Hi board,
although I haven't run into this particular problem with a game I bought form GoG yet, it still concerns good old games, some very fine ones, as a matter of fact:
Before mp3 started to conquer earth, games on CD-ROM used to have their soundtrack stored as audio-CD-tracks. In order to play them during the game, you had to connect your CD-ROM-drive with your soundcard using a tiny audio-cable. Nowadays, modern DVD-drives don't offer a connection for such a cable anymore, mostly because audio-CDs can simply be played by enabling "digital CD audio", which works fine for most media players.
BUT it doesn't work for games, at least not in my case. There simply won't be any music.
Is there any way of forcing old games to use digital CD audio rather than analogue (which would require this tiny cable that doesn't exist any more)? Any emulator? Your help would be greatly appreciated - without soundtrack, the old games are only half the fun they used to be.
Thank you very much!
- spitfire

Would it be possible to make a CD image, and then run the game from that?
I tend to use PowerISO, http://download.cnet.com/PowerISO/3000-2646_4-10439118.html?tag=mncol
but I'm sure there are better programs.

Both ScummVM and Dosbox have ways of doing this. I've seen at least one GOG title with CD-audio intact, so it's definitely possible.

Hmm, I still play some old games with CD audio tracks, and, for me at least, it's still functionning. I've recently (tried to) play Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, and except the whole graphic mess due to my ATI HD2600 when I activate 3D acceleration, the music is playing fine.
For now, I've not encountered any troubles with old games using CD audio tracks.

Thanx for your quick replies, seems to be an awesome community here :) I was also wondering about images, because then, you definitely can't connect any analog cables, but still, it seems that people are able to run audio tracks from them (it works with media player, for sure, that I've tested).
Dosbox and ScummVM are both emulating DOS games, right? I am wondering whether there's also a way of playing audio-tracks in old windows games. But you are right - it proves that it must be possible - I just have to find out how. Maybe it's also game dependent. I'm trying to install Battlezone and see how that'll do ...
Ooops, sorry, DarthKaal, haven't seen your post in time. Hm, that's interesting. Is your CD-drive still connected with the soundcard by this small cable or are you also "calbe less"?
Jedi knight II was a great game, btw :)
Have you also tried Dark Reign?
Just tried battlezone, no music, although the CD plays fine in WMP, WinAMP and Foobar. Dang ... if it works in the players, there must be a way to get it working in games, I just fail to see it :(
(edit 3:) All right, the solution was simple, and I was stupid: By putting the CD into my BluRay-Drive (which probably is primary) instead of my burner (secondary) it works! Even though the BluRay-Drive does not have an audio cable, neither. I don't totally understand why it doesn't work in the burner, though. Is it possible it only works in the primary drive? This brings up the question how people managed to get audio when mounting an image ...

I've not used disc images that much but I was under the impression that the virtual drives were emulating a real drive including the cables. It probably just hands over any raw audio to the soundcard and tells it to get processing
Oh and GOG has to have a good community, it's promised on the homepage

Yes--however, there are a few minor considerations in order for it to actually work.
First of all, the image program must be able to create a layout file for the CD (ideally in the CUE format for maximum portability) in addition to the disc image itself; without a layout file the CD audio will not work. If the program you are using can't create layout files it is useless. ImgBurn is one of the best available--it's totally free and easy to use--you just have to click a button or two and ImgBurn does the rest for you, and even creates a CUE file if one is needed. It creates byte-exact images under normal circumstances, so games that do basic disc checks for copy protection should be satisfied that you are using the real disc.
Additionally, the virtual drive program must be able to mount layout files; those that only accept actual images (ISO, BIN, etc.) are useless for this purpose--the game will install and run but the music won't work. Daemon Tools Lite is a good free option and supports all common image formats. Note that Daemon Tools installs a browser toolbar by default if you just blindly click through the installer--uncheck the toolbar and homepage change during installation to avoid this.
In the case of DOS games you can mount the disc within DOSBox itself, although this isn't just a point-and-click process (see IMGMOUNT for details); alternately, use a normal virtual drive program and mount that in DOSBox. The DOSBox CD drive should always be D: to ensure maximum compatibility (just as the hard drive should always be C:).
For Windows games, note that some are hard-coded to look for the CD in D: (or, alternately, the first optical drive--whichever one has the lowest letter) even if you installed them from a different letter. You can change the letters using Disk Management (Start>Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk Management), but note that other programs you have that are using paths pointing to that drive letter will no longer be able to find their files.
For hard-coded games that do not do a detailed disc check or have had the check bypassed in some manner you have the amusing option of inserting any audio CD of your choice in the drive the game is checking; the game will then play music from the CD, changing tracks appropriately whenever the game's real music was meant to change.

Doesn't work with World of Xeen properly in DOSbox no matter what.. It always skips the first 3 seconds of the audio clip it's supposed to play, then plays 3 seconds of the following. It seems that the game was designed with each voice actor saying all of their dialogue on to their own track, then the game has to retrieve the correct piece of audio from that track.. not sure if it's something in the game that doesn't make it work properly with cue/bin or if I just can't get it ripped right.. Both Alcohol 120% and ImgBurn produced the same result.

I could never get World of Xeen running with ripped discs actually. I had to mount the physical discs in DOSBox using this (can't remember the exact thing right now; @work):
mount d e:\ -t cdrom -usecd 0 -ioctl
Another thing you might want to check is the IRQ settings in the dosbox.conf file.
EDIT:
Added something to the mount thing.

Another way around this is mounting the images in an external virtual drive and then mounting--like every other program, DOSBox sees no difference between real and virtual optical drives and handles them identically, so you should see no difference. Of course, this depends on the disc images being correctly made in the first place (see my previous post).

I think I might have tried it that way at some point, but it just wouldn't recognize them, but I could try it according to your tutorial when I get home.

For Windows games: build an image in the cue/bin format, mount it with Daemon Tools and you are ready to go....

That's a good point. I know that the old games had audio cd tracks but I am quite surprised that music doesn't work on new PCs. Actually, the answer to that problem is obvious but I am not sure if I would have found it without your help.

Wow, that's really an amazing board, extremely helpful people here, thanks to all of you!
The creation of images is a very interesting topic, too. So far I've been stuck to Nero and Nero image drive, because I've many *.nrg images that can't be mounted by SlySofts virtual clone drive (and I have heard that Daemon Tools has some issues, so I am a bit hesitating trying that one). As far as I know, the *.nrg format can also store audio-tracks. So is it equal to bin/cue ore is the bin/cue combination more powerful?
And are there any other tools other than Daemon Tools that can mount bin/cue images? Nero seems to fail, what from what I've read, virtual clone drive can't do the trick, neither. And are the issues with Daemon Tools really that grave? I think it was said to cause problems with Securom and alike. I just don't want to run into a situation where games using securom won't launch anymore because they detect daemon tools...
Best regards
- spitfire

I think that the cue/bin format is better than nrg.
Never noticed any problems with Daemon Tools and Securom myself, but it differs between various configurations. The order of installation might also have something to do, since I always install Daemon Tools before almost anything else after a complete system reinstall.
EDIT:
Ooh, tested it now, using Imgburn and Daemon Tools. Worked flawlessly.