So, when you go to burn the ISO image to a new blank CD-R or DVD-R, you really are getting an exact clone of the original disc, right down to the file system information. It even contains the binary image of the optical disc’s file system and is copied over exactly as it sits on the disc. They’re a sector-by-sector clone of the data on the original optical disc, and all of that data is actually stored inside a binary file. With that in mind, ISO images can be extremely large in file size. These ISO files are uncompressed and don’t contain any specific container format. It even carries over the original file and volume label information. When you do this, you’re creating an identical copy of the original disc.

The most common uses for an ISO image is to burn the data to a blank CD-R or DVD-R. What are ISO files?Īs we mentioned, an ISO image is a snapshot of a CD or DVD. Follow along, and we’ll show you how you can mount an ISO and even take you through some of its applications. That’s just an example - there are many other uses for ISO images.