iPod headphone to RCA jacks adapter cable

If all you want is a well-made cable you can get those from Blue Jeans Cables, Audioquest or even Monster. However, there are a couple of options to using the headphone jack you should consider if you want to get the best out of the iPod.

An iPod dock with a line-out jack would bypass the internal amplifier of the iPod, letting you plug the 3.5mm stereo mini to RCA cable into the dock and then to your amp. There are lots of docks available but you can pick up a genuine Apple brand dock on ebay for less than $10 and be in business.

You'd get even better sound using one of the docks that take the digital signal from the iPod, bypassing both the internal amp and internal DAC. Onkyo, Cambridge Audio, Wadia and others make them at various price levels. One I've heard highly recommended is the Pure i20, one of the least expensive of the digital docks at around $90.

For what you are asking...the best I've heard was a cable made for me using a teflon covered silver conductor but it was not day and night better than a standard one, just a little.

I think you would do much better with the Pure i20 that Sfar suggested. I use something similar to it for docking my iPod Touch and iPads to integrate with my stereo.

It's hard to imagine that the i20 at <100 would NOT be the way to go and at close to what the cable you seek might cost.

Instead, I highly recommend getting a Pure i20 digital ipod dock. It has a superb DAC that beats the DAC in the ipod. Only about $85 on Amazon. RCA analog and S/PDIF digital outs.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Hey Steve, A PureDigital i20 is on the way! Now, what kind of digital output cable should I use and to where does it go? Thanks for your help/ Mark

...and, in the mean time while I wait the the i20 stereo dock, shall I reupload the iTune songs with Apple's 'lossless encoding', and, if so, how? Appreciatively