Virtual CDs Protect Game Discs from Careless Kids
By Peter Losh, FarStone Internet and E-Commerce Manager
This article was first distributed in several online publications
Virtual CDs can make life easier for parents, help keep game collections organized, and save wear and tear on expensive game and application discs.
Out with the Old Technology, In with the New
Remember when compact discs came out? They were a huge improvement over audio tape — a fact that nearly everyone recognized immediately .
They were also touted as durable, even permanent. Many damaged discs and a few hundred dollars later, we began to sober up from all that giddy hype.
Once we caught on to MP3s, there was no turning back. MP3s offered big advantages over physical media — they were indestructible (or at least easily replaced), they could be played continuously for hours, arranged in custom play lists, and taken just about anywhere.
Mobile music lovers have never had it so good.
PC Gamers and parents of young children, however, still have their share of problems with those OTHER discs: the expensive CDs and DVDs that you need to run PC games and disc-based applications.
CDs are remarkably fragile: hairline scratches or even a few smudges can render them unplayable. Supposedly designed to be portable, they're not all that easy to transport, but they are incredibly easy to lose.
All too often, shared discs are treated badly. Left out their jewel cases and exposed to kids and pets, game discs are mutilated. Traveling disc collections are soon scattered to the wind: volume 2 of a set may be forgotten in a motel room, volume 3 at a rest stop. The disc-based software that goes on every family trip frequently comes back ruined — if it comes back at all.
MP3-Like Convenience for Disc-Based Applications
Virtual CDs are to PC games and applications discs what MP3s are to music CDs. They bring MP3-like ease use and portability to video games, CD-ROM clip art collections, educational software, and other disc-based applications. They’re a perfect disc management solution for anyone sharing disc-based games and applications with members of the family or moving CDs and DVDs from place to place.
You’ll need a CD emulator to convert your physical disc into a virtual CD, or a file that runs directly on the hard drive. Since it’s nothing more than an electronic file, a virtual CD can be stored on a laptop computer or just about any digital storage device.
A virtual CD plays just like a physical CD, only with a much reduced load time. In fact, there’s no need to load the physical disc at all — simply click on desktop shortcut to launch a favorite game or application. You can have several virtual CDs running simultaneously in one of several virtual drives, which look just like physical drive in Windows Explorer. It may seem like overkill to keep multiple virtual CDs loaded, but gamers in particular like to hot swap between game titles or volumes of a set.
Choosing the Right CD Emulator
Most commercial CD emulators cost between $30 and $60 — a bargain compared to many PC game CDs, and well worth the price of admission if you’re able to spare just a few of your discs from abuse. But while nearly all CD emulators have certain basic features in common, not all offer the same usability and disc support.
You should also be aware that while a CD emulator is a great tool for most PC games, educational software, and unprotected DVDs, any legal CD emulator will not work with a CSS protected DVD. In other words, don’t expect to transform your Hollywood videos into a virtual DVD library any time soon.
If you’d like to purchase a CD emulator, you might want to download an evaluation version first. Try to determine which product works best with the discs in your collection. Figure out which brand gives you the best value for your money and offers ongoing technical support.
FarStone Technology makes a couple of excellent CD emulator, VirtualDrive being the most affordable at just under $30.
