digital download pc games of disk Digital download pc games of disk. The previous The Best CD-Reader article was totally outdated as we now know more about the SafeDisc & SecuROM protections than back when it was written. There for we've created this article on how to make a working backup of a Protected Game CD or when this is not possible, because of hardware limitation, to at least be able to play a Protected Game CD from an imperfect backup. It is still possible to create working Backups of most Copy Protected game CDs without the use of additional patches. The only thing required is a CD-Reader & CD-Writer which can read & write RAW DAO & Sub-Channel Data and software which supports writing in RAW Mode with Sub-Channel Data . These software packages are: - The best available Game Backup software currently available! When it is not possible to select the RAW Mode then most likely the CD-Reader or CD-Writer does not support this mode. It is however still possible to make a backup but additional tools are required to remove the actually protection (see Non RAW Backups ). There are a few utilities available which can identify which CD Protection is being used on your game CDs. Here is a complete overview of these tools, available @ CD Media World : If your CD-Writer/Reader does not support RAW writing/Reading then it is not possible to make a 100% working standalone backup but it is still possible to play a backup using these utilities: unSafeDisc v1.5.5 - SafeDisc unSafeDisc v2.40.10 & 2.51.xx - SafeDisc v2 UnSecuROM v1.0 - SecuROM & SecuROM v2 DAEMON Tools v4.x - SafeDisc, SafeDisc v2, SecuROM, SecuROM v2 & LaserLock PlayBackup v2.1 - SafeDisc v2, SecuROM & SecuROM v2 InseKtors v1.1 - SafeDisc & SafeDisc v2. For example MaxPayne v1.01 was blacklisting DAEMON Tools v2.74 & PlayBackup v2.1 . The MaxPayne blacklist problem was again fixed in DAEMON Tools v2.79 . But keep in mind that this process will happen over and over again. It's just a cat & mouse game with every new version of the SafeDisc v2/v3 protection! Most of the Philips , Lite-On & Plextor CD-Writers can handle any CD Protection, a lot of CD-Writer manufacturers have been using Philips drives in their own drives so these will also work fine. Here is an overview of the Philips CD-Writers to date: BlindWrite - Tested CD-Writers A real good overview of CD-Writers which support DA0-RAW modes. CD Media World - CD-Writer Technology The best available resource to see which CD-Writer manufacturer is using which drive on the inside! [email protected] @K - SafeDisc 2 Compatible Writer List A very complete overview of CD-Writers which can handle the SafeDisc v2 CD-Protection . CloneCD - Manufacturers of CD recorders A complete overview of all available CD-Writers which are compatible with CloneCD (and in which mode they work the best). CD Mate - Supported CD recorders A complete overview of all available CD-Writers including which writing modes they support! RAW Writing Mode List for RICOH CD-R/RW Drives A complete overview of Ricoh CD-Writers which can handle DA0-RAW mode. First identify which CD/DVD protection is being used on your Game CD/DVD (see Identifying a CD/DVD Protection ). Startup Alcohol 120%. From the [ Main ] Menu click " Copy Wizard ". Select the CD/DVD Device from which the Game CD is being read. Select the CD/DVD protection from the Datatype pull-down button at the bottom of the window. This will auto-configure Alcohol 120% for the optimum backup settings. When ready Click the [ Next > ] button. Select " Image Location " where the Game CD Image should be stored. When ready Click the [ Next > ] button. Select the " CD/DVD Recorder " to which the CD Image will be written to. All settings are again auto-configured for the optimum backup settings. When ready Click the [ Start ] button. Play the game! Here are the instructions to make a working backup of most Protected CDs using CloneCD 4 in combination with a CD-Reader/CD-Writer which can both can handle RAW DAO : Create the following directory (if it exists already empty it): : C:\TEMP\CD Data Read Settings Tab: Set Read Speed Data to 1x (176 kByte/s) Select Read SubChannel Data from Data Tracks (default) Select Regenerate Data Sectors (default) Set Read Speed Audio to 1x (176 kByte/s) Set Audio Extraction Quality to Medium (Fast) (default) Select Read SubChannel Data from Audio Tracks (default) UnSelect Only read the first Session (default) Set Fast Error Skip to Automatic (default) Set Sector Skip to 100 (default) UnSelect Abort on Read Error (default) Select Don't report read errors (default) Select Intelligent Bad Sector Scanner (default) Set Write Speed to any desired speed Select Don't Repair SubChannel Data (default) Select Always close last Session. Here are the instructions to make a working backup of most Protected CDs using CloneCD 3 in combination with a CD-Reader/CD-Writer which can both can handle RAW DAO : Digital game downloads are worse for the environment than Blu-ray discs. You would think that the world would be a less polluted place if everyone