Mac Mini 2011 Digital Audio Output with HDMI Video?

I to have a simular problem .My mac mini is setup as follows 24 bit 6 ch 192,000 multichannel .When I test the speakers in the speaker configuation-midi setup they all respond to pink noise and In the right order burt apart from that I only get stereo .For digital material and for everything else .

I I have sent a ticket and they have forwarded it to a apple tech. As soon as they come to an outcombe Ill be sure to post it .😢

Hello,

I come back to you after many days of testing various configurations and connections (both hdmi and optical) of the mini with my receier and HDTV. After many failures (and frustrations), during one of these test i magically obtained a multichannel 5.1 digital output from the mac.

The configuration that is working now is:

- connect the mini to the receiver both via hdmi and optical cable (toslink). This is the only way (despite the numerous attempted) I obtained the possibility, in midi configuration, of switching to more than 2 channels (stereo) in the hdmi speaker configuration

- in the midi configuration window enable 44800 bit rate (or 44100) and 8 channels 24 (16) bit for the hdmi and 44800 (44100) 2 channels 24 (16) bit for the internal output speaker

- at this point all the icons indicating the output preferences will desappear! Don't worry (this is the trick) all will work fine at the next step.

- playing a dvd with the mac dvd player: with a standard setup you will obtain a PCM multichannel output but 2.1 channels coded. You have to select from the audio preferences of the dvd player the receiver connected via hdmi and you will magically obtain a real dolby digital output.

- playing a dvd with VLC: selecting the hdmi audio output in the VLC audio preferencies you will obtain a PCM multichannel output that is 5.1 channels coded (DD). Pay attention to not select hdmi coded option! If you do this your output device will hang and no audio will be audible any more. Furthermore VLC will hang too and you'll have to force exit of the program.

Notice the need to link the mini with both cables, optical and HDMI, to the receiver. Neither of them works separately in 5.1 configuration . I think is an audio driver issue and hope Apple will fix it as soon as possible. There is no logical reason to use both cables connected simultaneously but this is the way things work.

I hope this post will help you to hear multichannel audio from your 5.1 speakers system connected to the mini.

Hi marco964,

Thanks for providing the input. I am sure it'll solve the long outstanding issues for many!

Just wanted to ask if this option works for DVD's only or can you play MKV files via, lets say, Boxee for mac and still get 5.1 digital audio?

Cheers

Hello m4sheikh,

I have not had a chance to take the test, definitely try in the future, but I hope I've "broken the sound barrier" and it will work with many different a/v file format.

Cheers

I have a Mini 2011 with mdp to dvi to samsung HDTV and optical audio to Rotel receiver. Using 10.7.1 and EyeTV I get DD fine. Using VLC I cannot get either DD or DTS. Using MPlayerX I can get DD and DTS, but not DTS-Lossless, which I can get with 10.6.8 on all other Macs.

Has anybody tried the thunderbolt port with converter to HDMI into the TV.

I was wondering If this would solve the audio problems there are with the toslink?

Expecting my mac mini I5 any day now.

I tried:

1 HDMI to Pioneer Elite, from PIoneer to Rotel via toslink (TV used as a passthrough as "correct unswer" suggests): No DD

2 HDMI to Pioneer, Toslink direct from Mac mini to Rotel: No DD

3 Thunderbolt to HDMI converter to Pioneer, Toslink direct to Rotel: No DD

4 HDMI to HDMI matrix swith with Toslink out, from HDMI switch: HDMI video to tv, toslink to Rotel: No DD

Hi,

I have the same digital audio problem as mentioned above.

In below set-up I only have video and no sound from my Onkyo receiver:

Mac Mini 2011 > HDMI > Onkyo TX SR 605 > Sony Bravia TV

If I use two cables from the Mini to both my receiver and the TV I have video and stereo sound:

Mac Mini 2011 > HDMI > Sony Bravia TV

Mac Mini 2011 > Toslink > Onkyo TX SR 605

I think Apple should fix this fast. Digital audio is a basic functionality in my opinion.

Let's hope we get a solution soon!

This is absolute madness from Apple... does anyone know if they are actually working on fixing this/is it fixable??

I was planning to go buy a Mac Mini until reading this forum...

At the moment I have:

MacBook 2005 > DVI > Secondary Monitor

> TOSLINK > AV Receiver

My MacBook stil works a treat and I love this set up, I get Dolby and DTC 5.1 through to my receiver, awesome. The MacBook needs upgrading though, poor thing, it can't handle 1080p.

So this is my proposed set up:

Mac Mini > HDMI > HDTV - Primary Monitor

> DVI > 2nd HDTV - Secondary Monitor

> TOSLINK > AV Receiver

I want to be able to switch audio between HDMI and TOSlink without having to mess about with cables, which will be awkward to get at.

The reason I will need to switch, it because sometimes I'll want to just use the one HDTV to work from (will also like to use headphones from late at night) and will need sound without switching on the entire system.

Why have Apple not enabled a sound control system to switch? Ridiculous. I'd really like someone from Apple to let me know if they're working on it, otherwise theres a nice little Dell thats looks attractive.

Crazy_2, try and find a 2010 Mini somewhere, either new

or refurb from Apple. Load it with the latest Snow Leopard

and enjoy (don't Lionize at this point)! My 2010 passes

DTS and Dolby without issue. My setup

Mini->Sony AV receiver(HDMI)->Samsung TV(HDMI).

Also, if you get Windows and create a Bootcamp partition,

you can use Power DVD 11 with an external Bluray and get

resampled 192kHz,24bit,5.1 set to the receiver over HDMI

and Bluray playback.

By the way, this Mini runs Windows 7 pretty nicely. May

be stressed with some higher level games, but otherwise

great.

The 2010 and 2011 Minis have several issues with Lion.

The 2011 Mini probably has great hardware, but Lion

is just not working well with it, be it firmware or Lion

itself, and I would suspect the later myself.

Thanks for replying. Interesting, but before I put any cash down, I'd love an Apple explanation. If this is software/firmware dependant, as many have suggested, would it work to get a Mini 2011 and install Snow Leopard?

Hi, I've just had a similar, really frustrating experience with the digital sound output on my new 2011 mac mini. Before my old mac mini died (RIP) I was using the optical output to send iTunes music (cd's ripped in aiff format) to my Meridian hi-fi system.

I plugged the tos-link cable into the new mac mini but just couldn't get anything out of the sound system. The internal sound turned off so I assumed the cable was properly seated. I tried working logically through all the combinations in the Audio Midi setup utility, but nothing. I proved the cable was Ok by connecting up a CD player, which worked fine. In both cases I could see the red laser light coming out of the hi-fi end of the cable.

Finally, I plugged it back into the mac mini and again set the Midi setting to 44100 Hz and 16 bit. It burst into life. It now works with 44100 Hz and all options except 'Encoded Digital Audio'. And 48000 and 96000 Hz. No, I don't understand why it now works when it previously didn't. I have however just managed to crash iTunes just by changing the settings!

All I have to do now is persuade it to work with the VGA PC input on my TV - then I'll be back where I was 2 weeks ago!

Hi! I had the same problem with my Onkyo pre-pro. The solution is to go in the Onkyo setup menu, and select the proper HDMI channel in Digital sound setup. Not sure of your Onkyo menu tree, but mine was

Input/Output Setup -> Digital Audio Input

Kicked myself and then blamed Onkyo for not defaulitng to the HDMI when it is selected for a source, but their system is more flexible.

Cheers.

Peter