My desktop computer died with the Beyond The Sword disk stuck inside of it. It may be weeks or months before I get it fixed, and in the mean time I'd like to play on my laptop. The game is already installed so I thought it shouldn't be too hard to figure out a way... But none of my tinkering has had any results.

I thought to myself, "well, how about I download the expansion" because surely a download is no good if that won't run without the disk. Oddly, that just gave me the same error. "Please insert the correct disc" or whatever is says.

My clever self tried to plug my Compact Disc drive into my boyfriend's desktop computer to make it open the drive. Seemed easy and logical enough, except this made his computer fail to start as well. Now we have two dead computers side by side. Is the disc just evil?

If that were not enough I'm going through the worst cramps I think I've ever had and I have nothing entertaining to do with myself. Life is just messing with me these days...

Anyway, I'm ranting because I'm annoyed about not having all the files on my hard drive and such... Main question is, CAN YOU PLAY WITHOUT THE DISK? If not, I might just go buy a second copy... Which is so a stupid waste of money, but what else is there to be done?

There's a little hole on the front of the CD drive. Unfold a paperclip and push it into that hole and the CD tray will automagically pop out.

Most drives will have a purely mechanical release that can be used to open it even if the computer is stone dead. Find the small circular hole a couple of mm across on the front drive and insert the end of an unfolded paper clip. This should open the drive unless there is something physically jamming it.

You're not supposed to be able to run the game without the disc. If there is a way of doing so, it would be against the forum rules to post it.

I wanted to post exactly same than Daedal did.

But when you buy windows OEM then you have license key what is important, you can use another copy and it is legal until your key is correct. But when civ4 disk gets broken then bye-bye and buy new copy.

Thanks, I'm going to look for a paperclip now.

Thanks guys! I used a safety pin since I could not find a paperclip. I got the disc! I got the disc! I'm smiling like for the first time in several days! Yeah! Hope I didn't violate any rules by posting this...

Yay! Glad it worked out for ya. :D


You're not supposed to be able to run the game without the disc. If there is a way of doing so, it would be against the forum rules to post it.
Well, there's the version sold on Steam; does that count? (Finally, those of us with laptops sans CD-rom drives can run civ without the world's biggest/ugliest dongle plugged in... in a way that isn't against forum rules to post. :D) It wouldn't really have helped in this situation, though. :(

Thanks guys! I used a safety pin since I could not find a paperclip. I got the disc! I got the disc! I'm smiling like for the first time in several days! Yeah! Hope I didn't violate any rules by posting this...

Er, no violation. I have to use the paperclip method myself because my disk drive doesn't like to eject Civ IV and on rare occasions I need to use another disk in the drive.

Sounds like you have a disk drive assassin.

That is why I made a image of my BtS disk and putted it in my hard drive ;)

didnt u get a crack from the download if ever?

Can't discuss cracks here. Even though it's as easy as going onto www.go.......

I have said too much.

hmmm never knew that that little hole was for...... recently had the same problem with a different disk, except it was my laptop that was broken.

Glad you got your disk. I was going to say the exact thing, pin hole method. glad others were here to help.

I may or may not have downloaded a possible exploit which might make it play with or without a disk. Maybe.

Having done a little personal research on the topic..
I find it very annoying that most illegal cracks of exe that just make them not require the games cd are atleast a MB smaller and lots of them are several MB smaller.

I was surprised to learn after all this time that the game doesn't use anything on the cd when your playing. Its just that greedy company trying to put real world controls on their virtual products.

I own a legal, fully paid for at Walmart, copies of Civ4, Warlords, and BtS. If I don't want to have the cd in my drive then I don't have to. Pox be on their generic, non legally signed by me licence agreement. :p

Having done a little personal research on the topic..
I find it very annoying that most illegal cracks of exe that just make them not require the games cd are atleast a MB smaller and lots of them are several MB smaller.

Not always, sometimes they are even bigger, but there are good reasons for that.


I was surprised to learn after all this time that the game doesn't use anything on the cd when your playing. Its just that greedy company trying to put real world controls on their virtual products.


This is the case since almost a decade now, there are actually only very very few games which NEED the CD/DVD for the game (because data from the disc is really really slow). And its plain stupid too. There was NEVER a single game which wasnt cracked in a matter of a few days, those CD/DVD-checks are absolute useless to prevent pirating, but they are very annoying for honest legal users. I like to compare them with those annoying anti-piracy spots in movie-DVDs. Pirates wont see them because they are cut out when copied, the only users who see them are the honest buyers of the DVD. Same with CD-checks (and copyprotections), a pirated copy has the crack delivered (no need to check other, maybe cheesy sites) and provide a easy and save to store image for installation. Honest buyers have to have the DVD in the drive all the time and if the disc gets damaged have to send it to the publisher and hope for a replacement, because they cannot easily create a backup disc. When will Publishers finally wake up and stop treating their customers like sh*t?


I own a legal, fully paid for at Walmart, copies of Civ4, Warlords, and BtS. If I don't want to have the cd in my drive then I don't have to. Pox be on their generic, non legally signed by me licence agreement. :p

Same for me, i own legal copies of Civ4+Bts and play on my notebook. The stupid DVD keeps spinning up once in a while if its inserted, which causes additional heat and noise. So i am using NoCD/DVD-Cracks ever since for all my (legally bought) games. If there will ever be a game with a fully functional DVD-check i simply wont buy it till there is a crack for it.

UMMM,
someone's going to internet jail
DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNN

I personnaly think that Civ players are generally loyal and will buy the game, regardless if they play with or without a cracked executable. I know its annoying that there are downloaders out there that dont pay, but I also think that we should be somewhat lenient, for not everyone can afford to buy the game. They however might get hooked for illegal downloads and when money permits it buy the collectors version OR the next version.

Personnaly, I never owned Civ2 (I was 11 at that point), however I got hooked and now own legal copies of Civ3, the entire civ4 series and Colonization. Without Civ2 I might never have bothered buying these games.

Should I now go to jail?

The thing do do would be to create a tiny mini-image (http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/192503) from your disc and mount that using virtual drive software. Safe, easy, (probably) legal.