Micro Mart - 10 March 2016_

42 Issue 1404

Ashampoo Burning Studio 16

B

urning Studio 16 is

the latest CD, DVD

and Blu-ray burning

software from

Ashampoo. Many existing

features have been improved

in this version, and there are

some new features too.

Although the price on the

website says £39.99, if you

download and install the fully

working 30-day trial and click

the Buy Now link in it, you can

get it for the knockdown price

of £15.99. Discounts on

Ashampoo products are huge

if you know how to get them.

This is not a simple burning

utility of the sort you can get

for free on the internet. No, it

does a lot more. There are

many extra, butrelated

functions that make it stand

out from the freebies. For

example, it has some very

useful tools for burning music

discs from tracks stored on

your computer’s disk drive.

You can shuffle the tracks of

an album into a random order,

and you can configure

equaliser settings on a track-

by-track basis, boosting the

bass on one track and the

treble on another.Tracks can

be normalised to the same

volume level and you can

specify inter-track gaps,

including zero, for each track

or the whole album.

Music CDs can be ripped to

your PC’s disk in a variety of

formats including MP3, FLAC,

Opus, APE, WMA andWAV. A

cover editor enables CD jewel

case covers to be created, and

it has some good features. For

example, you can enter the

name of an album ,and it will

find the artwork on the

internet and download it. It

won’t find obscure albums,

but many popular ones are

available. Cover artwork can

be found by inserting a music

CD too.You can also add extra

items like text, tables and

background. It also does DVD

boxes, booklets and other

artwork. The cover creator has

been significantly improved in

this version of Burning Studio.

DVD movie discs can be

created from movies on the

disk drive, and there's a useful

slideshow creator to turn your

photos into a slideshow that

plays on your TV and DVD

player. It's like a simple video

editor: you add all your

photos, and it automatically

adds them to a movie timeline

The latest version of this uninstaller packs a useful collection of extra tools, asRoland

Waddilovediscovers

with transition effects between

slides. Music can be added to

the soundtrack, and you can

customise the photos and

transitions. It makes the DVD

menu, and then you can burn

the whole production to disc.

It isn’t as good as a proper

video editor, but it is quick and

easy to use, and you don’t get

bogged down in technical

details. It just works, and the

finished movie is fine.

Any files can be burnt toa

CD or DVD, and disc spanning

is available if the content is

too large for one disc. The files

can be encrypted for security

too. Backup andrestore

modules enable Burning Studio

to be used as backup software

for your computer. A jump list

is available by right-clicking

the icon in the taskbar, and it

provides shortcuts to common

functions.

You might think twice about

buying Burning Studio 16 at

£39.99, but at £15.99, this is

a bargain. The range of

features is good, and it has

some useful tools for creating

movie DVDs, music CDs and

box artwork.

mmRolandWaddilove

Packed with useful

features

8

8

Quality

Value

88

Overall

DETAILS

• Price: £39.99


• Manufacturer:
  Ashampoo


• Website:
  http://www.ashampoo.com


• Requirements:
  Windows 7or later, 2GB
  RAM, 1GHz CPU, 250MB
  disk space

iThe interface looks good and semi-transparent menus slide out on the left

iThis is the slideshow creator that turns photos into a playable DVD movie

REVIEWS