Moving PC games from CD to DVD?

[Mike89]

Can this be done? I have many PC games which are on multiple CDs. I would love to convert them to single DVDs. If this can be done, describe the process. Thanks.

[anonymez]

you could simply rip all CD's to the hard disk as ISO images then burn them to a data DVD. install a virtual drive app such as daemon tools or alcohol 120% and mount the ISO's to install them

[NightTran]

nero vision 4

[Mike89]

Man I got a lot of questions about this. I don't want the virtual drive thing but that brings up an interesting question. I know I would still need the disk to play the game. Don't care about that cause I have almost all the no cd cracks anyway to play them (I have tons of games). Now I wonder if the same no cd crack would work if transfering the games to DVD. If this wouldn't work, I would never do it cause I have probably 75 games or so and no way am I going to go through that hassle of loading a disk in everytime I want to play one again. Took me a long time to not have to load disks (get all the no cd cracks) and no way am I giving that up. (And, lets not get into the pirating issue here please, I have purchased ALL my games). Then I wonder when copying all the cd's of a game on to one DVD, how is the installer going to know how to move from one to the other to do the installation?

The Nero Vision thing. I do have Nero Vision 4. I don't see an option there to do this. I only see making a video DVD which is not the case here. Care to provide more info regarding this?

[anonymez]

Man I got a lot of questions about this. I don't want the virtual drive thing but that brings up an interesting question. I know I would still need the disk to play the game. Don't care about that cause I have almost all the no cd cracks anyway to play them (I have tons of games). Now I wonder if the same no cd crack would work if transfering the games to DVD. If this wouldn't work, I would never do it cause I have probably 75 games or so and no way am I going to go through that hassle of loading a disk in everytime I want to play one again. Took me a long time to not have to load disks (get all the no cd cracks) and no way am I giving that up. (And, lets not get into the pirating issue here please, I have purchased ALL my games). Then I wonder when copying all the cd's of a game on to one DVD, how is the installer going to know how to move from one to the other to do the installation?

the method does not alter the data in any way, as far as the pc is concerned you have a cd in there. as long as you have fixed exe's/mini images/anything that'll allow you to play without the disc in the drive, you'll be fine.

I don't want the virtual drive thing

any other method i can think of will require much more effort and testing on your part. nerovision is for video content

[Mike89]

I don't know that much about virtual drives but I think we are talking about two different things.

I was talking about transfering games that are like on 3 or 4 cds, to one DVD so if I later needed to install them again (from scratch) I could just use one DVD instead of getting out all them dam disks. I hope they do away with cd games period. The days of a one cd game are long gone.

Seems you are talking about putting the games on a virtual drive (which means the hard drive) and playing them that way without the CD/DVD in drive. I have no need to do that. Way too much disk space to begin with (in addition to the game being already installed on the hard drive) and I already have no cd/dvd cracks to do that.

Am I missing something here?

[anonymez]

I was talking about transfering games that are like on 3 or 4 cds, to one DVD so if I later needed to install them again (from scratch) I could just use one DVD instead of getting out all them dam disks

exactly, and the method described works quite well.

virtual drive (which means the hard drive)

not necessarily. again, in this case the game cd's are as ISO images on a DVD. suggest you do a little reading up on this topic

[Mike89]

Have you ever actually done this? I don't mean taking material off more than one cd and putting it on one DVD. I'm specifically talking about doing this with game cd's to a DVD. I am still wondering how the game installer is going to be able to connect those ISOs that have been put on one DVD (like there might be 4 or 5 of them) during the game install. Is it just going to jump from one to the next to the next so the whole game installs? How does it know the order of the ISOs to jump to? I'm not talking about playing the game, I'm talking about installing the game.

Forgive me if I'm still not completely understanding you. It seems to me we are still talking about something different (or if we aren't, my knuckle head is not seeing it). You say do some reading. Well, I have done some and have never seen any material specifically pointing to what I want to do (addressing putting multiple game cds on one DVD so that you could then install the game off one DVD). I would love to read an article/guide about doing this. Dunno if there are any, but seems someone would be thinking about doing this. Games are a whole different ball game from movies or just filling up a DVD with CD data.

[NightTran]

you get all the iso cd and combine them in vision express

[anonymez]

Have you ever actually done this?

yes, i've backed up all my games this way

I am still wondering how the game installer is going to be able to connect those ISOs that have been put on one DVD (like there might be 4 or 5 of them) during the game install. Is it just going to jump from one to the next to the next so the whole game installs? How does it know the order of the ISOs to jump to?

i'm not sure if i can put it more plainly than this:

1. create ISO images of each cd of your game

2. burn those ISO images (as regular files) onto a DVD

3. pop in the dvd, mount the ISO of the 1st CD, then autoplay should kick in (or just run the installer); during install it'll ask you for the 2nd cd. you unmount the ISO image of the 1st cd, and mount the ISO of the 2nd cd. go back to the installer and click continue. then it asks for the 3rd cd, unmount the 2nd and mount the 3rd, etc

it's really very simple, just difficult to explain i guess

[Donovan]

you get all the iso cd and combine them in vision express

I just looked at Nero Vision 4, and I'm not really seeing how this would be accomplished..... pm details?