Gentlemen, I was disappointed to learn that the Delta 44 only has pseudo-balanced inputs, but it's good to understand that.
The phone jacks on a dongle is a bit of a nuisance, but if want something light to use for travel, at least you have access to the sound card through a readily-available connector and can wire your own cable. The miniature phone jacks on the SDR-1000 are a weak point. If my SDR-1000 behaves oddly, the first thing I check is the miniature phone plugs. I never check the phone plugs on the Delta 44 jack box. Why? Because they are a reliable connection. Ma Bell made TONS of these. The country's communication system ran on phone jacks. Why are they used in guitars? Can you imagine one with a miniature phone jack? They'd be falling out all the time or getting snapped off. The miniature phone plug arrived with the transistor radio as a way of making an earphone connection with a physically smaller plug/jack. The concept of the SDR-1000 is to use the minimum hardware necessary and utilize a PC with a sound card to do the rest. Sound cards predominately use miniature phone jacks. You can go to the local store and buy a cable to go from the SDR-1000 to a sound card. I still don't have a tool to crimp the connections on an RJ-45. I hate using the miniature phones and there are other connectors that have merits over the miniature phone, but I think it was the appropriate design choice. Mike AA8K
