What are / how to use ISO files

[Guest]

Hello All,

Through college, I have access to a Microsoft alliance whereby students can
download various Microsoft products. Some of these products download as
files with an *.ISO extension. I understand that these have something to do
with burning to a CD. I can burn them to a CD just like any other file. Can
anyone explain how to use these files? Can they be converted to *.exe files
and be unzipped or something? How do I get them to an installable format?

TIA,
Rich

 

[Dave Patrick]

This link may help.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;279157

--
Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

:
| Hello All,
|
| Through college, I have access to a Microsoft alliance whereby students
can
| download various Microsoft products. Some of these products download as
| files with an *.ISO extension. I understand that these have something to
do
| with burning to a CD. I can burn them to a CD just like any other file.
Can
| anyone explain how to use these files? Can they be converted to *.exe
files
| and be unzipped or something? How do I get them to an installable format?
|
| TIA,
| Rich

 

[neo [mvp outlook]]

Hi Rich

ISO file is an exact copy of a CD. You can't just burn it to a CD like a
normal file. Programs like Nero, EZ-CD Creator, ISO Burner, .etc. There
are other programs like WinRAR or ISO Buster that can extract its contents.
Heck if you didn't want to burn it all, you could even use a Virtual CD
program like
http://download.microsoft.com/downl...d58df02efa2/winxpvirtualcdcontrolpanel_21.exe
to mount the ISO file and access the files it contains.

 

[Woody]

using nero , go file>burn image or follow the instructions that come with
your burning program and you'll wind up with an installation cd , you can't
just copy the iso file to a cd .

 

[James A. Smith]

You use a .iso file to burn a "image" of a CD in most cases.
Most software that comes with CD-R/RW burners can do this such as Nero.

You can sort of think of a .iso file as a super .zip file.

What was done in many cases is that all the files that were on a CD were
copied into a .iso then people can download the .iso file and then using the
software people that did download the .iso now have a copy of the first CD.

This is one way people get the setup disks for Linux and other programs.

 

[George Hester]

You can always "open and extract them with ISO Buster."

http://www.smart-projects.net/isobuster/

 

[NobodyMan]

On Sun, 12 Dec 2004 14:30:55 -0500, "George Hester"

_______________________________

You can always "open and extract them with ISO Buster."

http://www.smart-projects.net/isobuster/

While this is true, many program won't install from the files,
extracted from the ISO, that are now sitting on a hard drive. Caution
is advised when trying this. ISOs were not meant to be extracted to a
hard drive and used, they were meant to be burned onto a CD.

 

[George Hester]

Really? I have never seen that. The only one that I know of that does this is Autocad and no I don't want to get
into why I say that. The solution is to use Subst and map a drive letter to the folder appropriately named that
contains the extracted ISO. Or use the virtual CD-ROM player described above.

 

[Alex Nichol]

Through college, I have access to a Microsoft alliance whereby students can
download various Microsoft products. Some of these products download as
files with an *.ISO extension. I understand that these have something to do
with burning to a CD. I can burn them to a CD just like any other file.

They are complete images of a CD, including all the directory Info. So
you do not burn them as Files. You need one of the third party
'mastering programs to do it.

In 'Nero' take Recorder Menu and Burn Image (you will have to change the
file extension it looks for to be ISO)

In 'Easy CD Creator' ver 6 it is File menu - Create disk from Image