archiving an old 8.1.7 db + binaries on dvd - "instant server"?

This falls under the general topic of information lifecycle management
(buzz) with a win32 slant.

Has anyone mucked with attempting to open an entire database (a small one) as read only from DVD with the oracle_home (8.1.7 in this case) also on the DVD?

I am very much looking forward to being able to nuke every single 8.1.7 home that I can find.
The downside of that, is that I don't want to have to re-install the 8.1.7 home (revisit the classic P IV OUI fun) just to accommodate a user request to access archived data.

(the db was not EE and it was 8.1.7 so transportable tablespaces were
not an option).

I had thought about unloading that oracle_home contents as a .reg script and could have that home restored off of the script on the DVD with the 8.1.7 home located on the same DVD ... but I wasn't too sure how that would work out if a 10g home was the only one present on that machine. Guess that's what testing is for.

Right - here is where having a virtual machine that still has that home installed would rock.

Maybe someone has run across a paper on this.

thanks,

Paul

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