I downloaded about a dozen games during the holiday sale, and it seems that only about half of them will install on my Windows XP machine, even though they're compatible. Right now I'm trying to install Baldur's Gate, but I'm having the same problem with games such as Icewind Dale, Neverwinter Nights, and The Last Express.

I've downloaded and re-downloaded the installation files via the GOG downloader to my Windows 7 Starter netbook. (The setup files will open correctly on the netbook.) They appear as orange icons in the folder, as well as when I move them to a thumb drive to put on the WinXP desktop. However, when I put the files onto the WinXP machine, the setup icons are no longer orange; they're just the generic application icon. (This does not happen with the games I had no problem installing - the icons remain orange on either computer.)

When I try to open the setup files in WindowsXP, I get a brief window of black which immediately closes. Is the system not recognizing the games? Is something forcing them to shut down before they can fully execute? I've downloaded the games at least three times now so I hope it's not corrupt files still.

Any help is appreciated! I could always play these games on the Netbook, but I'd really prefer to do it on a much more reasonably-sized screen and with a mouse.

Try going to C:\Program Files\Common Files\InstallShield & deleting everything in it.
If it doesn't work you can go to the recycle bin & restore them.

Hmmm... deleting the InstallShield files didn't work, but thanks for the idea!

Not very helpful really, but I wanted to say that the disappearing icon is the standard deal with WinXP for executables larger than 800MB or so. It only affect exe files where the icon is embedded in the file itself, files that have their icons set by the system are shown correctly regardless of size.

The briefly appearing window seems like a corrupted exe, although where this happens is not clear.
The window of black as you put it, is probably an error message. Try to run the exe from the command line to see if anything useful is shown.

Is your XP installation up to date?
When you use the GOG Downloader it checks if your system has .net 3.5 installed & installs it if it doesn't.
I don't know if it is needed to run the setup files, or just the downloader, but you are bypassing that check so maybe something to look into.
But yes, running the .exe from the command line might show something useful in the error message.

Hey, guys -

Thank you both for the suggestion to open the file in the command prompt. I'm getting an error message that says the program is too big to fit in memory.

I guess I need to upgrade the ram in this old computer, huh? The upgrades are cheap enough, and I have three extra slots for it. Doesn't seem too expensive.

Thanks for the help!

Just make sure you know what type & the amount of memory your motherboard supports.
The older stuff isn't as easy to come by as DDR3.

Actually it's not necessarily true that you need more memory. How much do you have now?
That error message also comes from a corrupted executable as well. You could try checking the file's checksum to ensure that the file is fine, before go hunting for other causes.