DVD ISO Tools
I have a reasonably large collection of DVDs which I have ripped to ISO images. The reason for this is twofold - I want to have a backup just in case the dvds ever go missing or something, and in the future I want to be able to play them on a windows media centre pc. For now, I will only be playing them on a computer, but even here the process could be streamlined a bit:
- Use Nero Image Drive or similar to mount dvd
- Open media player
- Play DVD
OK, it's not that cumbersome, but wouldn't it be much easier if I could just double click the ISO to play it? Well, I have. And here's how.
- I downloaded filedisk.zip from http://www.acc.umu.se/~bosse/
- I ran the .reg program included in the archive, copied the filedisk.exe to my c:\windows folder and copied the filedisk.sys to my c:\windows\system32\drivers folder
- I rebooted, as per the filedisk instructions
- Next I created some .cmd files to do the work of mounting, unmounting and playing the iso files
filedisk.cmd
c:\windows\filedisk.exe /umount z:
c:\windows\filedisk.exe /mount 0 %1 /cd z:
c:\WINDOWS\explorer.exe z:
filedisk_mplayer.cmd
c:\windows\filedisk.exe /umount z:
c:\windows\filedisk.exe /mount 0 %1 /cd z:
"c:\Program Files\Windows Media Player\wmplayer.exe" /prefetch:4 /device:DVD z: /fullscreen &
filedisk_umount.cmd
c:\windows\filedisk.exe /umount z:
- I gathered all of this together in windows explorer:
- Tools > Folder options
- File Types
- New
- File Extension: iso
- Details for ISO extension > Advanced
- Changed the icon to something suitable from shell32.dll
- Created 3 new actions
- "Browse Files" [C:\WINDOWS\filedisk.cmd "%1"]
- "Play in Media Player" [C:\WINDOWS\filedisk_mplayer.cmd "%1"]
- "Unmount" [C:\WINDOWS\filedisk_umount.cmd "%1"]
- I made "Play in Media Player" the default