switched to digital downloads, lessening the number of physical objects — and factories to produce them — in the world. A recent study suggests that even though removing physical objects lowers the potential for future for garbage and factory pollution, going digital isn’t the best answer to cleaning up the planet — in fact, the carbon footprint of downloading games is actually higher than buying a physical copy. The study, published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology , focuses on the carbon footprint of games distribution — specifically, an 8.8GB PlayStation 3 game — using the metrics of a typical UK production and distribution cycle. When measuring carbon emissions, there are more factors that go into the both the physical retail and digital cycles than it may seem. Aside from the obvious metric of factories creating the discs and packaging, other factors — such as the vehicles used to deliver the products, and the output created when eventually disposing of the items — contribute to the overall footprint. The same applies to digitally distributed games, like if televisions and monitors are powered on during a long download — something that doesn’t apply to purchasing a retail disc. Surprisingly, it turned out that the carbon emissions of a retail disc — including the production, vehicle delivery, and so on — were actually lower than that of a downloaded game. Carbon emissions for the 8.8GB PS3 disc were estimated to be around 20.82 kilograms, but an equivalent digital download reached 27.53 kilograms. Various factors contribute to the increased carbon footprint of a downloaded game, such as the electricity used by the downloader, the power used by data centers to deliver the content, and even the power used to created the digital file in the first place. The study does admit, though, that it had to make quite a few assumptions for one reason or another. As the study states, for instance, the type of software used, the purpose of a download, and the resources available to any given company are not totally available on an individual basis. However, there are available plausible averages that can be used. The study does look to the future, but notes that it’s too early to tell to see if carbon emissions of digital games will remain the same or decrease. In theory, internet efficiency will increase in the future, thus lowering the carbon footprint of a downloaded title. However, games generally increase in file size, and it’s difficult to discern whether or not internet speeds will increase enough in order to lower download times despite the larger file sizes. Other factors that are just now becoming widespread, such as remote downloading while you’re commuting home from work or being able to use your console while a game downloads in the background, will also play important roles in the game industry’s carbon footprint. If you’re (perhaps overly) environmentally conscientious and worried about the carbon footprint your gaming hobby will have on this planet, you might want to stick to physical retail purchases for now. If you’re all-in on the digital revolution but still feel guilty about (barely) negatively impacting the environment, you can purchase some carbon offsets from us here at ExtremeTech and we’ll stop downloading bad games when we’re bored. How to Create ISO Files From Discs on Windows, Mac, and Linux. Chris Hoffman is Editor-in-Chief of How-To Geek. He's written about technology for over a decade and was a PCWorld columnist for two years. Chris has written for The New York Times, been interviewed as a technology expert on TV stations like Miami's NBC 6, and had his work covered by news outlets like the BBC. Since 2011, Chris has written over 2,000 articles that have been read nearly one billion times---and that's just here at How-To Geek. Read more. An ISO file is a complete disc image of a CD or DVD bundled into a single file. You can mount an ISO file to make it available as a virtual CD or DVD, allowing you to convert physical discs to virtual ones. ISO files are particularly useful if you want to use old game or software discs on a modern computer that doesn’t have a disc drive. Although, you should note that some DRM copy protection schemes won’t work with ISO files, unless you jump through additional hoops. ISO files are also great for things like providing a disc to a virtual machine program, or just saving a copy of a disc so that you can recreate it in the future if you need to. Windows. Windows doesn’t have a built-in way to create ISO files, although modern versions of Windows— Windows 8, 8.1, and 10—can all natively mount ISO files without any additional software. To actually create an ISO file from your own physical disc, you’ll need a third-party program. There are lots of tools that can do this, but you need to be careful because many of them are packed with junkware. As always, we recommend Ninite as a safe place to grab tools of all sorts. On the ISO front, Ninite includes tools like InfraRecorder, ImgBurn, and CDBurnerXP. Just