Virtual CloneDrive is a neat little tool that creates virtual drives on your computer’s Windows operating system. These drives work and behave just like a physical CD, DVD, or Blu-ray drive. The purpose of this virtual drive is to open image files. Virtual CloneDrive supports all common image formats such as ISO, BIN, IMG, UDF, DVD, and CCD.
But ISO files are supported in Windows 10
Yes, you can mount ISO files (and IMG image files) without installing any third-party software. But you can only mount one ISO file at a time. According to Microsoft, mounting several ISO images could lead to an unstable system.
With Virtual CloneDrive, you can mount up to 15 virtual drives. And, as mentioned above, this free tool supports several additional image types that are not supported by Windows 10.
Why do I need Virtual CloneDrive?
You can, of course, use a physical drive and insert your CD, DVD, or Blu-ray discs. As long as you are okay with juggling your discs, there is no need to use virtual drives. But if you would like to save some time and effort, then a virtual solution is optimal.
Just copy the image files to your hard drive. Of course, this can take some time, but you only need to do it once. From now on, you mount the image with a couple of clicks and use the virtual drive like any other drive. One application that immediately comes to mind is playing video games. You don’t want to spend minutes inserting the physical disc into the player of your computer whenever the game needs to load additional content for the next level. And some computers don’t even come with a player anymore.
Another application would be to save movies images (from DVDs or Blu-rays) or audio CDs on your computer. Again, after transferring the images to your computer, there will no longer be a need for physical media.
Are there disadvantages?
The only downside I can think of is that you need the storage space required to store complex games or movies on your computer. A single game or movie can take several Gigabytes of your hard drive.
