How do I tell if my Mac supports Mini Toslink?

Apparently on many modern macs the 3.5mm headphone audio jack supports Mini Toslink.

How can I tell whether my mac supports it, whether it supports surround sound (4 speaker or better), and whether the microphone input acts as a mini toslink input?

Solution 1:

I can not find a direct source to note when Apple started making audio output ports toslink enabled. But to answer your other questions:

• Almost all macs since 2006 do support this, and looking at the product page for each model will tell you exactly.
• If it supports toslink, it supports surround sound
• According to this KB, the input is also optical as well.

Solution 2:

Do the following:

1. Open "About This Mac"
2. Open "More Info..." (skip this step on macOS Sierra)
3. Open "System Report..."
4. From the left pane choose Hardware > Audio
5. Check if Optical Digital Audio Output is present