However, Burning ROM can burn multisession Blu-rays, and can burn this type of media from ISO disc images (and supports AVCHD).
For that, look to competitors like Ashampoo Burning Studio.
Blu-rayīurning ROM can burn Blu-ray data and movie discs (if you get your media in the right format), but as with DVDs, it offers no help with authoring or transcoding video files to the necessary format. Burning my four test video clips took just 1 minute and 12 seconds, but it was just writing the files to disc, not creating menus the way the other programs could, so the timings aren’t really comparable. Although the program can set up the proper folder structures for DVD and Blu-ray movie discs, it offers no help with creating the movie, and none of my files were transcoded to the required format, as with Ashampoo and Power2Go. Video projectsīurning ROM 11 let me choose from DVD-Video, AVCHD, BDMV (Blu-ray movie disc), but there was no specific help for creating a VCD (video CD) or SVCD (super-video CD – playable on some DVD players), as there is with the CyberLink and Ashampoo products. Once I selected the song files to burn, Burning ROM displayed a useful thermometer-style bar across the bottom, representing how much of the target disc's space would be taken up. Also, when I chose the Copy option, the program didn't detect the music CD in the drive. But the program didn't offer to burn a new disc with the music CD contents I'd just ripped. There was no indication of time remaining, though progress bars for each track made the process clear.īurning the same music to a blank CD (using Nero's "Ultra Buffer") took a swift 2 minutes and 25 seconds, the same time it took Power2Go, and much faster than Ashampoo's 4 minutes. The default output was Nero AAC (mp4), which took 2 minutes and 25 seconds. Ripping the 60 minute Buena Vista Social Club CD to 192kbps MP3 files took 2 minutes and 20 seconds, compared with 2 minutes and 3 seconds for CyberLink Power2Go, and 2 minutes and 2 seconds for Ashampoo Burning Studio. The program helpfully looked up the album and track names, and even showed the album cover art in the ensuing Match dialog, where the program asks you to verify that the correct album was found. To rip an audio CD with Burning ROM, you head to the Extras menu and choose Save Audio Tracks. The interface had a habit of opening new main program windows regularly when I chose a new activity or a disc was inserted in a drive, even popping up the Welcome screen again.
Each project type offers several tabs with very detailed options, such as multisession, spanning multiple discs, file system, and write speed. Nero 9 Reloaded does a good job of ripping, burning and editing a wide range of audio and video formats, but it's not as easy to use as our current media suite of choice, the slightly more expensive Roxio Creator 2010.You also get the choice of mixed-mode CD, in which one disc can act as both an audio CD and a data disc.
Nero 9 owners can upgrade to Reloaded for free, which indicates how little has changed in the new version. However, you still need to buy the $10 Blu-ray plug-in to author Blu-ray discs.
As well as creating and editing movies and authoring DVDs, it now lets you archive AVCHD Blu-ray-compatible content to hard disk or a USB device, which is more versatile than keeping all your HD content on optical discs. One of the few enhancements that differentiates Reloaded from Nero 9 is in the video editing and burning application Nero Vision. Also included is a copy of BackItUp & Burn, a very capable backup application.
Nero ShowTime plays audio and video, although it's not quite as good as free alternatives such as iTunes, Windows Media Player or Media Player Classic. The wizard-based Nero Express and Burning ROM take care of ripping, copying and burning CDs and DVDs. You can also access the individual Nero applications from here, but we experienced long pauses and occasional crashes, so it's quicker and easier to do so from the Windows Start menu. Common tasks such as disc burning, disc copying, audio ripping and data backup can be performed from within the SmartStart interface. This version retains the SmartStart launch environment, which is functional and easy to navigate. There's not much difference between this version and its immediate predecessor, Nero 9, although Reloaded is certified for use with Windows 7, so you won't have any compatibility problems. Nero 9 Reloaded is a media suite that lets you rip, edit and burn music, photos and videos to and from a variety of media.