CD/DVD Emulation Software

For burning CD/DVD images of games to HDD and for mounting as virtual CD/DVD drive. No need for burning to CD/DVD. Would prefer something which I can burn the images and later on donw the line can use them with other systems/installations.

Must be compatible with Vista 64x and should be able to work with future OS installations, such as Win7 etc.

This is for use with my own games. I might consider using it for backup imaging, but this is a secondary requirement. Would prefer something which can dodge Starforce (if such a thing is possible). No cracks/warez/keys wanted.

Have been bitten a couple of times in the past with WinXP Pro, so am more interested in overall system reliablity than anything else. Will not consider anything which demands I change my setup to suit it. Am prepared to consider free and non-free, but not adware-type solutions.


So what's the best option for me? Please suggest why 'x' and not 'y'. I have used some in the past, but want a fresh perspective.

Ta!

http://www.magiciso.com/tutorials/miso-magicdisc-ove...

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/916902

Daemon tools, used it for donkeys.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

http://www.magiciso.com/tutorials/miso-magicdisc-ove...

Seconded!! I use MagicISO after backing up the kids games to prevent them scratching the CDs..

EDIT: Win 7 32bit & 64bit

Edited by deleted (Fri 11-Mar-11 12:52:13)

I find virtual clonedrive to be the best.

Ta spasch. You mentioned Win7/32/64. No one else has really explained why they favour what they favour.

Folks, I can google all the lists too, but need to know why you recommend them over the rest.

In reply to a post by camieabz:

Ta spasch. You mentioned Win7/32/64. No one else has really explained why they favour what they favour.

Folks, I can google all the lists too, but need to know why you recommend them over the rest.

I recommend things I use, not google results.

Why not install them each and try for yourself. They are all free.

Why do you recommend it?

In reply to a post by camieabz:

Why do you recommend it?

Because I use it and it works.

In reply to a post by camieabz:

Ta spasch. You mentioned Win7/32/64. No one else has really explained why they favour what they favour.

Folks, I can google all the lists too, but need to know why you recommend them over the rest.

It's stable, non-intrusive and so easy to use that my 5 year old son can swap ISO files when he wants to play different games. Also, it's free..

Urg, what a poc magicdisc is.

1st prob - 4 different versions for various windows builds, and a really old installer.
2nd prob - unsigned driver.
3nd prob - right-click menu with a huge list of junk links that mostly link to magiciso paid software
4th prob - the right-click menu doesn't disappear when you click elsewhere!!
5th prob - does it even associate itself with iso files so you can just double click to mount them?

eta; the right-click menu even interferes with explorer windows when it's open, lol
eta2: and this is why having a really old installer is bad; www.noisp.me.uk/sc/magiccrap.PNG
eta3; because of the failed uninstall, I needed to use system restore to remove the unsigned driver

It's been a while since I've come across freeware that bad.

Edited by deleted (Fri 11-Mar-11 15:48:11)

I never said it was perfect, but it works for us..

1. Yeah, PITA..
2. No comment as I've not experienced this..
3. Here's a link to the menu: I can only see 4 items that are not related to the running of the program
4. Agreed, that is annoying.
5. Not that I know of, but that's not something I want/need..

In reply to a post by Spasch:

3. Here's a link to the menu: I can only see 4 items that are not related to the running of the program

The How-to link is nearly all magiciso. For reference, this is VCD's menu.

In reply to a post by camieabz:

This is for use with my own games. I might consider using it for backup imaging, but this is a secondary requirement. Would prefer something which can dodge Starforce (if such a thing is possible). No cracks/warez/keys wanted.

On this point, not even daemon tools does a very good job imo, even though it is the only one (afaik) to claim it can. I vaguely remember reading a case where no-cd patchs were ruled to be legal under fair-use laws, so I'd personally use that method. The patches are, at the very least, just as illegal as copying the disc to an image and using software to bypass copy protection.

Edited by deleted (Fri 11-Mar-11 16:36:37)

In reply to a post by 12eason:

The How-to link is nearly all magiciso. For reference, this is VCD's menu.

Neat, I'll have to look into that proggie. Can you right-click on the virtual drive in explorerer and mount an ISO directly without using the menu??

FWIW I only have one game with Starforce. A bit of a hassle, but I'd be willing to use that one game from disc, or even bin it. It's a con, the amount of cash that companies waste on data protection for those of us that buy the product.

Once more, those of us that do not pirate/crack etc have to put up with 3rd party software due to greedy little people who won't pay. If one can't afford, then ignore the product and force them to drop the price.

Yeah, along with a list of previous mounts.

In reply to a post by camieabz:

Once more, those of us that do not pirate/crack etc have to put up with 3rd party software due to greedy little people who won't pay. If one can't afford, then ignore the product and force them to drop the price.

Yep, Steam ftw.

In reply to a post by 12eason:

I find virtual clonedrive to be the best.

I use this too with no problems on WinXP, Vista, 7 64bit.

In reply to a post by 12eason:

Yeah, along with a list of previous mounts.

Sweet!!

Virtual Cd, been using it for years. but it is not free, it costs almost 30 of that strange Euro currency or almost 35 of that currsy called the Dollar that belongs is made in the u.s.a

Out of curiousty, would it make for a bad setup to run any ISOs from the same drive as the game installation (neither being the C: drive)?

I had a mind to just create the following:

G:\Games
G:\ISO

...and let the gaming commence. Just wondering if it will be a problem for the drive controller to handle that. Might it be best to pop the ISOs on the slowest hard drive (which is obviously much faster than any optical drive)?

it probably would be fine unless the hdd was been particurly slow eg. an old drive that filled up to the brim and fragmented. Any modern sata drive should handle that situation fine. It certianly is still better than reading of cd/dvd media itself.

In general, the game loads the data from the CD and then runs without it for much of the time so there's little interactivity. To check this, play the games from the CD as normal and note how much and when the CD is being accessed.
As for your copy protection, there are quite a few free/trial burning apps out there that will faithfully reproduce the original CD in ISO format. When you mount it, the CP is still there so I don't see how anyone has been starved of a living.