Line out vs Mic in jack?

[gran172]

Ok, first of all i'm sorry if i posted this in the wrong section.
It's probably a stupid question but, what's the difference between the line out (green one) and mic in (red one)? I mean, i connected my headphones on both and it seems to work fine on line out and mic in. Do they serve different functions?
Here's a picture of my case ports: http://www.sentey.com/media/Features/Gabinetes/Gaming/Stealth/Ports_700.png
I'm not 100% sure if they are line out and mic in since they say "HD Audio (red one) & Mic (green one)". I'm really confused right now because i'm not sure if the red and green jacks on the back of the computer are the same than the ones on the front.

 

[Mr5oh]

The MIC in should be for a microphone. However on some motherboards, you can reconfigure the ports in the driver, so the MIC port and sometimes even LINE IN to be outputs as well. It's a way to get surround sound on motherboards without having all the other ports. Especially since not everyone use the MIC or LINE IN ports. I'd say this is the way your PC is currently configured since you get sound output from the MIC as well.

 

[gran172]

I see, would there be a difference in sound or something? Just wondering because on the case specifications the frontal mic in jack says "HD audio" or is it just marketing?

 

[CountMike]

Front HD Audio jacks have plug sensor to sense what's and if anything is plugged in. Also, dedicated Microphone inputs have pre amplifier circuits (because of lo power from mics) while Aux and Line IN may have attenuating circuits against overload. That may prove to lower mic sensitivity if driver can't compensated for it.

 

[gran172]

Thank you both for the help, really useful !