How to split up large files and zip archives

There are quite a few reasons why one would want to split up big files or zip archives into several smaller ones. Imagine you have a big video that doesn´t even fit on one DVD or you have a large zip archive that you want to store / distribute on floppy disks.

Another good reason to split up large files is to make them easier for download. Not everybody has a fast internet connection and many of those who don´t also do not use a download assistant that would allow them to resume downloads at a later time. Believe me, it can be very frustrating when you try to download a big file and the download gets stuck near the end after an hour or two and you have to start all over again.

And if you are the one offering stuff for download, then you would waste a lot of bandwidth when people need to repeat the download several times before they succeed. And even worse - some of them would try to blame you.

Fortunately, it´s very easy to split up (span) large files with IZArc, distribute them in small "pieces" or store them on several disks and later join the single parts together again. This lesson explains how to split up large files.

To span a file with IZArc, it needs to be in the ZIP archive format (.zip), hence you need to archive it first.

Once you have created the ZIP archive, select the option Create Multi-Volume Set from IZArc´s Tools menu.

In the following dialog window you can then select the ZIP archive that you want to span and also select a target folder and enter a file name for the spanned files. Do not forget to add the file extension .ZIP to the "spanned archive name", or you won´t be able to merge the files later.

You will get a confirmation message when the spanning process was successful and see all the single files that have been created. Now you can copy them to different disks or upload them to your server to offer them for download.

In the next lesson you will learn how to rebuild the original ZIP archive by merging the single files together. Hint: when you are offering your customers / subscribers spanned archives for download, don´t forget to instruct them how to reassemble the pieces. Simply point them to the next lesson (see footer for HTML link code).