Can I connect VAIO headphone jack direct to my Hi-Fi?

[chrmitch06]

I have a VAIO VGN-AR61M and want to use the headphone jack to connect to my Hi-Fi using Phono plugs. At present it produces no sound although the VAIO internal speakers work fine. Is the headphone output at the wrong impedance i.e. cannot deliver line-level output?

I cannot use the alternative digital optical output jack directly because the Hi-Fi has another source connected to that.

The Sony documentation is not detailed enough so any help much appreciated.

[Blencogo]

It should work OK.

Have you checked the Audio settings in Control Panel are set to analogue Headphones and not to a Digital Audio Output like HDMI?

[chrmitch06]

Yes my Audio is set to default at Headphones/speakers (i.e. analogue)

I have tried headphones and they work fine.

I have tried connecting the optical digital jack to my other, second, hi-fi set-up (optical input) and that works fine when I enable it.

I can only think that the headphone o/p from my VAIO is not at line level and cannot drive the hi-fi phono inputs. How can I get the spec. from Sony, and maybe a way forward from here?

[Blencogo · Accepted solution]

If the wiring is correct I would expect you to get some output.  A mismatch may cause some distortion but I would not expect no output at all.

I would recheck the 3.5mm stereo jack to 2 X RCA cable is OK and the HiFi RCA inputs work by connecting another source like a walkman or iPod.

Line output is usually in the region of 150 - 300 mV and headphone output about 500 mV so unless you add a resistor it will never match exactly but it is close enough - I would usually use about 75% volume on the Vaio.

If the wiring and the inputs are OK and the headphone output will not drive the amp, you may need to wire in some form of pre-amp.

[chrmitch06]

Thanks for the info. I will give your ideas a try and take it from there. I will re-post if I discover something significant. Thanks again for the response.