The most recent articles from Personal Computer World

Review: Magix MP3 Maker 14

Tim Smith — 2008-06-16T10:41:00.000Z

Tim Smith, Personal Computer World, Monday 16 June 2008 at 10:41:00

Import, edit and play music, and rediscover long-lost tracks

With free music players available, Magix MP3 Maker is not only different, but has the audacity to charge money.

Is it really worth the cost? Firstly, it will play and record all the major file formats, including WMA, AAC and even OGG, without modification. Secondly the music finder software, which Magix calls Mufin, has now been integrated into MP3 Maker. All your tracks are analysed and playlists automatically created based on style.

It’s a good way of matching a mood and rediscovering forgotten tracks, and there is no limit to the length of playlists. There are also presets allowing you to compile a playlist to fit a CD or DVD. Playlists can also be transferred to a portable media player, although we had to create a folder structure manually. Unlike rival Roxio Creator, if you burn to a DVD no user interface is included.

Tracks can be browsed by location or by track information and the current playlist is always on display, while directories of online radio stations and podcasts are regularly updated. A DJ console allows you to mix tracks by matching their tempo. This speed of each track is detected automatically, but when we tested the fully automatic DJ it adjusted most tracks beyond comfortable levels.

One major frustration with previous versions of MP3 Maker remains, however, namely its inability to use the media control buttons on a keyboard. MP3 Maker 14 is loaded with features and it’s these that justify the asking price compared to the free alternatives such as Windows Media Player and iTunes.

The DJ console is a little specialised, but the Mufin track-generation tool would suit anyone with a large, and mostly forgotten, music collection.

Review: Izotope RX 1.04 audio editing software

Karl Foster — 2008-01-30T00:00:00.000Z

Karl Foster, Personal Computer World, Wednesday 30 January 2008 at 00:00:00

RX promises to transform audio from wrecked to wonderful, with well-developed restoration tools

Noise destroys. No matter how carefully you prep a recording session, whether for music, video, podcasting or presentation, hum, hiss and buzz creep in.

And with so many of us hauling our old LPs, tapes and analogue home movie soundtracks into the digital age, there’s a clear demand for processing that can overcome the limitations of older sound-recording technologies.

With this in mind, Boston-based developer Izotope has devised a suite of restoration tools that’s not only dedicated to dealing with common audio horrors, but one that also includes highly sophisticated wave-massaging features.

RX is a standalone application hosting five audio-restoration modules dedicated to removing distortion from overdriven analogue and digital recordings. These remove clicks and crackles from such physical media as vinyl and wax cylinder, eliminating the hiss common to recordings made with non-digital processors and tape, as well as cancelling hum from sources such as mains electricity.

In all areas, RX performs admirably. With analogue audio digitised to disc, it’s easy to batch-process a clean-up job on a bunch of vinyl album tracks, tame tape hiss and rescue signals afflicted with analogue or digital distortion.

The Declipper, Declicker, Hum Removal and Denoiser modules are great, but RX’s real bonus is its Spectral Repair. This allows you to precisely select any unwanted element, such as a cough, clunk or even a mobile’s intrusive ringtone, and use the data surrounding the selection to cover the anomaly completely.

Few restoration suites are as comprehensive, flexible and powerful as RX. At the price, it’s a good choice for anyone seeking pristine audio from compromised recordings.

Review: Ableton Live 7 music software

Terry Relph-Knight — 2008-01-24T00:00:00.000Z

Terry Relph-Knight, Personal Computer World, Thursday 24 January 2008 at 00:00:00

An extremely powerful suite for recording, composing and performing

Ableton Live has won many awards and is the field leader in loop-based DAW (digital audio workstation) software.

Version 7 audio output is stunning - fidelity has been improved by redesigning the audio engine for 64-bit mix summing, POW-R (psychoacoustically optimised word length reduction) dithering and optimised sample-rate conversion.

Over time Ableton Live has expanded from the core product into a suite, which now includes three instrument collections, namely Tension (physical modelling string synthesiser), Electric (classic electric piano sounds) and Analogue (vintage analogue synthesisers), two drum collections, session drums and drum machines, a software synthesiser, operator and a software sampler.

Purchasing options allow users a choice of modules. There are quite a number of user requested new features in version 7, including time signature changes within an arrangement, export to file of warped and unwarped video, display and simultaneous edit of multiple automation lanes per track, simpler synchronisation to live musicians or DJs using a new nudge function. REX files can now also be dragged, dropped and played just like WAV or AIFF files.

