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copy protection - secret drivers installed

that's just fcking sick, and all points made in that topic are correct, I use a noCD for ALL my games, wether they are legally obtained or not doesnt matter, I do not want to play a discjockey all time just because I want to play a game, there is no data on the CD that they need anyways, it's just the copy protection, which hinders about everyone except the people it is supposed to hinder.
 
I've been getting very annoyed with some of the protection techniques out in general use. Many of which are poorly tested, and buggy - and interfere with legitimate users. In a number of cases, the problems caused by the protection, are not always recognisable or fixable by the support teams (see the anecdote below). Does anyone know what proportion of tech. support calls are due to malfunctioning protection software? This would be an interesting statistic.

Perhaps, things would have been better if the CD-RW drive manufacturers had made an agreement with the publishers not to support the writing of certain protection techniques - in the same way that VCR manufacturers made an agreement with Macrovision, so that macrovision encoded signals would not be recorded.

Now we have all manner of methods - most proprietary, and some stronger than others. Some more invasive than others. However, interfering with other software, stealth installation of system-level drivers and profiling the software on your machine, are unacceptable in my opinion.

I remember a few years ago, when I bought Railroad tycoon II - I bought it at full price. It would not run at all on my machine.

I made several calls to the premium rate tech support line but they were unable to help - you could try another CD-ROM drive, was their most helpful suggestion.

I tried to take the game back to the shop - "You should have checked compatability before buying, Sir." "Sorry, but software, once opened, cannot be returned for exchange or refund under any circumstances."

I was about to write-off the £35 I had paid, when I tried something I'd promised myself never to do - support a warez site and download a crack. I installed it, and the game worked perfectly thereafter. I never sent a disparaging letter to the publisher, though I had much fun writing it.
 
Personally ( without reading the article in question yet ) i just emulate cd drives, i have 5 'virtual' drives and once i get a new game, i just rip it to my 120gb hdd and choose a virtual drive to play it, then i install the game from the virtual drive and never need the real cd in the real drive again. Now then, whats this article ...
 
i have tried using virtual CD drives but for some reason it never works, i guess i haven't bypasssed the CP very well....
anyways under the DMCA making backups of encrypted games is totally illegal
 
Originally posted by: crazycarl
i have tried using virtual CD drives but for some reason it never works, i guess i haven't bypasssed the CP very well....
anyways under the DMCA making backups of encrypted games is totally illegal
Click to expand...

Don't be so sure. I believe reverse engineering for compatibility purposes is allowed under the DMCA. Cracking the encryption to make a legit backup (fair use) of the cd should fall under that. IANAL though. 😉

One of these days I'll hire a lawyer for lunch or something just to pick his brain.
 
hah yea , i think u have to get an exemption from congress to reverse engineer though? not entirely sure
btw love your sig quote!!!
 
Originally posted by: crazycarl
hah yea , i think u have to get an exemption from congress to reverse engineer though? not entirely sure
btw love your sig quote!!!
Click to expand...

Maybe. I'm _really_ bad with processes. 😛

The sig changes frequently, but GWB quotes are frequent. There is just so much that he said worth remembering. 😉
 
if it did i bet someone's firewall would have picked it up by now...
i don't think 'spyware' is the real issue, more or less just crappy driver coding which has caused a lot of BSOD from what i hear? i dunno. i am too poor to buy games so i don't have to deal with CP very much 🙂
 
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