Osx and hd audio

I was one phone call away from ordering a new mac mini to serve as a mac osx HTPC, mainly to take the place of my failing bluray changer. My plan was to use Makemkv to rip my blurays and then use Plex to play them. I just had to confirm that I would be able to pass the hd audio. I have a fairly extensive HT setup so I really want the hd audio capabilities.
After several days of inverstigating, I now understand that osx will not permit this. Its not the hardware (since hd audio works under bootcamp), but the os itself. Does anyone know why ? Is this an oversight or is this due to some DRM agreement between Apple and the greedy Hollywood moguls ?
I know I can buy a mini and a copy of Windows and make this work under bootcamp, but doesnt that kind of defeat the purpose ? Seriously, the last thing I wanted to do was buy a Windows box, but at this point it looks as though that is what I'll have to do.
Is there any way this hdaudio/osx thing is just an oversight and will be fixed in the not to distant future ?  Apple never fails to confound me !
Dan

The hardware as you say supports it. Apple have never officially supported Blu-Ray discs on a Mac so have never had to add support for HD audio formats, until or unless Apple support HD audio on the iTunes Store they may not get round to this.
While you can use Boot Camp (and Windows) now, it maybe that at some point XBMC and/or Plex might manage to support HD audio without help from Apple. (Both can play MKV files and currently downscale HD audio.)
There are some Blu-Ray playing applications for the Mac, they all seem to be rather blatent copies of each other. However I did find that at least Aurora Blu-Ray Player for Mac seems to be claiming that they can do 7.1 and Dolby HD on a Mac via the built-in HDMI port i.e. Mac mini or MacBook Pro Retina/Air.
See http://www.bluray-player-software.com/articles/mac-dts-hd-7.1-player.htm
Personally I find this highly dubious but at least there is a free trial version to try out.

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