In a previous post entitled “”All Media Disc Burning Software”, I presented CyberLink’s Power2Go 8 disc burning software package, described it, and gave my initial impression.
Power2Go 8
Having admitted in that earlier post that I was a little partial to CyberLink’s disc burning software due to the fact that I have used earlier versions and was most satisfied, I am putting that behind me as we look further into the suite and its capabilities.
System Requirements and Specs
Lets take a moment to review the system requirements and specifications. The system requirements are as follows (and these are minimum requirements):
Operating System:
The program requires Windows 7, Vista, or XP.
System Memory:
128 MB of RAM for data and audio burning; 256 MB of RAM for video burning, although a minimum of 512 MB of RAM is recommended.
(Editor’s Note: The fact is that these minimums are just what they are – the bare minimum to run the system. In my opinion, anything less than 2 GB of RAM (preferably 3 GB) will prove less than satisfactory.)
CPU:
CD/VCD (MPEG-1) production: Intel Pentium II 450
DVD (MPEG-2) production: Intel Pentium III 800 MHz, or AMD Athlon 700 MHz (Intel Pentium 4 2.0 GHz, AMD Athlon 2100+ or above recommended). (Editor’s Note: The CPU requirements, like all the others, are a minimum requirement. The rule of thumb here is, the newer and more powerful the processor, the better the program will run.)
Hard Disc Space:
1 GB for making Video CDs
5 to 10 GB for making DVDs
25 GB for making Blu-Ray Discs
Burning Device:
A CD or DVD burner to burn VCD/DVD/SVCD/AVCHD titles
Supported Burning Speeds (CD):
1x, 2x, 4x, 6x, 8x, 12x, 16x, 20x, 32x, 48x
Supported Burning Speeds (DVD):
1x, 2x, 4x, 6x, 8x, 10x, 12x, 14x, 16x, 18x, 20x, 22x, 24x
A Blu-Ray recordable drive to burn Blu-ray discs.
Supported Burning Speeds (Blu-ray):
1x, 2x, 4x, 6x, 8x, 10x, 12x
Supported Formats
Now we come to the subject of supported file formats. They are as follows:
Video:
.AVI, .DAT (MPEG-1), .MPE, .MPG, .MPEG, .ASF, .DVR-MS, .M2T, .M2TS, .MOV, .MOD, .MP4, .MTS, .TS, .TOD, .VOB, .VRO, .WMV, .WTV
Music:
Audio CD, .MP3*, .WMA*, .WAV*, .M4A
Image:
.BMP, .JPE, .JPEG, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, .TIF, .TIFF <hr<> Finally, Supported Disc Formats:
CD: : CD/RW
DVD:: DVD-R/RW, DVD-R DL, DVD+R/RW, DVD+R DL, DVD-RAM
Blu-ray Disc (BD): BD-R, BD-R DL, BD-RE, BD-RE DL, BDXL
Whew! That was a mouthful. Now, we come to the fun part – a look at the features. First off, we’ll start off with the most important of all the features, the disc burning tool.
Disc Burning Tool
Burning Tool Interface
As I said earlier, the interface for the burning tool is straight forward. There are eight options across the top of the tool interface: Data Disc – Music Disc – Video Disc – Photo Gallery Disc – System Recovery – Copy Disc – Disc Utilities. When you hover with your mouse over each option, a description of the option appears in the middle of the interface (for lack of a better term), which is most helpful.
I have had the opportunity to avail myself of most of these options, with the exceptions of the Blu-ray disc, and can report that the tool works quite smoothly. Disc copy (Copy Disc) is efficient and the copies I made were of high quality, with no bad burns in the bunch. I copied the entire Ring des Nibelungen of Wagner – a total of fourteen discs and the copies sound as good as the original.
Data Disc burning was just as good. I took my Audio Book Collection from the hard disk and burned seven data DVDs, and the result was that all the copies were solid.I tested them further by playing them through Windows Media Player AND I-Tunes – smooth play-back equals a good burn.
I then created a video disc for my daughter. She has a pet rabbit called Oliver, whom we are house-sitting at the moment, and we created a video record called “Oliver – This is Your Life”. We made several short videos of the various stages in the daily routine of a 4 year old Dutch bunny, and stitched them together in a video presentation, added background music, and the result was satisfying. Power2Go came through again.
The audio ripping function is also straightforward, with all the appropriate details such as source, album name, artist name, track/title/artist duration field, destination folder and settings for format and quality all laid out for easy use.
Drag and Drop Desktop Burning Gadget
Power2Go has this Drag and Drop Desktop Burning Gadget which is on your computer’s desktop. The idea is for one to be able to drag and drop files to the gadget directly and burn audio, data, and video discs as well as copy discs. What you are doing here is basically circumventing the regular interface, supposedly simplifying the process. As a test, I dragged the audio files for Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony (the DG version – Karajan’s last) and dragged them to the gadget, inserted a CD, and started the burning process. It took only four minutes to burn the disc, and the result was – you guessed it -great. Another good burn! I have yet to try the other formats, but will do so in the very near future.
Right now, this post is getting rather long, so I have decided to make this review into several parts. Stand by for Part II – when I tackle the rest of the suite! For those interested in purchasing, click on the text link below!
New Power2Go 8 – Buy & Get Free MediaShow!
Special Offer from CyberLink
Check out CyberLink’s latest special offer for Power2Go 8 by clicking on the link below!
