Installing and playing games from hard drive

hey, was wondering if anyone could tell me how i can play and install my PC games from my hard drive without having to put the disc in. i copied all the files from the dvd rom onto my hard drive and then tried to install the game but it kept sayin missing file??? even tho i copied everything from the disc to the hard drive. People who do download games can play them on there PCs ok without having a disc, how do they do it???

not that i download anything, i have all the original games but just cant be bothered to keep finding and putting the discs in lol

thanks for any help

Daniel

 

or alternatively

(although great advice from DVDBack)

you can d/l a no cd patch for said game (google it)

you just install from cd then copy in the patch

(it comes with instructions usually)

RL

 

try extracting the game to your harddrive.dont just copy and paste.

 

why a 500GB hard drive whats wrong with a 200gb that can still hold quite a few games.my xbox holds quite a few games and thats only 80GB

 

thanks for all the info, especially for that guide link on to another post. thanks really helpful, but i have had a problem, do i need to install the game 1st? im trying it out on one of my games - lord of the rings battle for middle earth, when trying to install from the image i made, it encounters a error and cannot install the game, but when i install the game from the disc and then play the game from the image it works fine. The image just wont install the game. I have to install using the disc.

is this what is supposed to happen?

thanks
danny