Romey has a question for us:
Hi Matt. I have some teaching CDs I want to make a copy of. When I copy them my computer won't play them as it asks for the original disc. Is there a program that will override this problem? Thanks if you can help.
Copying game or program CDs and DVDs is more complicated than copying music CDs as you need an exact copy not just a rewrite of the data
Some commercial discs have copy protection built in so if the burned copy isn't an exact replica the burned disc might not work correctly – I suspect this is what is happening to you.
Obviously there are copyright issues to consider here
Some people make back-up copies of discs they own to protect the originals from scratches and damage and that seems fair to me
Do you have access to the originals discs?
So to copy them successfully you need to do so in a particular way that makes a bit by bit copy of the disc
Usually the easy way is to make an exact ‘image’ of the disc and then burn that image to another disc. This is similar to the discussion we have had about using Acronis True Image and other ways to Back-up your system
There are specialised programs for making images. I Like ImgBurn and Daemon Tools
According to their website: 
ImgBurn is a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application that everyone should have in their toolkit!
It has several 'Modes', each one for performing a different task:
So you can use this free program to copy a disc to your computer as an image file and then write the image to another disc as a backup. It is a very powerful program and the ‘deep geeks’ swear by it. But is is easy enough to use for beginners and the help and user forums are available too. Did I mention ImgBurn is small to download an free!
Here is tutorial on how to make an image using ImgBurn copied from www.ehow.com
How to Build an Image File With ImgBurn
Step1 - Download and install ImgBurn from its official website. You can choose from a variety of download sites, and the installation file's relatively small, so it shouldn't take long to save.
Step2 - Launch ImgBurn. Unless you changed its installation settings, you can find ImgBurn shortcuts on your desktop, in its Start Menu "Programs" folder or in the Quick Launch menu.
Step3 - Choose either "Create Image File from Disc" or "Create Image File from Files and Folders" from the opening screen of options. Pick the first if you're building an image from a DVD and the second if you're building one from video files on your hard drive.
Step4 - Pick the drive holding your DVD from the "Source" drop-down menu. ImgBurn automatically chooses what it thinks is the right one, but if you've got more than one, you may need to manually pick the drive.
Step5 - Click the folder icon next to the "Destination" field and choose where ImgBurn will save the finished image file.
Step6 - Press the big button showing two DVD discs to read the DVD and begin building the image file.
Burning an image file to disc is just as easy. For more tutorials & guides refer to the ImgBurn Forum
The only thing that ImgBurn doesn’t do is ‘mount’ an image to your PC. Mounting an image is basically a way to ‘trick’ your PC with software into thinking that the image file is actually a physical Disc in an extra CD/DVD drive. The extra drive with a new drive letter will pop up and interact with Windows in the same way your physical CD/DVD drive does. Using images and mounting them is actually a good way to store Discs you access regularly as it is much faster than waiting for the CD to spin in your physical drive.
I have recently started using Daemon Tools lite which is very good and free
http://www.daemon-tools.cc
Download
http://www.daemon-tools.cc/downloads
You can use Daemon Tools to make an image file, or you can stick with ImgBurn for creation. Once you have an image file use Daemon Tools to mount the image. Basically just run the program and click File-Open and select your image file. If you open My Computer you will find your ‘new’ drive ready to go.
So hopefully that answers Romey’s question. Does anyone use the programs above or some alternatives. Have you had any success making image files in the past? Would you like to know more? Then leave us a comment on the site using our brand new comment section. Thanks :)
Comments for this post
