Headphone Jack Placement

Hey, just curious how the front headphone jack placement has worked out for you guys. I've never owned a laptop with it here and it seems pretty odd to me. Is there some hidden benefit that I'm not seeing on the surface?

 

I don't have a front heaphone jack - mine is to the side. I can't, however, see any good things about having it on the front. On the contrary I can think of a few situations where it would be bad for the plug to be there (i.e. digging into your stomach, thereby putting pressure on the plug), especially if you're not using an angled minijack.

I use headphones constantly, so to me it would be a dealbreaker. On the other hand, I realise I'm in the minority as usual, so to most it propably doesn't matter one iota.

 

See that's interesting because my initial thought was that a front placement would be better suited for headphones, not full-time externals. I guess I came to that conclusion because a lot of the gaming laptops have their jacks in the front and I figured most would be the headset type.

 

Well, I suspect that most gamers have huge laptops and that most of them use them solely on tables, thereby eliminating the problems I have with front-plugs.
It depends on usage, basically. If you use the notebook on your lap or even "worse" use it while sitting leaned back with your legs up, a front plug is a no go. If for nothing else then because it will strain the plug when pressure is put on the jack. However, part of that can be mitigated by using a small angled minijack. I'd still not do it, though.

 

I GET WHAT YOU'RE SAYING NOW.

Yeah I guess my concern is that I tend to be an external speaker guy, so I'm going to have a cord that awkwardly wraps around the side to the front 24/7. Whereas a headphone type would be directly input into the jack.