videos on Safari Books Online, and headphone jack problem

[taxman10m]

My plan was to use the Nexus 7 to read books and watch videos on Safari Books Online. Looks like Chrome won't display the videos unless Flash is installed (which it can't be unless you follow some instructions that have been posted here). I find that pretty disappointing. Supposedly, Safari Books is releasing an Android app on Monday. They have had an iPad app for quite some time. Anyone know if videos work in the iPad app?

My Nexus 7 also had an issue with the headphone jack. Sound only comes out of the right earpiece. I tried the suggestions others had posted here about pushing it in hard, but that didn't do anything. Will be returning it. Leaning toward not getting another one until quality issues and my Safari problem are resolved.

 

[Vondutch67]

For the headphone issue: Make sure you're using a set of stereo headphones, not ones from a cell phone that include a mic. You can visually confirm the type of headphone that you're using by counting the number of plastic "rings" on the connector. For use with the Nexus 7, two rings are good and three rings are bad.

THE GOOD

THE BAD

The reason for this is that a stereo mini-plug is TRS (tip, ring, sleeve) and when inserted into devices that only have a stereo-out (i.e. no capacity for microphone usage) they align with the internal connectors correctly and sounds go where they are supposed to go (left and right with a stereo "image"). When you insert a TRRS (tip, ring, ring, sleeve, aka three rings) connector, bundled with every smartphone sold today, into a stereo "port", those extra rings will cause the areas of the connector designated for "left" and "right" audio to be misaligned inside your Nexus 7 resulting in one channel not coming through your headphones. The quick reason for this is that the additional "ring" on that type of connector is for the microphone, which, again, throws everything out of whack when used on devices not equipped with TRRS output via their headphone jacks.

Of course, having said all that, I could be completely wrong about this and you may simply have a bum Nexus 7 on your hands I certainly hope not though...

 

[taxman10m]

Unfortunately all the headphones I have tried are the two ring kind. $20 stereo one's from Panasonic and Sony.

 

[Vondutch67]

Sorry TaxMan, that's no good

 

[iamhephzibah]

Yeah, same issue here... Decided to return and I'm just waiting for the Google response RMA. No set of headphones work... Even tried Beats by Dee.

 

[dparrothead1]

For the headphone issue: Make sure you're using a set of stereo headphones, not ones from a cell phone that include a mic. You can visually confirm the type of headphone that you're using by counting the number of plastic "rings" on the connector. For use with the Nexus 7, two rings are good and three rings are bad.

THE GOOD
Click to view quoted image


THE BAD
Click to view quoted image


The reason for this is that a stereo mini-plug is TRS (tip, ring, sleeve) and when inserted into devices that only have a stereo-out (i.e. no capacity for microphone usage) they align with the internal connectors correctly and sounds go where they are supposed to go (left and right with a stereo "image"). When you insert a TRRS (tip, ring, ring, sleeve, aka three rings) connector, bundled with every smartphone sold today, into a stereo "port", those extra rings will cause the areas of the connector designated for "left" and "right" audio to be misaligned inside your Nexus 7 resulting in one channel not coming through your headphones. The quick reason for this is that the additional "ring" on that type of connector is for the microphone, which, again, throws everything out of whack when used on devices not equipped with TRRS output via their headphone jacks.

Of course, having said all that, I could be completely wrong about this and you may simply have a bum Nexus 7 on your hands I certainly hope not though...

Not so, my Samsung ear buds work just fine and they have the 3 rings and mike.

My over the ears phone, works great, also. Not hard to push in at all.

 

[MobileAppDev]

My plan was to use the Nexus 7 to read books and watch videos on Safari Books Online. Looks like Chrome won't display the videos unless Flash is installed (which it can't be unless you follow some instructions that have been posted here). I find that pretty disappointing. Supposedly, Safari Books is releasing an Android app on Monday. They have had an iPad app for quite some time. Anyone know if videos work in the iPad app?

Taxman10m - We just released an Android Native app this afternoon (Safari to Go in Google Play). It plays videos, as does the iPad app which was also just refreshed last week.

Also note that watching videos on our full (desktop) site will require flash, but we also have a mobile site http://m.safaribooksonline.com, and you should be able to switch to the mobile site from the footer of the logged-in homepage to access your recent titles, bookmarks, folders & search which are all synched with our full-site via our API.

Sorry I can't help with your headphone problems, but I hope you enjoy the app/mobile site!