For the longest time, I have wondered about why such a good ‘poota’ only has a phones jack.
One day, I decided that I needed to connect my Da’s Mac Mini to his flashy new television. Having converted the DVI out to HDMI (using an inexpensive connecter… you can get an expensive one that has gold and diamonds encrusted on it but I couldn’t afford one), I realised that the DVI/HDMI would have no audio on it… So, I had to use an analogue stereo sound cable, which I really didn’t want to do. After all… what I really wanted was to play DVDs with 5.1 Dolby or DTS 7.1 or 9.1 or 11.1 or 67.513.1 or whatever it has… (some of those I made up). A stereo cable would not do justice…
Also, the TV had one of those ports that have an optical in for sound. After a lot of research, I found out that even the humble Mac Mini has an audio port that is not only analogue, is also an optical out, and can also pour hot steaming expresso from it as well (make sure you put the cup under the port before you start piping out hot coffee).
So, in theory, you can connect your mac (mac mini in my case) to an amplifier, while connecting the video to your tele, and create a mini multimedia hub for yourself!
PRETTY NEAT-O!
Additional: Apparently, all Macs (new Macbook Pros for sure) now output sound if you connect an hdmi to mini display port cable to it. But not all cables adhere to the correct standards, so choose your cable carefully.
Neat-o-roony!