Can I hook my speaker out to my line in connection and record?

Question

I'm trying to find any way I can to transcribe an interview I have recorded. My latest attempt will feature connecting my speaker out connection with my line in connection on the sound card and using Windows Speech to dictate it. I don't need it to be perfect, just get a rough transcription.

My question is, could this work or will I just cause damage to my computer?

Answer 1

You can safely connect the Green (normally "Line Out") to the Blue (normally "Line In").

The Pink (normally "Mic") input is generally designed to handle more amplification and since line-out operates at higher levels, you would likely overdrive the signal and not be able to hear anything anyways. On a poorly-built device, this could theoretically be damaged.

Most modern sound "cards" are designed to reassign the ports using their driver software, so the potential to damage anything is extremely low as all the required circuitry necessary to adjust levels has to be available on every port.

The easiest solution is to purchase a "Y" splitter (3.5mm male -> 2 female 3.5mm) so you can keep your regular speakers plugged in to monitor.

If your sound-card has the 'What you Hear' or 'Stereo-Out' channel on your input settings, you don't need a cable at all. You can just set that as your recording input and it'll loop whatever you have back to your recording software.

Answer 2

My wife has used her Google Voice account to transcribe her notes to text. If you had an account, you could call to leave a voicemail and play the recording into the phone (or possibly on the computer through a VoIP call with Skype).

I'm not sure how long a voicemail can be on Google Voice, so if the interview is any length of time, it may not work (or would end up being more effort than it's worth).

Answer 3

On Linux, jackd makes it possible to use the sound output of any program as the sound input for another without needing to go to line out and then back in again. Soundflower provides the same thing on a Mac.

There may be a Windows program for this, but I am not sure.