Image preloader with jQuery

Today I saw a tiny JavaScript code on Stack Overflow which can be used as a jQuery plugin for preloading images. It is very handy and can be used easily:

jQuery.fn.preload = function() 
{
  this.each(function()
  {
    $('<img/>')[0].src = this;
  });
}
 
jQuery(document).ready(function($)
{    
  $(['./images/image1.png', './images/image2.png']).preload();
});

I use this function to preload drag images which are used by event.dataTransfer.setDragImage but you can still preload everything else. It makes also much sense for hover images.