A new compressor device has been added which features side-chaining capability and allows a choice of three compression models, one of which is based on the feedback design found in classic studio compressors.

Possibly because of its use of minimalist graphics, Ableton Live has always been quite lean and mean and the download of version 7 is still only 78.2MB, expanding to around 120MB on installation.

Installation requires the entry of a serial number followed by an unlocking process - completed online, via email or telephone challenge and response system.

Following installation Ableton displays a Lessons view in a vertical panel. The Lessons panel in Version 6 carries lots of information in small text. In version 7 this has been simplified and split into five bold categories - A Tour of Live, Recording Audio, Creating Beats, Playing Software Instruments and DJ-ing with Live.

There are also two large setup categories that explain how to set the various Audio I/O and Midi options accessed via the Preferences menu. Exploration of supplementary lessons is provided by the use of hypertext links within the main lessons.

Users of previous versions will feel right at home because there is little obvious change in the superbly designed user interface. It consists of a display window split into five panes. A left-hand vertical pane allows browsing for files or devices and below this is a small Information pane. A horizontal pane along the bottom displays selected device interfaces, waveforms or Midi note charts and a vertical panel on the right contains the lessons and tuition material.

The largest pane in the centre flips between two views: the Arrangement view, which resembles the ticker-tape multi-track view common to most DAW software, and the Session view, which looks a little like the side-by-side channels of a hardware mixer. The Tab key is used to toggle back and forth between these two.

Since its introduction in October 2001, Ableton Live has gone from strength to strength. Version 7 offers musicians a very powerful recording, composing and performing tool. Compared to other DAWs that are dedicated to recording and mixing, its mixing capabilities are still limited to only two sends and returns, and there’s also no provision for surround sound so it’s stereo only.

Review: Magix Audio Cleaning Labs 12 XXL music software

Tim Smith — 2008-01-03T00:00:00.000Z

Tim Smith, Personal Computer World, Thursday 3 January 2008 at 00:00:00

Breathe new life into your old recordings

We all have recordings that are less than pristine but still worth hanging on to, be it a show from the radio, an old vinyl LP or a recording of a concert.

Magix Audio Cleaning Labs 12 XXL is a software studio for restoring audio recordings and is bundled with a preamp for recording directly from sources such as vinyl turntables and cassette players.

The software follows the standard Magix format of a step-by-step approach with dedicated buttons for quickly adjusting the main settings.

There are several videos included within the Tasks menu that explain some of the more complicated filters such as the spectral cleaning. This is nothing to do with ghosts, but rather an effective way of removing noise from a recording without deleting the audio behind it.

Adding audio to a project can be as simple as loading an audio file or ripping a CD. The options for recording are very flexible with presets for vinyl, tape and internet. Recording can also be set for a certain time and duration.

A USB-powered preamp is also supplied. This is particularly useful because it is much easier to bring just a turntable to a computer rather than a whole stereo system; the preamp is needed because the output from turntables is too low to work with an ordinary soundcard. The preamp has RCA sockets for turntables and a 3.5mm jack socket for attaching other audio sources, such as a cassette player. Even though these devices can be plugged directly into soundcards, the USB socket is less likely to require scrabbling around the back.

During testing, we found the Audio ID identification tool didnít work with a variety of tracks from big names such as Led Zeppelin, Gene and KT Tunstall. There is, however, a useful link to the Freedb.org website for searching for albums by title or artist. Once the album has been found the specific link can be entered into Audio Cleanup Lab for it to apply the information to the different tracks.

The cleaning section is where the software shines against alternatives such as the open-source Audacity. There are plenty of presets for different recordings, such as those made from cassette tape or LP, as well as several automatic modes. They may not be perfect, but make a very useful starting point.

The effects are all visible and split into two sections: cleaning and mastering. Each section has a one-click option for adjusting the settings automatically. Volume is set in the middle and there is a button to bypass all the effects. This is useful for making sure that nothing significant is lost from the recording; it can be easy to get carried away and take too much away. Some of the more detailed effect settings windows will also play what is being removed.

Restoring audio files is not just about taking away, there are also several ways of actively improving the tracks by widening the stereo separation and boosting the higher frequencies that are often the victims of the cleaning process. Audio export options are unlikely to disappoint either, not least because Magix is entirely neutral when it comes to file formats. WMA and AAC are both on offer, as well as OGG for those with compatible players.

