VirtuoCD - Virtual CD Manager  V1.4 Shareware version
Stephen J. Prochniak (Proch@VirtuoCD.com)
Derek C. Cianci (Derek@VirtuoCD.com)
Copyright  1999,2000

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SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM FOR INFO ON THE FULL FEATURED VCD
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What's NEW in 1.4
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GUI
-COMPRESSION (Does not work on FAT16)
-Option to start minimized in tray
-Checkboxes work the way they should now.  On Click instead of On close
-A new and smarter Get Image dialog.  Handles errors.  Lets you ignore errors on old and scratched up CDs so that you can still get something of an image
-No Service Pack 4 pre-requisite anymore
-New help button whisks you away to the new virtuoCD web site.

DRIVER
-Win2k Explorer crash fixed.

what's NEW in 1.3
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GUI
-minor cosmetic fixes
-A brand new "Import" feature which allows you to do the following:
1)  Move images to another machine without having to use the original CD
2)  Mount ISO images that come from elsewhere (not from a CD that you have)
3)  Automatically converts BIN type images to ISO.

DRIVER
-Fixed a bug where there is a small memory leak every time you remove a CD.  
-Fixed a bug where a CD would still appear to be in the drive after it was removed.

What's NEW in 1.2
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GUI
-a few cosmetic changes.  Mostly to make small fonts look normal.
-Fixed bug where some CDs would show up twice in the library

DRIVER
-Improved performance
-Fixed bug where system could freeze under stress test

What's NEW in 1.1
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Alot of GUI improvements, including:
-Drag CDs to insert or remove
-Store notes, such as CD Keys with each disk
-Various minor enhancements

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Installation over Previous versions
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1.  Unzip the contents of this package into the directory where VCD exists.
2.  Copy VCD.sys to %systemroot%\system32\drivers\   (commonly c:\winnt\system32\drivers\)
3.  Reboot




What is VirtuoCD?

	VirtuoCD?is a Virtual disk driver and GUI that allows you to copy an image of a 
CD to your hard drive.  It then gives you the ability to mount this drive as a volume.
The manager allows you to "Create" virtual disk drives, which will appear in 
explorer or file manager.  You then use the VCD manager to insert or remove virtual CDs.


Why VirtuoCD?

	Remember when you got your first CD ROM drive?  You probably had a 486 machine
with about 16 MB of RAM, and a hard drive that was about 512 MB.  You also probably 
remember installing some software from 20 or 30 1.44 MB floppies, this was brutal. 
CDs came along and provided us with a large removable storage medium.  Although slow,
(a 2x drive was about 300 KB/s with a lousy seek time) they greatly enhanced our
ability to distribute and install software.

	Things are different now though, as you can get yourself a ~40 GB hard drive
for a reasonable price.  It'd be nice to only have to use the slow CD only once, and
not have to constantly switch CDs whenever you want to use another program that requires
a CD (a lot of games, libraries, and encyclopedias do).  These are the benefits of using
VirtuoCD:
-Faster access to your CD data
-Don't wait for the CD to speed up everytime you access it
-Switch CDs with the click of a button or two
-Don't have to worry about damaged media (scratches!)


System Requirements:
-Winnt 4.0 or Win2000
-Enough memory to run Winnt 4.0 or 2000
-A hard drive big enough to store any image that you might want to make


Using VirtuoCD:

Installation:

1) unzip the VirtuoCD files into a directory that has a lot of room in it.  I suggest buying
a new hard drive specifically for VirtuoCD.  Of course, if you are reading this, you probably
already unzipped the files.  In this case, copy or move them.  You should have the 
following files:

VCD.sys
VCD.exe
Default.vdd
README.txt
License.txt
Msvcrt.dll
MFC42.dll

2) run VCD.exe and follow the instructions.  VirtuoCD sould notice that it needs to install
the driver.  Once it has installed the driver successfully, you will need to reboot
so the OS recognizes the new driver.


Getting images:

1) Click on "Get Image".  You have to make up a friendly name for the CD (one that you will
use to select the CD when you want to put it in the drive), and pick the drive letter
of the CD ROM that the disc is in.  Click OK, and go do something that takes 5 minutes or so.


Mounting Images (Inserting virtual CDs):

1) On the right, you have a list of the CD images that you have taken.  On the left, is 
the list of available drives.  Choose both an image and a drive and click "Insert a VCD".
You may now use the drive just as you would a normal CD.  You can also use drag and drop
to both insert and remove CDs.


Options:

Start VirtuoCD on login:  VirtuoCD will be placed in your startup group.
Autorun:  When you insert discs, autorun will occur in whatever fashion it did as a CD.


Other info:

-The VCD.exe will start the driver automatically once it is executed. 
-VirtuoCD lives in your "system tray" where the clock is.  You can always press close
in the manager, and you can still use your virtual drives.  
-Left click on the icon in the system tray to bring the manager back.  
-Right click on the icon to Exit the manager (You can STILL use your drives)


BUG REPORTING:
Report bugs to proch@mediaone.net


What does the registered version have?

The real version will do all the things that the shareware version does, plus (at least) the following:

-the ability to create multiple virtual drives.

Later versions MAY have the following: (I won't guarantee these, but if they're easy to implement, they'll be there)

-Support for Audio CDs
-Writable CDROM drives.  IE, take an image of a CD ROM and use it as a writable CDROM.



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ORDERING INFORMATION
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See the official VirtuoCD web page at http://www.VirtuoCD.com for ordering
information.

