Recently I've started getting all of my games online, through such sources as Steam, I find this great because anyone will tell you that I'm impossibly bad at keeping track of CD's and finding them when I want to play a game can be a pain. To this end I've decided I want to back up all of my PC games to my external hard drive (and before you say it it's not illegal, I checked and I'm exercising a legal right). So does anyone have any idea how I could create a 1:1 .iso (or other format that's virtually mountable) so that I can keep them along side my game files and mount them when necessary? I've had a look at some Slyfox software, Alcohol 120%, CopyCD, Nero but none of them do true 1:1 including copy protection (again what I want to do is perfectly legal under EU legislation). Could I get a new DVD drive that would make a true 1:1 image? Any help / pokes in the right direction would be lovely. P.S. I only have about 20 games still but they range from the 90's (E.G. Little Big Adventure) to some later ones (E.G. Oblivion and a few Games for Windows Live games which I'm told are notoriously troublesome).
Why would you want to? The whole benefit of digital distribution services like Steam is that you can just re-download the game whenever you want to. Their servers are the backup, so you don't have to do it.
Ive got slysofts anydvd and it works perfectly, Ive been converting all my dvds to .iso for my media center. The only disk ive had that it hasnt worked with is silent hill, no idea why though.
Read my post properly before replying. Edit: That was harsh, I was implying that I need to backup my older games, I'm well aware of Steam and it's system.
I assume so , I put the disk in select copy to .iso, select where to save it and it does its thing. The files are massive though 4Gb+ and if i burn it back to a dvd i get the exact same disk as the original, with no quality issues, You can download a trial off there website, its only a small download and should only take minutes.
And you don't need to worry about anyone on this forum moaning because your backing up. I'm sure most of the people on here agree that the laws that state that you aren't allowed to back things up etc are complete BS. oh, and welcome to Bit-Tech
Open steam. File menu. backup games. Saves downloading them, if you need to reinstall, or install on another PC. open the folder and run steambakcup. job done. You might want to back up any save games from my docks.
it's a pretty badly worded post, then! i didn't get that at all. anyway, cloneDVD should do it for ya. you might still need a securom crack though.
Doesn't read that way. "I started getting all my games online including steam I now want to back them all up".
I suggest you borrow a tape-to-tape machine. You can make a toastie in your brevel toaster and watch the generation game while you wait...
In a thread asking how to backup 1:1. The rest of your OP not mentioning you already know about Steam backups.
To directly answer your question: I'd recommend PowerISO, which is what I use for opening/editing/creating/burning/mounting images. It's gimped in functionality without registration but otherwise it's power and worth it as a be-all end-all image program. Now having said that, tbh it's totally pointless to use anything other than Steam's built-in backup feature. Regardless of the situation I can't understand why you wouldn't just use it. But that's just me.