Get a dumpster surround sound system to play from my Macbook?
OK, first thing to know is that if your source doesn’t produce surround sound, then there’s no way to hear surround sound. That means your stereo mp3s will never produce surround sound on any computer – because they don’t have 5 tracks. They have two tracks, a left and a right. The sources that produce surround sound are generally DVDs (movies or audio DVDs) and a very few computer games. In 4.1 surround, the DVD contains (or the game produces) 5 tracks of audio, one for each speaker and one for the subwoofer. Generally surround is at least 5.1, there is a ‘front center speaker as well. Now if your macbook is recent, it has S/PDIF digital optical audio out. The kicker here is that it has no Toslink square digital optical audio out jack. Instead, it conceals its optical audio out in the Mini headphone j
You can use the Griffin FireWave ($63 at Amazon) to connect a Mac with a firewire port to an analog surround sound system. However, like ikkyu2 mentioned, a surround sound system that supports digital audio is really the way to go.
The Turtle Beach Audio Advantage SRM is a USB soundcard that should work very nicely. It has 7.1 analog outs, a digital out with stereo left/right and DVD passthrough, and a special mini 5.1 connector for their “5.1” headphones. You just use a provided breakout cable instead of the mini-DIN if you want to connect to an amplifier or computer speakers. It’s a little smaller than a pack of cards, and runs off USB power, so it doesn’t add much bulk to your laptop bag. The SRM is a rebranded version of the “Audio Advantage Roadie”, which as far as I can tell has identical hardware. You can definitely use the SRM drivers with the Roadie. Everything seems to work just fine. If you spot a Roadie for cheap, it should work great, and save you some money. I’ve spent quite a bit of time working with with USB sound. I’ve used an Audigy 2 NX (absolutely dismal sound, moderately crappy drivers), a Sonica Theater (wonderful sound, horrible drivers), and, most recently, the Roadie/SRM. The Sonica Theat
