Using microphone input port as headphone output

I have one audio output jack and one audio input jack on my laptop. I want to use it for real time audio mixing, and I need to have another discrete output for headphones that is independent of the master out.

I want to know if it is possible to reconfigure the microphone input jack as an output jack, and if so, how to go about doing so.

Thanks.

Solution 1:

To find the tool to reconfigure the audio ports is this easy under Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS.

sudo apt-get install alsa-tools-gui
hdajackretask

The tool seems really easy to use. Unfortunately my hardware seems to be unidirectional as I can only select input options for the mic on my laptop.

Ps. I wanted to do this because my headphone jack is broken.

Solution 2:

Many low end soundcards have hardware restrictions on the input/output flow. Circumvent this with hardware schematics and a soldering iron.

However, it's possible your soundcard supports input and output on any (or some) of its ports, and you just need the software to do it. ALSA and OSS provide the kernel drivers so other software can access the card. PulseAudio and JACK are two different programs that let you play with streams of sound. It's likely that if you invest a bunch of time reading manuals and editing configuration files that you can do what you want.

You may also want to check out Ubuntu Studio. It tracks with the mainline Ubuntu releases, but is set up with a bunch of packages that professional audio folk bent on using open-source linux software would use.

Ubuntu uses PulseAudio because of its focus on desktop audio. Ubuntu Studio uses JACK because of its focus on sound production.