how to activate 5.1 surround sound
 

how do you get all 5 speakers working in the 5.1 surround sound system. I can only hear 2. the left and right only.

I've tried everything suggested but it keeps telling me that a command is not found when i run the terminal. I still can't get it to operate.

check for the Sound card manufacturer's support for Linux. Usually it should have worked. You must have a Desktop to support 5.1 .
Check for the series of sound card. And see if that particular motherboard vendor provides driver for that particular sound card.
Like if have a Gigabyte motherboard with Realtek sound Card . Then either or non or both can provide driver for your sound card for Linux. You have to check once in their official site.


Or go to sound preference>hardware tab>profile then try to change profile and see happens...

Suggest you look at this: http://www.halfgaar.net/surround-sound-in-linux The 'testing' section at the bottom gives a thing that says 'rear right' and so on out of the appropriate speaker. Run that and see what happens.

The thing is, if my experience should be gone by, the computer will not use surround sound unless told to do so. So your surround sound may be working.

EDIT: There is also 'speaker-test' in the alsa-utils package.