In addition to the funky audio-out situation, I've found the media player on the BB 8830 World Edition to be an infuriating substandard POS. No tone controls, no standard forward/reverse/jog functionality ... etc. It's pretty bogus. It's like BB tacked on this media player application as an afterthought, and then realized, "Oh, people will want stereo output." Duh. But heaven help you if you want to just plug in your headphones.
Well, today I actually made the Radio Shack adapter work. No kidding. I purchased a "Headset Jack Adapter - 3/32" to 1/8" Wireless Phone" from R.S., part no. 274-004. But I had a weird experience in the store, testing the adapter. At first it did not work. Then the sales person offered to try a standard mini-to-micro adapter. That gave me one channel, per my previous experience. While she was looking for other alternatives, I tried the aforementioned part 274-004 again, and voila! it worked. No real clue as to why, at first, but I bought the item ($10). Later at home I plugged in my headphones and again it did NOT work. Arg! I experimented with several configs, and finally found the solution that works:
Step 1: Plug in mono headset or standard micro-to-mini plug adapter
Step 2: Play media
Step 3: PAUSE media
Step 4: Unplug mono headset/standard adapter and Plug in stereo headphones
Step 5: Un-pause media -- voila! Stereo media through headphones.
Now, I suspect this isn't good. There's an impedance mismatch somewhere. In between songs I get a little "snap/click" kind of noise. Dunno if that's endemic to the BB's media player (which is crap) or if it's a symptom of electrons going where they shouldn't.
I've ordered the Verizon adapter which looks like a perfect alternative. Turn your headphones into a stereo headset. Sweet. But at the end of the day, the BB 8830 is a poor excuse for an MP3 player. After spending $30 on a micro-SD card and $10 on a R.S. adapter and another $12.99 on a Verizon adapter, I could have bought a Sandisk 1GB MP3 player with a built-in FM tuner and standard media controls for about the same money.
I'm just hoping someday soon BB upgrades the media player application so at least it provides a graphic EQ and fwd/back/jog controls.