Virtual disk andvirtual drive are software components thatemulate an actualdisk storage device.[1]
Virtual disks and virtual drives are common components ofvirtual machines inhardware virtualization, but they are also widely used for various purposes unrelated to virtualization, such as for the creation oflogical disks, software development, testing environments, and data management. They offer flexibility, ease of management, and the ability to simulate different storage environments without needing the corresponding physical hardware.
A virtual drive is a software component that emulates an actual disk drive. To other programs, a virtual drive looks and behaves like an actual physical device.
In modern operating systems, all storage media appears to programs asdevice drivers, which abstract away the physical implementation differences between different storage media. Consequently, a virtual drive is a device driver with an additionallayer of abstraction between theinterface and the underlying physical storage medium.
A virtual disk may be in any of the following forms:
In hardware virtualization, virtual machines implement virtual drives as part of their efforts to emulate the behavior of an actual machine.[2] As with an ordinary computer, a virtual machine needs one virtual drive and one disk image tostart up, except when it is performing anetwork boot. More virtual drives are added as needed.
Virtual optical drives are used on physical computers to transfer the contents of the optical disks onto hard disk drives. Doing so helps in resolving the problem of the short life span ofCDs andDVDs and takes advantage of the faster data transfer rate of hard disk drives. However, virtual optical drives are also used forsoftware piracy: earlycomputer games used disc existence verification to ensure licensed use, which can be circumvented using virtual optical drives.
As a countermeasure, theStarForce copy protection scheme attempts to thwart disc virtualization. Modern video games have migrated to onlineproduct activation as part of their distribution process.
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