be sure to download them through Ninite. Some of these programs—like ImgBurn—do include junkware in their installers if you get them from elsewhere. After you choose and install one of these tools, all you really have to do is insert a CD or DVD into your PC, click the option for reading a disc or creating an ISO, and then select a location to save the ISO file. macOS. On a Mac, you can use Disk Utility to create images of discs. To open it, press Command+Space to open the Spotlight search box, type “Disk Utility”, and then press Enter. Insert a disc, click the File menu, and point to New > Disc Image from [Device]. Select “DVD/CD master” as the format and leave encryption disabled. Disk Utility will create a .cdr file from the disc. On a Mac, this is practically as good as an ISO file. You can “mount” it from within the Disk Utility application by clicking File > Open Disk Image. Assuming you just want to use the .cdr file on a Mac, you can leave it as a .cdr file. If you want to convert it to an ISO file to use on other operating systems, you can do so with a Terminal command. Open a Terminal window and run the following command: Replace “/home/username/original.cdr” with the path to the CDR file and “/home/username/destination.iso” with a path for the ISO file you want to create. In many cases, you may be able to rename the .cdr file to an .iso file and be done with it, but this method doesn’t always work. We recommend sticking with the terminal command. Linux. On Linux, you can create an ISO file from the terminal or with any disc-burning utility your Linux distribution may include. For example, Ubuntu uses the Brasero disc-burning utility. Open the Brasero Disc Burner, click “Disc Copy,” and then you can copy an inserted disc to an “Image File.” Other Linux distributions and desktops may include similar tools. Look for a CD/DVD-related utility and it should have an option to copy a disc to an ISO disc image file. Note : Brasero was removed from the default installation in Ubuntu 16.04, so you’ll need to install Brasero from the Ubuntu Software Center. Creating an ISO file from the terminal is as simple as running the below command: Replace “/dev/cdrom” with the path to your CD drive—for example, it may be “/dev/dvd” instead—and “/home/username/cd.iso” with the path to the ISO file you want to create. You can mount the resulting disc images with the “mount” command in a terminal or with graphical tools that basically just provide a prettier interface over the mount command. Once you have your ISO files, you can copy them to a computer’s hard drive, store them on a USB drive, or make them available on the network. Any computer without a disc drive can read them and use them as a virtual disc. Disc or Digital Games, Which Downloads Faster. I'm getting an Xbox One this Christmas and I'll have multiple games, both disc and digital, to download onto it. I want to know which kind of game will download fastest so I'll have something to play while I'm waiting for the other games to download. Subscribe Subscribe to RSS feed. Report abuse. Was this discussion helpful? Sorry this didn't help. Great! Thanks for your feedback. How satisfied are you with this discussion? Thanks for your feedback, it helps us improve the site. How satisfied are you with this discussion? Thanks for your feedback. Replies (6) Depends, disc will install faster, but only if you go into offline mode, otherwise the Xbox will try to download patches before installing the disc, and games this generation have really big updates, I thin Halo:MCC had like a 15gb day one patch. And with downloading, I don't find it too bad because you can play other games or do something else while it's downloading unlike the 360, I normally see my Xbox downloading at about 35mbps. And i f you're getting it for Christmas, prepare yourself, things might get bad because of all of the gamers getting their console on Christmas as well, and last year there was the DDoS attack that took down Live for a few hours. Digital download pc games of disk. 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: - Read a disc to an image file - Create an image file from files on your computer or network - or you can write the files directly to a disc - Write an image file to a disc - Check a disc is 100% readable. Optionally, you can also have ImgBurn compare it against a given image file to ensure the actual data is correct - Put your drive / media to the test! Used in combination with DVDInfoPro , you can check the quality of the burns your drive is producing. ImgBurn supports a wide range of image file formats - including BIN, CCD, CDI, CUE, DI, DVD, GI, IMG, ISO, MDS, NRG and PDI. It can burn Audio CD's from any file type supported via DirectShow / ACM - including AAC, APE, FLAC, M4A, MP3, MP4, MPC, OGG, PCM, WAV, WMA and WV. You can use it to build DVD Video discs (from a VIDEO_TS folder), HD DVD Video discs (from a HVDVD_TS folder) and Blu-ray Video discs (from a BDAV / BDMV folder) with ease. It supports Unicode folder/file names, so you