The Export section also deals with creating CD labels and inlays, a features that's sometimes forgotten but needed by those wanting to keep their music collection looking good.

At £50, Audio Cleaning Lab 12 XXL is quite expensive, but the editing tools are powerful and work well without being overcomplicated.

Review: Magix Mufin Musicfinder audio tool

Tim Smith — 2007-12-07T00:00:00.000Z

Tim Smith, Personal Computer World, Friday 7 December 2007 at 00:00:00

A playlist generator that doesnít need tags or even track names

Playlist generators are a great way to make use of your music collection but are normally reliant on the tags given to music tracks.

Magix Mufin Musicfinder analyses each track individually, avoiding the problems caused by missing or inaccurate tags.

Playlists are generated by finding tracks that are similar to a starting track, whether or not the tag genres match. This requires quite a lot of work as every track must be run through the software, so don't expect to be generating playlists as soon as the software is installed. A test collection of around 10GB took several hours to analyse.

Thankfully the process can be paused and resumed, and it was graceful enough not to disrupt other running programs. However, the analysis is kept locally so the process must be repeated if several computers access music from a network share.

The interface is based around columns, with the left-most column for selecting tracks by album, artist genre or existing playlist. Tracks appear in the central column; one click on the Find Similar Tracks button and a playlist is automatically generated.

We were genuinely impressed that Mufin managed to find complimentary tracks, including some we would not have thought to have included in the playlist.

There is a normalise option to even out any radical changes in volume and playlists can be exported to mobile players.

One gripe, common to Magix MP3 Maker too, is that keyboard media control keys are not recognised by Mufin. Coupled with the lack of a mini player mode, this makes Mufin a little unwieldy. The good news is that Mufin will be built into future versions of Magix MP3 Maker, which is a more capable music player, and the playlists can be exported.

Review: Sony Sound Forge 9 audio editor

Karl Foster — 2007-06-04T00:00:00.000Z

Karl Foster, Personal Computer World, Monday 4 June 2007 at 00:00:00

Sony's popular audio editor now sports multi-channel audio capability and has noise reduction as standard

Back in 2003, Sony made the shrewd move of acquiring Sound Forge from original developer Sonic Foundry.

This audio editor has since been extensively enhanced, each new version offering added functionality for those seeking pro-level sound manipulation, but who do not want to shell out a fortune.

Version 9 adds yet more to the mix, while retaining a very reasonable price point considering the facilities on offer.

The most significant upgrade is the means to record and edit multi-channel audio files, enhancing the program’s appeal to those working with video, in particular. Multi-channel support even extends to the Spectral Analysis function, and a 5.1 Dolby Digital AC-3 plug-in is also bundled for export.

Sound designers and musicians would still likely stick with the multi-track audio capabilities of Cubase, Sonar, et al, but will appreciate a dedicated wave editor that now hosts a tasty bundle of mastering effects from Izotope.

As with the previous version, DirectX and VST plug-ins can be used in the processing chain, although the program offers an impressive variety of real-time effects and processors as standard.

However, they’ve been freshened up with enhanced dialogs that enable you to adjust wet/dry levels as the preview plays. There’s also new real-time phase-scope and mono-compatibility metering so you can easily keep an eye on potential phase cancellation when mixing.

Workflow is more comprehensible thanks to the new facility to customise the colours of the previously rather drab interface. It’s not merely a cosmetic tweak - colour can really help you keep track of what’s going on in complex projects.

The needs of the consumer audience, such as those digitising vinyl and tape-based recordings, have also been addressed by the inclusion of the excellent Noise Reduction 2 plug-in, formerly an add-on. It does a great job of calculating out noise induced by deck rumble, tape hiss and the like and is very easy to use.

Videographers may go a bundle on it as a means of ridding wild-tracks (i.e. a recording of audio without video) of ambient noise pollution. Samplists, also, will find Noise reduction 2 an essential resource when working with dodgy source material.

People aiming to rip CDs, meanwhile, have another new gadget in the shape of Gracenote CD Album Identification, a system by which artist, track and other information can be downloaded for embedding into an audio file, and to which original song information can be submitted. However, Sound Forge really is overkill for such users.

This application sits firmly with professional wave-manglers and, in its current version, is an indispensable buy for serious videographers using the Sony Vegas suite, as well as for musicians into Sony's Acid XMC.

