Play music out your PC's speakers from your Zune HD's dock. (Windows 7)

[Fecal Face]

I am a genius.

I've discovered a way to play my Zune's music out it's dock, through my PC's speakers.

Unless of course someone else has posted a way to do this, in which case, I am in no way a genius.

ANYWAY, here's a tutorial that shows you how to do it!

It even has pretty pictures!

Here we go:

First, find that pretty little hole in the back of your dock; The one where the A/V cable goes in.

Yep, That one.

Second, get yourself one of these:

Male to Male 3.5mm cable, doesn't have to be long, I got mine for ~$12. Just get one long enough to reach the dock from your PC.

Go ahead and put one end in the aforementioned hole.

Next, find this on the back of your computer. On the motherboard or sound card or whatever you use:

That's the line-in jack. That or the microphone jack will work fine.

Plug the other end of your Male to Male cable into the line-in jack (or the mic jack, whichever you prefer)

Next thing you do is find your sound devices. This is what it looks like in Windows 7, and as you can see, I've found it under Recording Devices. This may be different for you depending on what OS you are using:

Right click on that, and go to Properties:

Under the Listen tab, check the "Listen to This Device" box, and select what you want it to play out of (Playback Through This Device). Pick your speakers, or if whatever you want to play it out of.

Hit apply.
Or hit OK, it really doesn't matter
Just don't hit Cancel

Voila! Your Zune HD's dock is now playing music out your computer's speakers, and you can control it with the wireless remote it came with! Your Zune is also charging at the same time!

You can play music while playing games, surfing the web, whatever, wihtout any software running, but I normally have my Zune Software running anyways because my Zune HD seems to periodically sync with my PC while it's on the dock.

Now go listen to some awesome music

[gamersat678]

Male to Male 3.5mm cable, doesn't have to be long, I got mine for ~$12

Man you got ripped off. I got an eforcity 3m for $1.03.

[Strider_Aus]

Originally Posted by Fecal Face

[LEFT]I am a genius.
I've discovered a way to play my Zune's music out it's dock, through my PC's speakers.
Unless of course someone else has posted a way to do this, in which case, I am in no way a genius.

.....Um, all the music on my Zune is from my collection on my PC. Why would I play it via the Zune, to the Dock, to my PC line in....when I can just play it via the PC Zune software or VLC etc ????

[emfa]

Originally Posted by Fecal Face

[LEFT]I am a genius.

Wow amazing discovery!

Couldn't have done it without this tutorial!!!

Theres an easier way. Connect the zune HD to the speakers AUX and your done!

btw next time use eBay!

[poisonousjuice]

good tutorial. it is a lil silly since you can just use the zune software but this is a good idea for those low on RAM.

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Strider_Aus

.....Um, all the music on my Zune is from my collection on my PC. Why would I play it via the Zune, to the Dock, to my PC line in....when I can just play it via the PC Zune software or VLC etc ????

Excellent point!

[Fecal Face]

Originally Posted by Strider_Aus

.....Um, all the music on my Zune is from my collection on my PC. Why would I play it via the Zune, to the Dock, to my PC line in....when I can just play it via the PC Zune software or VLC etc ????

Well I have a 5.1 speaker setup, and when I use "Speaker Fill" or whatever the feature is on Windows 7 to make the music come out of all speakers, there's a noticable delay between the sound coming out of each speaker (for example left one plays a sound then a tiny delay and the right one plays it.). It was annoying. For some reason, however, when I used the line in / "listen to this device" method, the music came out of all speakers and there was no odd delay.

So really the only reason I did it was to fix the delay issue I was having, although I'm not sure why that fixed it at all.

Also I think it's cool to control my music with that remote

You're right though. This actually is pretty pointless, you COULD just play it off your computer.

I guess genius was an overstatement. Lol

[Briankealing]

Note to people who do this on Windows 7:
MIC input also works (pink). Make sure to TURN OFF ALL SOUND EFFECTS or you will get really crappy quality. Do this by going to the "effects" tab and turning all off.

It saves a lot of memory compared to running Zune software for netbook users like me, so it's a pretty good way to play music.

[bla8291]

Originally Posted by Fecal Face

I am a genius.

I've discovered a way to play my Zune's music out it's dock, through my PC's speakers.

Unless of course someone else has posted a way to do this, in which case, I am in no way a genius.

ANYWAY, here's a tutorial that shows you how to do it!

It even has pretty pictures!

Here we go:

First, find that pretty little hole in the back of your dock; The one where the A/V cable goes in.

Yep, That one.

Second, get yourself one of these:

Male to Male 3.5mm cable, doesn't have to be long, I got mine for ~$12. Just get one long enough to reach the dock from your PC.

Go ahead and put one end in the aforementioned hole.

Next, find this on the back of your computer. On the motherboard or sound card or whatever you use:

That's the line-in jack. That or the microphone jack will work fine.

Plug the other end of your Male to Male cable into the line-in jack (or the mic jack, whichever you prefer)

Next thing you do is find your sound devices. This is what it looks like in Windows 7, and as you can see, I've found it under Recording Devices. This may be different for you depending on what OS you are using:

Right click on that, and go to Properties:

Under the Listen tab, check the "Listen to This Device" box, and select what you want it to play out of (Playback Through This Device). Pick your speakers, or if whatever you want to play it out of.

Hit apply.
Or hit OK, it really doesn't matter
Just don't hit Cancel

Voila! Your Zune HD's dock is now playing music out your computer's speakers, and you can control it with the wireless remote it came with! Your Zune is also charging at the same time!

You can play music while playing games, surfing the web, whatever, wihtout any software running, but I normally have my Zune Software running anyways because my Zune HD seems to periodically sync with my PC while it's on the dock.

Now go listen to some awesome music

Or you could just use that same cable to hook up your Zune directly to your line-in port, without using the dock...I've been doing that forever. And if you're using the dock to charge your Zune, you could still bypass that by just using the USB cable.