[t.foster73]

I have to say that I've tried my Chaos Theory backup DVD and USB Drive on more than 15 computers at work. Before I formatted and Re-Installed Windows on these machine (I'm an Administrator, and a nasty Virus was playing havoc with the machines), I installed Chaos Theory on all of them. This is not to play on you understand, but to test the functionality of the USB trick. All these computers have different hardware, but are quite powerful. Using my backup and USB housing, I was able to install and play on 13 machines. The two it wouldn't run on were due to incompatible hardware, however the DVD check screen was passed, and these would have played also had they had better VGA cards installed. Also, the backups were created on 3 different DVD Re-Writers.

I'll go further and say I've yet to find a machine the backup won't work properly on. Going on these findings, I would say that problems playing from a backup must be due to one of these reasons.

1.A bad DVD image, or to be more specific, a bad MDS image, possibly due to a poor Re-Writer. However my images were created on Pioneer 109D, and other cheaper drives.
2.An illegal copy of the game. Of course I'm not pointing any fingers, but I've had several E-Mails requesting a DVD-KEY. It goes without saying that my image (MDF and MDS) was created from an original DVD.
3.Out of date Alcohol120 or Daemon tools (obvious, but you never know)
4.Possible conflict with IDE channel, even though STARF***ER or SF_NIGHTMARE are installed. Always disconnect your IDE drives physically if your backup won't work, to be sure it's not this.
5.Finally, it's possible that the USB adaptor itself could be the problem. I'm not rolling in money, so I'm not going to go and buy several housings just to try this, but for your information, my working housing is a Venus DS Model No.2512B2, costing £20 (UK)