It’s never been particularly easy to drive for the uninitiated, but such is the nature of top-notch audio software. There are concessions made towards usability in Sound Forget 9, but the depth of this software will likely drown newcomers to audio manipulation. It eclipses Steinberg’s Wavelab thanks to a low-low price, but is hobbled in that it’s similarly PC-only - most audio creatives work on the Mac and that’s a territory to which Bias Inc, with Peak Pro, currently lays claim.

Nevertheless, if you’re a PC owner, want perhaps the best-value audio editor on the market, generally work with multiple audio channels and are up for a lesson in the basics of sound manipulation, Sound Forge 9 is an excellent buy.

Review: Steinberg Sequel music software

Karl Foster — 2007-05-11T00:00:00.000Z

Karl Foster, Personal Computer World, Friday 11 May 2007 at 00:00:00

Steinberg takes on Apple’s Garageband with a beginner-friendly songwriting tool

Creating music on computer proves a head-scratcher for many.

The creative flow is easily dammed by the complex interfaces of high-end Midi and audio sequencers, such as Cubase and Logic, hence there’s a ready market for entry-level songwriting software.

Apple has been more than busy catering for it with the Mac-only Garageband, part of the £55 iLife ‘06 suite. It’s a supremely simple composition suite that supports pre-formatted audio and Midi-based Apple Loops to speed production.

However, not to be outdone, Steinberg has waded in with Sequel, a product for both OS X and Windows and featuring a similar slap-it-together attitude towards workflow.

Sequel ships with more than 5,000 loops and more than 600 software instruments, any of which can be plonked into the single-window interface and automatically beat-mapped to keep performances in sync. There’s also the facility to record up to eight tracks of audio and import your own samples, so it’s not merely a case of pasting Steinberg’s own offerings into a composition - there is an amount of creative control on offer.

At 6GB, Sequel is a big installation, but that’s mainly down to the supplied audio content which should be hived off to a media drive at the earliest. The audio and Midi content provided is of generally high quality and covers many modern musical genres including dance, metal, electronic and World. However, if your tastes run to the more esoteric, you’ll have to record it yourself via Sequel’s multitrack recording functions.

The software’s layout is refreshingly clean. At top left there's the Pilot Zone, which hosts the main editing, automation and project-management tools. Getting a song going is merely a case of clicking the Add New Track icon and selecting loops from the library via the Multi Zone at base, then shifting them about in the Arrange Zone.

There’s an amount of sample-editing to be had in the Multi Zone, should loops need fine-tuning, and a collection of such popular effects as reverb, delay and chorus, as well as dynamics and EQ processors, can be applied per track or globally. It’s also possible to automate certain functions via draggable handles on timelines that run alongside the audio content.

Come playback, Sequel presents a variety of options. By default, it’ll play what you’ve set up in the Arrange Zone, but there are other replay modes suited to performance. In Live Mode, sections of the song can be assigned to pads which can be triggered as the mood takes you - great for spontaneous songwriting.

Alternatively, there’s Chain Play mode by which song sections assigned to the pads can be triggered in whatever order you fancy, with sections looping when you click the Cycle button. DJs and musicians should find both features highly entertaining.

Once the mix is finalised, you’ve the option of exporting the piece straight to iTunes as an AAC file ready for transfer to an iPod. Alternatively, there’s the means to export uncompressed Wav or Aiff files at up to 44.1kHz, 24-bit stereo.

So, how does Sequel fare against Garageband? The latter handles video, which Sequel does not, and can access Audio Units-based instruments and effects that may be resident on the system. Sequel doesn’t do third-party plug-ins, so you’re limited to what’s bundled. Garageband also has a wealth of Apple Loops libraries, although we’re likely to see Sequel-optimised collections before long.

Where Sequel does score is that it’s available for Windows PC, filling a gap in the market for an entry-level audio/Midi sequencer. For those bamboozled by Acid, Cubase Studio, Logic Express, Sonar, et al, Steinberg’s latest could provide the key to unlocking musical genius. Users will likely move on to more sophisticated products as confidence grows, but Sequel will still fulfil a useful purpose as a live-performance tool.

Review: Magix Music Maker 12 Deluxe audio software

Tim Smith — 2007-02-01T00:00:00.000Z

Tim Smith, Personal Computer World, Thursday 1 February 2007 at 00:00:00

A complete audio studio that’s great for beginners

Making music on computers has come a long way from the weak bleeps of FM synthesis Midi, just how far is amply shown by Magix Music Maker 12. Priced well within the reach of the curious, it is capable of good results for both beginners and experienced musicians.

