A little hazy on .iso's

[srfdude]

I have a software suite on my hdd that I would like to backup on a DVD. Not bootable. Should I burn it as an image (iso) or as data? Not really sure what is the purpose of iso's. Iso's just put everything together as sort of a large file? If I need to reinstall how do you extract everything?
Thanks for help with this very newbie question.
Mike

[Groucho2004]

As for ISO images - look here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_image).

In your case, just burn the folder containing the software to a CDR/DVDR in normal data mode.
You'll be able to install the software from the optical disk afterwards (if what you are burning is an installable version and not an installed version of the sw).