Can audio go to both the speakers and a bluetooth headset simultaneously

Question

I have a hearing impaired person in the house and want to equip her with a bluetooth headset while the rest of us listen over the speakers. I am able to connect the headset and get it to play by setting it as the default speaker. Problem is that the speakers are then turned off.

Working with windows 7 and Samsung bluetooth headphones.

Answer 1

See if Virtual Audio Cable will work for you. You can basically create a virtual audio device which will send sound to both the speaker & BT headset.

Answer 2

Here's a good enough working solution on windows 10 that does not require any additional software installation:

1. Right click on the sound icon and choose "Recording devices"
2. There should be a device named "Stereo Mix" in the list. However, if you can't see it, right click somewhere on the list (on a device or on the free space around it) and choose "Show Disabled Devices"
3. Right click on "Stereo Mix" and Enable the device.
4. Right click on "Stereo Mix" again and go to Properties
5. Under "Listen" tab, check the box that reads "Listen to this device"
6. Finally, on the "Playback through this device" drop down, choose your bluetooth headphones device.

Now set the Speakers as the default playing device, and the sound can be heard from both the speakers and the bluetooth headphones. Adjust volume of the devices in volume mixer.

I should also note that the quality of the sound in the headphones drop a bit, and a tiny bit of delay is also introduced (i guess it wouldn't work if you're a DJ)

Answer 3

Jack audio connection kit does that for free. http://jackaudio.org/

Answer 4

I like to use the open source program Audio Router

https://github.com/audiorouterdev/audio-router

Answer 5

What worked for me (Windows 10):

1. Right mouseclick on sound icon in system tray, choose "Open Volume Mixer"

2. Click on the Speakers icon:

3. This opens the settings, there choose the tab "Listen" and then enable "Listen to this device":

Enjoy :)

Answer 6

VB-Audio's Virtual Cable is donationware - you can make any donation.

I paid EUR 2 for the drivers and EUR 2 for their excellent mixer software. Once you register, you get two additional audio cables, bringing the total to 3 + 1 for the mixer. It's excellent. I takes a while playing around with Windows' Audio settings (you have to set in the output devices "Listen to this device" on the virtual audio cables A + B and set these 2 to the 2 devices you want to listen to) and then the standard output to the voicemeter. Then in the voicemeter, set "A" to MME: cable A for "B" to MME: cable B and voila.) am sending input from Google Play to laptop speakers + bluetooth speakers at the same time. Great surround!