Is plugging headphones into the 3.5 mm jack on my speakers a bad idea?

Mortis Angelus · February 24, 2016

I have a pair of Creative GigaWorks T40 Series II hooked up to my computer for when I use my computer in any way; listening to music, watching youtube or watching some movies or any other time I really don't need headphones.

So far, during gaming, I've been using the Creative Sigma Tactic3D headset which comes with a USB-soundcard. Now these are great for their price and you can make them sound really good with the onboard software. However, I want to try to switch up to the Audio Technica ATH-M50X for two reasons: 1) I want to have even better audio, and 2) I want to have a pair of headphones that works well without any extra proprietary software. The Sigma Tactic3D are awesome when hooked up to the soundcard-dongle, but plugging them straight into any computer or Mp3-player using the 3.5 mm jack they sound pretty bad with overly powerful bass and muffly mid and highs, something which has been brought to attention in many reviews of that headset. I am also moving over to using an external mic, as the creative headset mic literally sux.

Now, what I wonder is: how will I set this up? So far it's been easy: When I want to use the headphones I just plug the USB-dongle into my computer and it shuts off the mobo/soundcard-sound. But with the ATH-M50X I can't do that anymore. One possibility is to just attach a Y-splitter for the headphones and speakers, which was my first plan. But then I realized: My speakers have a headphone output. Now my question is:

Will the signal from the speaker-output be the same as from the mobo/soundcard or will it be modulated by the speaker hardware? What I mean is, will e.g. the stereo-effect or EQ get changed if I use the headphone-output compared to plugging it straight into the mobo/soundcard output? Or are those jacks found on speakers pure line-through-puts with no modulation to them?

blueballs · February 24, 2016

I don't know much on that subject but the signal won't be as good as plugged directly into the motherboard just like your front computer audio port, your speaker port if it's a bad quality won't be as good. Try it and see if it bothers you?