harmon kardon soundsticks with ipod?

[elephantgarlic]

my g/f has a new set of the soundsticks for her powerbook, but we want to use them with the ipods... they use USB for the audio input...

- does anyone make a 1/8" -> USB audio adapter?
- does anyone make a RCA -> USB audio adapter?
- could I make one myself by figuring out which pins are sending audio, and wiring it up to a set of RCA ins?

help! any suggestions would be great.

[mattwardfh]

You can't just use an adapter on the Soundsticks. Here's the way they work:

The Soundsticks software drivers in the OS intercept the digital audio data and send it over USB to (I think) the subwoofer, which contains the digital->analog converter. The analog signal is then sent to the subwoofer and the two speakers, which reproduce the sounds.

In order to use them on the iPod, it would have to act as a USB master (which I don't think it can since it acts as a USB slave) and have a driver that would send the digital signal to the Soundsticks.

A more likely possibility is that someone could make a little box which takes an analog audio signal, digitizes it, and then sends it over USB to the Soundsticks. This might happen if USB speakers become more common, but they're so rare as it is that I don't expect to see this happen.

get a mini plug to mini plug cable(3.5mm). Plug the ipod into the line in of the powerbook and play the ipod throguh the powerbook thus playing the music through the speakers.

[mattwardfh]

Yeah, that will work, playing it through the computer like that. But there's no way to play without the computer.