No music on MM6, 7 or 8

[Sir Bishop]

Hello everyone. I love this series. It's one of my all time favorites. But I can't get the music to work. I am fairly computer literate and have been working this issue for quite some time now. Here's the scenario:

- HP 6730 running Windows 98 SE
- No driver conflicts reported in device manager
- No errors reported in DXDIAG
- Running DirectX 8.1 (this is as far down as I have been able to get it)
- Installation CD is almost mint save a few extremely small scuffs
- Gameplay CD plays in a CD player fine EXCEPT track 1 is silent
- Music and sound effects not loaded from the "Audio.snd" file work fine
- Your patches had no effect (but thanks, I will still need them!)
- This system played the music fine for many years
- System's been returned to factory configuration

Still no music

I have exhausted every possibility I can think of so anything in all your wisdom and experience would be tremendously appreciated!

[Macros the Black]

Since you already have Grayface's patches, all you need to do for MM7 is:

1. Put the cd in the disk drive.
2. Open windows media player.
3. Select the tab named "rip music" or something like that (mine is in Dutch).
4. Make sure all the tracks are selected, then click "rip now" or "start ripping" or whatever.
5. Find your Might and Magic game installation on your drive.
6. Create a folder in there called "Music".
7. Drag the tracks you ripped into that folder.
8. Rename them starting from 2.mp3 to 20.mp3.
9. Go back to the main MM7 folder.
10. Open the file named "mm7.ini" with notepad.
11. Change the line "NoCD=0" to "NoCD=1".

That should do it. I haven't tried this with the other Might and Magic games since my cd's work fine for those but I figure the process should be similar.

[GreatEmerald]

It works for me on WinXP x64 with CD music just fine. At least the earlier versions, not tested the latest yet.

[Sir Bishop]

Thanks for the help. Unfortunately, I have heard of the ripping solution
and it will not work in this scenario. Here's why:

1. Media Player 7 will not recognize the "Audio.snd file" in MM6 (or 7 or 8).
2. It gives an error message that means the system does not have the
correct codec to run the file.
3. This error is baloney as I can run other .snd files fine.
4. It's also baloney as I mentioned earlier, this configuration has run these
games with music successfully before.

Here's some additional information:

1. The Installation and Gameplay CD's are flawless
2. The Gameplay CD will play normally in an audio CD player EXCEPT
track 1 is silent (at least for the 40 seconds I listened to it - maybe it's
supposed to be this way, I don't know)

I'm fairly desperate here. So again, thanks for any help!

[GreatEmerald]

It has nothing to do with audio.snd, it has to do with your play CD.

[mkienenb]

It has nothing to do with audio.snd, it has to do with your play CD.

Or to put it another way, audio.snd only contains the sound effects for the game, not the music. The music is in standard music CD format as music tracks on the CD

[Sir Bishop]

Well, I'll certainly take your word for it but that just makes
the whole issue even more confusing given the following:

1. This systems' CD drive plays other commercial music CD's just fine.
2. The MM6 Gameplay CD plays in a regular CD player just fine
(excepting that track 1 is silent - is this normal?).

Maybe I need new CD's but that seems a bit insane given that the disks are
completely clean and I'd say about 99.9% flawless. Any more ideas?

[mkienenb]

Well, I'll certainly take your word for it but that just makes
the whole issue even more confusing given the following:

1. This systems' CD drive plays other commercial music CD's just fine.
2. The MM6 Gameplay CD plays in a regular CD player just fine
(excepting that track 1 is silent - is this normal?).

Maybe I need new CD's but that seems a bit insane given that the disks are
completely clean and I'd say about 99.9% flawless. Any more ideas?

Track 1 is silent because it contains the computer data (What you see when you stick the drive in your PC). It's not so much silent as random noise to a CD player, and I think most modern cd players no longer try to play it if they detect it as data since playing a data track used to damage the player.

