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What a tremendous effort! Dolby audio for windows 10 download.

Is it really not possible to output AAC through the optical port? I have a japanese receiver which supports surround AAC decoder (it's part of the ISDB standard) and would love to have this working..

Looks like it works. Too bad its so much work..

Modding the AC3 prefs file does work and it is certainly easier. My surround proc clearly denotes on the front panel display how many channels of audio it is receiving from the source *before *processing. With the AC3 prefs hack, I regularly see 5 discreet channels from HD QT trailers, mkv torrents, etc..
While I haven't tried the Jack method, it may offer some more flexibility and ease of changing settings.

Actually, this hint does work, but ONLY if you have an AC3 soundtrack. The hint on this page explains how to get 5.1 if you do NOT have an AC3 soundtrack. Jack is a real time AAC->AC3 encoder. I happily use the Perian + AC3 Passthrough hack to enjoy 5.1 AC3 over optical from MKV and MPG/DVR-MS files.
Theoretically, 6Ch AAC passed over optical should be recognized if your receiver supports AAC - I've never heard of an American one that does this.
Finally, although I understand why (sort of) Apple uses AAC (AC3 is about 1.5x-2x the size of AAC) it boggles my mind when I try to think of why Apple uses AAC for movies bough on the AppleTV. The ATV has an optical output, is generally used with broadband connections, and would give users a much better experience if Apple simply used AC3 - which is universally supported in the US.
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Naren Hazareesingh

The latest version of Handbrake, the Apple TV settings, creates two sound tracks by default: AAC and AC-3. It complies with the Apple TV requirements to get true surround.

'Your Mac can not do real surround sound from its built-in optical audio port; in fact, not even your Apple TV can. 'But Wait!' you say, 'Yes it can, Apple even advertise surround sound as a feature of the Apple TV!' or 'I can play a DVD and I'm hearing surround sound.'
I find this a bit overstated. Lots of people are playing DVDs, or recorded TV from an EyeTV device on their Macs. The audio output (select the appropriate output device from within the the application) is Dolby Digital 5.1, exactly the same as from a DVD player or a digital television set. It's not Pro Logic, it's not watered down in any way.
In addition, lots of people are ripping DVDs with Handbrake and producing AppleTV content with Dolby Digital (AC3) tracks. These play fine on an Apple TV. Indeed, the power-up movie on an Apple TV is a 'real' Dolby Digital track (actually there are two - the stereo AAC track and an AC3 track).
It would be nice if Quicktime would natively support AC3, but I don't have hopes of that happening soon.
A.

The opening statement is bold, but incomplete, and is contradicted in paragraph 4. There are several inaccurate statements in the posting.
The optical port is simply a serial digital data port, shovelling bits (ones and zeros - light on and light off) out in a sequence. It is up to the device at the other end to deal with the data that it receives.
The optical audio port of the Mac can indeed feed multi-channel data, if that is what is encoded in the bitstream. Several applications pass the data exactly as it is encoded in the source. I have some DTS-encoded CDs (Police, Moody Blues) that I keep in iTunes (AIFFormat). I can play them through the optical port or through AirTunes - my receiver (connected optically to an Airport Express) switches into DTS decoding automatically. The same when I play a DVD movie - the receiver (connected by optical cable or by coax with an optical-to-coax convertor at the Mac end) switches to decode as required. DTS-encoded material can be downloaded from Swedish National Radio, and played via iTunes - it is real surround - very real.
Other parts of the post are uncontested, by me. There may well be other sources where multi-channel data is encoded differently, and, yes, my receiver may not be able to decode them. What I interpret this post to offer is a conversion between one form of audio encoding to another form, the latter being one that the receiver can decode. All of that, however, has nothing to do with the capabilities of the optical port, which is already very capable.

I wasn't aware that Plex was able to do realtime AC3 transcoding. That's essentially what this hint is providing at a more generalised level.
Plex also has AC3 and DTS passthrough (as do many other apps, such as the Apple DVD Player and VLC) but that only helps if your media already has AC3/DTS encoded audio.
I'm going to have to check out Plex for the Mac mini media centre, it looks very cool.
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k:.

thanks 4 the PLEX link.
soooo good, re-encodes AAC 5.1 surround to AC3 on the fly to my amp. LEGENDARY
cheers

Thanks for the feedback - I was being deliberately half-wrong, and controversial in the opening paragraph in order to get people's attention - I then back down from that opening statement to more accurately (I hope) state the facts as I know them.
In short, to reply to some posters above, you're right. If you have audio in AC3 (aka Dolby Digital) in the media file you're playing, you can get surround sound through the optical port. This is AC3 Passthrough. Your Mac or Apple TV isn't generating the AC3 information in realtime, it's passing through a raw digital stream that's already encoded in AC3.
One thing that a lot of people don't realise is that the system only 'sees' the optical port as a stereo output device, Mac OS X does not see the optical output port as a multichannel output device. Mac OS X on it's own can not dynamically generate and output surround sound through the SPDIF port as it only knows it as a two-channel output device. Other equipment, for instance the PS3, can do realtime Dolby Digital encoding so games and other software can generate AC3 multichannel output in realtime - it doesn't need to be pre-recorded and pre-encoded as AC3.
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k:.

'Thanks for the feedback - I was being deliberately half-wrong, and controversial in the opening paragraph in order to get people's attention - I then back down from that opening statement to more accurately (I hope) state the facts as I know them.'
Well gee thanks. Saavn pro cracked for windows 10. What do you do for an encore?
Here's some feedback: I'd appreciate it if you didn't post anymore. The Internet is already full of misinformation without people spreading it on purpose.
A.

Um, yeah thanks for the misinformation then! WTF?!

For what it is worth, I appreciate this hint. I have been looking for a solution to enable true 6-channel output through the SPDIF port. Not for video playback (since it's already AC3/DTS), but for gaming. Using the hint (with slight modifications), I can finally output surround sound in games like World of Warcraft.
Thanks :-)

Yes, I agree! I did found this solution with AC3jack before but I did miss some documentation how to set this up. Now I found it here,..
As I could see, I did it right, but I can't test it because the lack of an A/V receiver. I will buying a receiver as soon I have a confirmation about the feasibility.
I do need a realtime encoder to monitoring out of LogicPro, when I mixing surround. But I'm still afraid, that this solution is not what I'm really looking for because of the cpu-load and eventually latency.
I would be much more amused, if I could find a 'Dolby Digital Live' (DDL) or 'DTS connect' USB or Firewire card for the mac. It makes me angry, that cards like that exists since 2005 for the PC but still nothing for the mac!

WHAT optical port? I have four Intel Macs, including a Mac Mini 800 2.0Ghz and 4GB RAM, 2 iMac 24's, and a MBP 17, but that doesn't give me an optical port anywhere. I have optical ports on my drum machine, my Fast Track Pro, and a few other sundry items, but no optical outputs built into any of my Macs.
Isn't all this based on having an optical port on your Mac?

Apple Music Player

Thanks for knowing more than a few Genius', mediaphile. I've already ordered cables and adapters for my attempt to bring life into my studio via SPDIF and the Toslink view of everywhere-sound.
Now, which tracks will I use for the big test.. hmmm.
This is a nice entry for me coming into this new-found forum.
Danke.