Today I found a 40gig hard drive that served me no purpose. I thought for a moment, and realized I could put all of my application/office work programs (microsoft office, drivers for stuff, etc.) onto this one hard drive. Then I want to go ahead and share this HD on the network, so that I can install these programs for anyone at any time without having to fetch the CDs.

Will this be a practical thing to do? What would be faster - installing programs (that range from KBs in size to 100's of MB in size) from a cd or from a fast ethernet(100 Mbps) switch on network?
P.S. - some cd-rom drivers read at 24x and some read at 40x. Thanks

It depends! Some programmes just will not install over a network and have to be installed from a local disk.

If you mean install to a network computer from a server, well that depends on how the installation programme was written.

However it should be a simple matter to copy the files to a local disk when they are required and delete them when the installation is complete.

Stuart

Copy iso images to the drive and allow access to the image. This would be the fastest. Then just transfer the image to each pc and open the image on that particular computer only.

IN THE MATTERS OF STYLE,
swim with the current;
in matters of principle,
STAND LIKE A ROCK

thanks lurkswithin. Could you tell me what an ISO is. I'm not having too much luck finding out what it means and what they do on the Internet. thanks

Techweb encyclopedia

google is your friend.

http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/index.php/id;1066672400;fp;1024;fpid;3

The best discription of an ISO file would be that of a regular CD music disc that one may purchase of their favorite artists. In side is 10 to 20 tracks of songs and to copy the disc normally you would have to copy each song(track) seperately one after the other. This takes time. So an ISO image is created. This is like a picture that looks like the disc but shows every minute detail of a disc.
and that ISO file is copied and transfered faster and then converted back to be burned in the convinintional way. It also allows for bootable files to be inserted and all kinds of other editing similar to picture enhancements add-ons/ins and so on. The difference being that an ISO file will fit on a floppy but can contain all the information of your 100gig harddrive.
also you can't just copy a dvd disc and have it work the same as it doesn't work like that. But with a little practice you can create iso imaging programs for self installation of about any kind of program installation that you can think off.
I use it for backing up my drives and all.In the case of a failure I can click the imagine and converted back and within a few minutes my system has been restored back to the same as when the imagine was created.
lots of practice and trial and error but most dvd/cd burning software gives details about iso imaging.

IN THE MATTERS OF STYLE,
swim with the current;
in matters of principle,
STAND LIKE A ROCK