how to plug 5.1 surround sound system (MBP 2011)

The headphone port in your MBP is both analog and digital. You can plug a mini-TOSLink to TOSLink cable into it, connect the other end to your surround sound system, and have 5.1-channel digital sound.

TOSLink is the name for the optical cable, there is a adapter to convert the stereo mini optical to a regular TOSlink which then connects to your receiver which can process 5.1 sound.

The Mac only passes 5.1 through, it doesn't process it.

So to get it you must have something or play something encoded in a surround sound format, like Dolby on a DVD movie for instance, which the Mac passes through to your receiver for decoding and playback on the 5.1 system (or 7.1)

Naturally your receiver has to be able to decode the surround sound format.

What's nice if you have a good receiver, that it will convert the 2.0 of iTunes music into surround "sounding-like" sound (not true 5.1), with the sub-woofer taking those bass channels for a much richer, full room sounding playback experience.

You need to enable the optical output in the Sound System Preferences.

I have a Macbook Pro (Early 2011 Model) and after reading all the articles and forums on getting 5.1 surround sound output, I went and purchased the optic fiber cable and mini toslink adapter and hooked up my MBP to my AVR 142 Harman / Kardon receiver.

But now I’m still not able to not get Digital 5.1 surround sound!! Additionally, in Audio MIDI Setup (under Utilities), I can only select Stereo from the drop down menu, as "5.1 Surround" and every other option, such as 7.1 surround are grayed out.

Is there anything that I have missed out in the setup? or do I have to try some other method to get the surround sound??

Please Help!!😕