Hi, To respond to Gordon's comment about the difficulty in tactilely distinguishing input and output sockets on the iMic -- his one small criticism about a practical usage among his recommendations based on perfomance -- here is the description excerpted from my September 18 post. I'd use the ridges of the speaker icon (on both sides of the iMic disc, above and below the port) to identify the speaker output, then mark the case like Dan does.
"The Griffin iMic is offered as one of the Mac Mini accessories. It provides an alternative to the missing audio line-in by using the USB port, but does not include a microphone. You might use this to record cassettes, LPs, or radio broadcasts to your computer in digital format using a sound capture program, like Wiretap or Audio Hijack. The iMic is a hockey-puck shaped disk with an 18-inch long cord that ends in a USB connector. There are two mini-jack ports located at 5 o'clock and 7 o'clock, when the USB cord is at 12 o'clock. They're labeled with icons on either side of the disk: a raised ellipse of a microphone for input from low-power devices such as microphones and a shell-shaped speaker with ridged sound waves for input from high-power line-level devices such as stereo equipment. A toggle-switch between the two ports allows selecting the port you want to use for input/output. To connect stereo equipment, which use RCA cables, to the mini port, you can get a Radio Shack Y-Adapter Audio Cable in either 3-foot or 6-foot length. Part numbers are 42-2550 and 42-2551 and prices are $5.99 and $6.99." Hope this helps. Esther On Thursday, January 12, 2006, at 08:34AM, Dan Keys <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >I scratched a mark in the case near the switch. >Also, on my unit, the two jacks, are slightly different. You might >find that the opening of the case around the earphone jack is >slightly smaller than the opening around the microphone/line-in jack. >When the switch is toward the earphone jack, that is microphone input. >HTH > >On Jan 12, 2006, at 10:20 AM, Gordon Smith wrote: > >> Just ad an IMic from Griffin Technologies, (if memory serves). I >> have one of these little boxes on my Mac Mini, and I tell you - in >> terms of latency and quality, they out-perform some of the so- >> called top notch PCI cards on the PC platform. I have just one >> small criticism. From a tactile perspective, there is no way to >> distinguish between the input and output sockets. The box is >> circular, the mic/line switch is mounted dead center. Other than >> that, excellent. >> >> At 07:28 12/01/2006 -0800, Dan Keys said: >>> Hi, >>> I am extremely pleased with my iMic interface on the Mac mini. >>> However, having the audio inputs as a part of the system is also a >>> plus, I would think. >>