I'm not an expert on PC CD drives, but in the old days, late 1990s, you had to have a separate cable between your cd player and your computer to make a computer game be able to access regular cd music tracks. Unfortunately, I don't know if this is still true. I buy my computers pre-assembled these days, and other than adding memory or harddrives, I don't mess with the internals any more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game ... ming_music

Do you have any other games which use cd music tracks? If so, are they working?

It could be a driver issue -- make sure all of your audio drivers are working.

It could be a volume issue -- make sure that all of your various volumes are non-muted and audible.

You might also take a look at the bottom of the following posting, but it's saying about the same thing:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/genmessa ... c=48825035

Finally, the Grayface patch will allow you to rip your audio tracks into mp3 files and save them directly on your harddrive. If nothing else, that will work for you.

[AndyNZ]

I have an old CD drive on one of my PCs and it doesn't play the music through the PC speakers - it has a Jack Socket on the front of the CD drive and the music plays from there - only if I have headphones or speakers plugged into that socket, obviously.

[mkienenb]

I have an old CD drive on one of my PCs and it doesn't play the music through the PC speakers - it has a Jack Socket on the front of the CD drive and the music plays from there - only if I have headphones or speakers plugged into that socket, obviously.

Yes, that's how it works if you're missing the direct-connect audio cable.

[GreatEmerald]

I have an old CD drive on one of my PCs and it doesn't play the music through the PC speakers - it has a Jack Socket on the front of the CD drive and the music plays from there - only if I have headphones or speakers plugged into that socket, obviously.

Old drive indeed. You can still find quite a lot of those these days, but I don't think they are produced any more. My new PC has neither the headphone jack nor the PC speaker itself

[mkienenb]

Here's a good article and picture showing how audio tracks get physically pulled from the drive to your sound card.

http://www.yourdictionary.com/computer/ ... udio-cable

And here's another one that add a little more info:

reviews.cnet.com/4520-6603_7-5118840-8.html

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... qAhnD6Uq0g

[Macros the Black]

Well, if you can't get the music off the cd you could try googling the soundtracks for download.

Found the MM6 one here: http://downloads.khinsider.com/game-sou ... -of-heaven

Edit: apparently that site has the others too.

MM7: http://downloads.khinsider.com/game-sou ... -and-honor
MM8: http://downloads.khinsider.com/game-sou ... -destroyer

[Sir Bishop]

Thank you all so very much for all your help. It's greatly appreciated.

Here's where I am now: After many hours of experiment, trial and error, I
have finally, FINALLY found the right combination to get the music running
out of the front cd drive jack (sweet!!). Of course, this still leaves the sound
effects in silence but at least a final resolution now seems within reach. So,
correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe all of this points to a problem with the
cd drive's cable connections (as was mentioned earlier). I'll be cracking the
case on Sunday to find out. Thanks again! You guys rock!

[mkienenb]

Thank you all so very much for all your help. It's greatly appreciated.

Here's where I am now: After many hours of experiment, trial and error, I
have finally, FINALLY found the right combination to get the music running
out of the front cd drive jack (sweet!!). Of course, this still leaves the sound
effects in silence but at least a final resolution now seems within reach. So,
correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe all of this points to a problem with the
cd drive's cable connections (as was mentioned earlier). I'll be cracking the
case on Sunday to find out. Thanks again! You guys rock!

Yes, that's what it sounds like.
Typically, it's a 4-pin cable that goes from the back of your cd drive to a port on your sound card.

That was back in the days when sound wasn't integrated onto the motherboard.

[Sir Bishop]

Yep, that was it. Sent this system in for a drive upgrade a long time ago.
I guess the idiots didn't even bother putting the cable in and never gave
me a cable so I assumed that it WAS in (stupidity on my part, I know).
Apparently, everything I've been running since that time has been digital
so I never even knew there was an issue until I plopped in MM6.

Anyway, thanks for the assist. Sir Bishop humbly bows to your Grandmaster
Hardware skills!

[Xfing]

It's pretty fun to actually make one of your characters a permanent zombie. It can fit well in terms of roleplaying - a Black Knight would be ideal.