large memory (expandable is fine)

Sorry for such "Low end" questions!!!!  :)

Max

Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #1
None of the clip players have a line out, but I you only want to plug it into your car you don't need one. Line out is useful if you're going to use a stereo and headphones, since the player can detect which you're using and adjust the volume so that you don't blow out your ears running headphones at line level. If you're only using one the. It doesn't matter, you can just leave it at line level all the time.

Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #2
Thanks for the reply saratoga, but I don't quite follow what you're saying.  Sorry to be a pain!  If you cold explain in any other way that would be great...  Cheers.

Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #3
Thanks for the reply saratoga, but I don't quite follow what you're saying.  Sorry to be a pain!  If you cold explain in any other way that would be great...  Cheers.

There is no necessary technical difference between a well-designed headphone out and a well-designed line out, but not necessarily vice-versa.

IOW, if you treat a headphone out jack  as if it is a line out jack  and hook it to the line in of some other component like a car, adjust the volume to suit and all is well.

OTOH, plugging a pair of headphones into a line out may or may not work well.

Another way to look at is that a headphone out jack is like a line out jack on steroids, but not too much.

Using a headphone out jack for a line out jack will generally work very nicely.

And that is why if a device has only one output jack, it is probably better that it be a headphone jack.

If I had a nickel for every time I hooked one of my Sansa players to a line in jack on my stereo...   Bottom line, it works and never hurt anything.

 

Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #4
The only risk you run with a lot of these cheap players is that you may not be able to charge them from a stereo while also hooking the headphone jack to the line in. Reason for this is cheaper devices tend to assume the headphone jack is floating, while cheaper car stereos may assume that neutral on the line in is grounded. That shorts the headphone out to ground, which doesn't sound great.

Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #5
The only risk you run with a lot of these cheap players is that you may not be able to charge them from a stereo while also hooking the headphone jack to the line in. Reason for this is cheaper devices tend to assume the headphone jack is floating, while cheaper car stereos may assume that neutral on the line in is grounded. That shorts the headphone out to ground, which doesn't sound great.

Good call. That can be a problem with music players of any price.

Simplest solution should this arise, is probably to power or charge the player from its own charger or power supply. The floating ground is kept floating, and all is well.

Just make sure that the charger uses the usual two-prong power plug and has no third ground pin.

One can also have this problem when using a headphone amp with a PC.  Same solution.





Re: San Disk Clip - Line options? Or headphone out only?

Reply #6
Recently a colleague bought a Sansa Clip Sport after I recommended the Clip Zip which is no more available.
The Sport can not sort playback by filename, on directory play you can choose between random and filesystem order. For classical music absolutely unusable! Furthermore it uses a chipset which is not supported by rockbox. So be careful  ;)