[Spliff]

My brother recently bought the 20" iMac. He tried to connect his Altec Lansing speakers and subwoofer to it, but the jack doesn't fit. However, the speakers fit in his older eMac.

What kind of audio/speaker jack is used in the iMac? And what kind of adapter (inexpensive) would he need to get his speakers to work with the iMac?

iMac ports

[tooki]

The speaker jack is strictly for the Apple Pro Speakers. For any powered speakers, use the headphone jack.

tooki

[Spliff]

Originally posted by tooki:
The speaker jack is strictly for the Apple Pro Speakers. For any powered speakers, use the headphone jack.

tooki

Thanks.

Sometimes, Apple's design decisions are just bizarre. Why put such a unique port on a computer that can't be used with other speakers? Why not just design speakers that use the same port as every other speaker on the market?

So, if my brother wants to use his headphones, he has to uplug his speakers first.

[mindwaves]

I'm not sure about your particular speakers, but they often have a headpphone jack on them.

[Drakino]

Apple has a design philosophy of reducing cords with their own products. Hence the ADC connector on displays, elliminating a power cord going to the monitor. Same theory with the Apple Pro speakers.

With the G4 Cube, they were USB based, but needed more power then the normal USB specification. So the USB ports in the Cube can put out more power then normal.
Now they use a seperate jack to avoid confusion, as I am sure Apple support got swamped with calls like "Why won'y my speakers work when plugged into my USB Hub/Keyboard?"