Can't access a music CD

[Chuck Swiger]

On Oct 12, 2011, at 5:14 PM, Polytropon wrote:
> On today's disc drives, you typically don't have a
> 3.5mm headphone connector for direct listening. Also
> some sound cards (unlike most onboard sound chips)
> have the ability to connect the "CD audio" wire inside
> the machine. This feature is obsolete, but still works.
> It's typically not part of laptop designs.

A fair number of motherboards with integrated audio will take the analog audio output from a CD/DVD drive; the better ones will also accept a 3-pin digital SP/DIF connection as well.  Even if they don't, however, it's not uncommon for them to have audio connectivity in the form of a microphone input buried within a 10-pin extension header (AC'97 and Intel's HD Audio front panel connector), rather than have a 4-pin or 3-pin connector which matches the cable which came with the CD/DVD drive.

Anyway, none of the above should not be needed with modern SATA devices-- digital audio data goes directly over the SATA cable without a need for a separate audio cable.  Any laptop (which isn't obsolete) would use this route.

Regards,
-- 
-Chuck