Nero 7 Ultra Edition

When I first got serious about CD Burning, I had two options to choose from: Adaptec Easy CD Creator and Ahead Nero Burning Rom. The first version of Adaptec I had used completely crashed my PC which forced a reformat. This made it easy to choose Nero at that time. Since then, times have definitely changed and the feature list is ever growing. We will be taking a look through the latest Ultra Edition to see what’s new and noteworthy. There is so much packed into the Ultra Edition that we will not be able to tackle it all, but rather mention features that stand out.

When you look to purchase some burning software, you obviously want it to be able to burn your data and probably make audio CD’s. You are certainly missing out on a lot if that’s all you want to do, as you can see in the below feature list. Needless to say, Nero is a complete media suite that is for much more than simply burning.

For those of you who are interested in a no-nonsense list of what’s new in 7, Nero has provided this:

Burning and Copying

• Full-o-meter automatically adjusts to you project type (DVD-1, DVD-5 or DVD-9)
• Intelligent size calculation will suggest a DVD if data will not fit on a CD
• New, easy-to-use GUI for Nero Express and Nero InCD
• Use Nero Scout to index your digital media making it easy to find the right video or song for your CD or DVD
• Support for Blu-ray (BD-RE and BD-R) media

Audio

• Support for 5.1 and 7.1 audio recording, editing and mixing
• Create beats, melodies and sound sequences
• HQ mastering (192KHz) resolution audio supported
• Up to 32 bit audio supported
• Sample looper
• Rip tracks from audio CDs (SoundTrax)
• Adjust tempo of samples & loops to mixes for seamless track transitions
• New surround effects
• Pump-up your music mixes with powerful Beat Editor, Sequencer and Text II Speech converter

Photo and Video

• HDV capture support
• Compress video to fit mobile, PDAs, home theater and HDTV standards
• Dolby Digital 5.1 Encoder integration
• Extend capture device support
• Export slideshows to share or archive
• New 2D and animated 3D menu templates to spice up your home-made professional quality DVDs
• Capture, edit and export High-Definition (HD) video files.
• Browse customized image directories
• Burn to DVD, SVCD and VCD or export to video file for sharing
• Stream media files across any UPnPâ„¢ compatible devices

DVD

• Support for chapter menus (DVD+VR)
• Split and merge titles (DVD+VR)
• Automatically overwrite unprotected titles if space on disc is low (DVD+VR)
• Add/remove images from slideshows (DVD-VR)
• Simulation/Preview of DVD-VR project
• Looped DVD navigation
• DVD-Audio support

Backup

• Backup without logging in
• Advanced calendar & scheduling for backup jobs
• InCD 5 Drag&Drop file backup support for BDRE/R (Blu-ray)
• FTP backup
• Intelligent compression filter
• Shadow Copy feature used to ensure a verified backup
• Advanced pre & post scripting features
• Secure your data with 128-bit encryption & password protection
• Backup access rights of files and folders in NTFS volumes
• Backup to disc images
• Create bootable restore disc
• Verify existing backup
• Virus protection of backups
• Backup on login
• Backup directly from Windows Explorer
• Backup drives onto hard disks (internal and external)

Playback and Share

• Metallic skin (Nero ShowTime)
• Multitask when using Nero Home (e.g. Watch TV while creating a slideshow).
• Supports playslists that consist of multiple media formats such as pictures, music and video
• Powerful database to store and organize your media
• Compatible with popular remote controls to play your pictures, music, video and TV.
• Time-shift TV
• Quick and easy access to all of your Digital media files using Nero Home’s advanced search features

Extras

• Nero Scout (enables a user to easily catalog and find media files located on the computer)
• Add/Remove languages in the Nero ProductSetup
• Repair option to fix damaged installations of Nero
• Customize installer to tailor your Nero applications to your needs
• In-program updates

Let’s check out the main GUI and see if anything has changed from the previous version.