[Pisces]

Another option is to make an image file of the CD (usually a .iso format) and copy it over through the network onto your harddrive. Use software like Deamon Tools to mount that file making into a virtual cdrom drive.

For the old games you could also try to run them in a Virtual Machine. Which is similar to dosbox, but it simulates a complete pc, not just dos. I never liked dosbox. It just doesn't fit with me. Or me with it. For dos games you need Microsoft Virtual PC 2004, since support for it has been removed in more current versions of it. Though I did have trouble with it's native dos-memory manager. It didn't like me using the MSDOS 6.22 emm386.exe and himem.sys memory manager, but Silent Hunter 1 didn't like the native memory manager either. Perhaps your games are less of a problem. But there are also other brands of virtual machine software (like Vmware). Microsoft is just free for download and use. Also, a cd-image is easily mounted in a virtual machine as if it is a real cdrom. I ran 2 Windows Server2008 and one Vista virtual machines today on a 3Ghz (hyperthreading) machine with 2 GB. It wasn't quick, but didn't choke either. Just laggy as hell with that load on it's back. So I'm sure it has no problem with an old game that needs below GHz specs.