I remember playing Baldur's Gate on 5-6cd's or what it came on. It was a real pain switching all those plates.
I remember doing a full install once, the amount of times it asks you to swap back to a CD previously already used in the installation, just to install more game data from said CD to the HD from is ridiculous.....
As for the copyright protection, I pretty much just do what AshMantle does, grab a dummy image, or a fixed exe. I cant be bothered to have to look around for CDs to insert just to play a game that uses CD for verification scheme, then not doesn't even use it for the entirety of said game.
I am also one of them guys against the use of StarForce protection, thankfully for me it hasn't affected my DVD/CD-R Combo drive at the least, but man have I heard alot of horror stories from reliable sources regarding it...