shouldn't run in to any problems if you're using an international character set. ImgBurn supports all the Microsoft Windows OS's - Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT4, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 2008, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10 (including all the 64-bit versions). If you use Wine , it should also run on Linux and other x86-based Unixes. It's a very flexible application with several advanced features that are often lacking in other tools, especially when it comes to burning DVD Video discs. It supports all the latest drives without the need for updates (including booktype / bitsetting / advanced settings on many of the major ones - i.e. BenQ, LiteOn, LG, NEC, Optiarc, Pioneer, Plextor, Samsung, Sony). There is an image queue system for when you're burning several images (which you can automatically share between multiple drives if you have more than one) and an easy-to-use layer break selection screen for double layer DVD Video jobs. The Automatic Write Speed feature allows you store your favourite burn speed settings on a per 'Media ID' basis, right down to a drive by drive level. Data captured during the burn (write speed, buffer levels etc) can be displayed / analysed using DVDInfoPro . Whilst ImgBurn is designed to work perfectly straight out of the box, advanced users will appreciate just how configurable it is. Oh and let's not forget the best thing about it. it's 100% FREE ;-) Please do not use this software to make illegal copies of copyrighted discs. If everyone who likes my program donates $2 (or whatever they can afford), I'll be able get more drives working, test with more types of media and add more exciting new features! It's another 'quick fix' release to workaround the 'Insecure Library Loading Vulnerability' (MSA 2269637) in Windows. This one also adds proper (as in, multi-session/track) support for the .CDI image file format. * Requires pfctoc.dll from the 'Padus .CDI File Mounter' package (pfctoc.zip) which can be downloaded (free of charge) from Padus's website. There's a link on the 'Download' page. Following on from the Primera Technology range of auto-loaders support added in the previous version, this one adds support for the new Vinpower Digital RipBox. As usual, there are a few additions, changes and fixes too. I have quite a large collection of optical drives now (way beyond the capacity of my PC) and I've always wished I could have a few more on-hand for testing with. That's where my recent discovery of the 'Addonics Storage Tower' comes in! Addonics have Storage Tower units supporting 5 or 9 drives and up to 5 drives can be controlled via a single eSATA cable from your PC (9 therefore requires 2 cables). If any of the above sounds interesting to you, please take a look at the review I've just published. Following on from the Acronova Nimbie support added in the previous version, this one adds support for the Primera Technology range of auto- loaders. As usual, there are a few additions, changes and fixes too. Along with the usual endless list of tweaks and fixes (look at the changelog), this one includes support for Acronova Nimbie duplicator units and has a new Explorer style pane at the top of the Disc Layout Editor window. As it happens, the v2.4 series did need another 'maintenance' release and this is it. sorry! As the name suggests, the site is dedicated to providing you with a one-stop-shop for the latest firmware releases for your optical disc drives. The site is a joint venture between the man behind 'Digital Digest' and us lot (and by that I mean myself and the beta team!). The site has actually been up and running for a few weeks now, but with the release of v2.4.3.0, I figured now was a good time to plug it! Thanks again to everyone that have helped make this release possible. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank a few of the unsung heroes out there. 1. The Beta Team - They find the bugs so you don't have to! Occassionally they also come up with some decent ideas and if I'm feeling in a good mood I implement them! 2. The Translators - Helping to bring ImgBurn to the masses! I've enough trouble just doing the 'English (United Kingdom)' version so it's great that others take the time to translate it into their own language. 3. The Donors - All the kind people out there that donate some of their hard earnt cash. Seriously, without you lot ImgBurn wouldn't exist. In this release you'll find some new features such as BIN/CUE support (yes, that includes multi-session/track images, CD Audio etc) along with support for newer revisions of UDF (1.50, 2.00, 2.01, 2.50 and 2.60). For a more detailed list, please click the link below. » Contact I'm not a company, I'm just me. » License First and foremost, ImgBurn is a freeware tool. You cannot bundle it with your own commercial application and you cannot sell it in any way, shape or form. As an individual, you're allowed to use it anywhere you like - be it at home or at work (assuming they don't mind of course!).