[sam89364]

Hi, I am planning to buy a Mac Mini to use as a media center PC. For sound, I want to link the optical output from the Mini to my surround sound system.

According to my research on the internet (a couple of weeks now), It is possible for Mac's to pass on AC3 sound data from DVDs (using Mac's DVD player) and AC3 data from movies (AVI, DIVX, ...etc) using VLC player.

The problem is movie files (AVI, MKV) with AAC encoded 5.1 sound. a Mac will only pass on 2 channels through the optical output. It cannot output the AAC through optical since most (all?) sound systems do NOT have AAC decoders. They can only understand AC3 encoded 5.1 sound data.

What I need is a way to encode the AAC into AC3 (at real time) while playing the video. In other words, I do not want to convert my videos before hand. I want a method to do it on the fly WHILE the video is playing.

It would be really ironic if it was not possible to do it on a Mac since all iTunes sold video is encoded with AAC, AND both Windows and Linux can do it.

Thanks!
Sam

[awaspaas]

Linux and Windows re-encode into AC3 for optical outputs? I don't think think they can but I may be wrong. All of the above (Mac included) can pass through AC3 optically, but can Linux and Windows really re-encode on the fly? Do you have evidence of this?

[sam89364]

Well if you look carefully above you can see that I have posted links that show how to do that already. Here they are again:

For Windows: Mathod1, Method2
For Linux: Method1

Anyway, this is besides the point. The question is how to do this on a Mac? Suggestions anyone???

[awaspaas]

I had never heard of that and I overlooked the links, sorry. I don't know of a way to do this with VLC or Mplayer on Mac. Wouldn't that be nice though. You should suggest it to Apple as a Quicktime feature. (they're probably already working on it - they start projects years before they're released)