I use Daemon tools to store disc images of games on my HDD. If there's a small rotation of games that require the disc in the drive to play, I'll keep the images in a directory, and mount each one as a separate logical optical drive.
While this can easily be used for illegal copies of dvd's/cd's, I'm not referring to that at all. I own all the discs, I just don't feel like taking them in and out of the drive all the time. Don't want them to wear out

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But before you try anything else. Try loading from a networked dvd drive. Share the DVD drive on the laptop, map it to a drive letter on the desktop, and see if that works.