Music Maker is now supplied on DVD, so there is no disc swapping required to access the large collection of samples as in past versions. Having said that, the DVD is not the most responsive of media and a way to copy DVDs onto the hard disk would be preferable.

There are plenty of new features in version 12 in terms of both samples and instruments. The Magix Vital Instruments set are very realistic and a long way from the poor Midi squeaks of yesteryear. There are also more export options including uploading your own podcasts.

Where Music Maker 12 Deluxe really excels is in helping beginners get going. The Song Maker is a good way of learning how to use the software and getting inspiration. This one-step wizard is used to select a style, set of instruments and duration – Music Maker then creates a song accordingly. The results obviously can't match human inspiration, but it’s a good place to start.

Starting out from scratch is a simple process. There are several different ways of creating a drum track, from building an arrangement to specifying a style in the Livid drum machine. Music can be entered with a Midi keyboard and there are special low-latency drivers supplied to improve recording of the music.

There are some aspects of the program that may frustrate those with a solid background in musical theory. Samples are arranged by pitch, so it is easy to choose samples that work with each other, but they are numbered rather than described by key or pitch, making it harder to follow a particular chord progression. Recording instruments is also a little limited, but this is more the area of Magix Music Studio.

It’s worth noting that, during testing, we had a couple of stability problems when Music Maker crashed when asked to produce a track longer than four minutes.

This aside, Music Maker 12 Deluxe from Magix is a great way to get started in the world of computer music.

Also consider:

Cubase 4 and Cubase Studio 4

Steinberg’s flagship music production suite gets a new look and many new features

Ableton Live 6

Although based on the ideas of Dance and DJ music with their use of loops, Ableton Live 6 can easily be applied to all sorts of new musical ideas

Sony Acid XMC 6

Although Acid XMC is a no-frills product, it is still capable of producing good-quality recordings

All audio recording, editing and mixing reviews

Review: Cubase 4 and Cubase Studio 4

Clive Akass — 2006-11-23T00:00:00.000Z

Clive Akass, Personal Computer World, Thursday 23 November 2006 at 00:00:00

Steinberg’s flagship music production suite gets a new look and many new features

Steinberg’s music production suite has been given a major revamp in Cubase 4 and its cut-down Studio edition, which offers a large subset of the features at less than half the price.

A new-look interface helps minimise the screen clutter inevitable with software that requires you to monitor many features at once. You can easily choose which controls and information appear in the Track Inspector and Channel panels. But the changes are not so much as to confuse users familiar with older versions.

There are, however, a lot of new features to get to grips with. They include a new Instrument track that provides a short-cut to setting up a virtual instrument, though it is limited to one midi input and a stereo output.

You can set up and save track presets that store configurations of audio, Midi or Instrument tracks. These can be categorised to assist searching and reuse.

They are part of a new set of asset management facilities, designed for professional musicians and studios, in two complementary modules: MediaBay helps you to organise and preview audio, Midi, video and project files as well as presets; SoundFrame helps you manage sounds from any source, and search for them using a variety of criteria.

SoundFrame starts you off with more than 1,000 fully indexed sounds of its own. Cubase 4 (but not Studio 4) also has a separate tag editor, allowing you to view and amend attributes to facilitate searches.

Also available only in the larger package is Control Room, which is identical to a module of the same name in Steinberg’s Nuendo 2 product. It provides a soft console for controlling outputs to studio monitors and headphones, and inputs from the likes of tape decks and CDs.

Cubase 4 also introduces VST3, the latest version of Steinberg’s open Virtual Studio Technology standard for plug-in modules. VST3 is backwards compatible with earlier standards but easier on the CPU, as audio is processed only when a signal is present.

VST3’s main party trick is support for multiple buses. A VST3 plug-in will detect whether a channel is mono, stereo, or 5.1 surround sound and adjust its operation accordingly. Incidently the suite can import and export the new MP3 Surround format.

Cubase 4 comes with 33 VST3 plug-ins (21 in Studio 4) and four new virtual instruments: Halion One, Prologue, and (not Studio 4) Spector and Mystic. A downside, which has irritated some Cubase users, is that the new version does not support Direct X plug-ins.

Other new features include AudioWarp time stretching and pitch changing, and improved scoring facilities, though we did not get time to try these out. This in itself speaks volumes about Cubase 4: there are too many new features to be taken in without extended use.

Cubase 4 users get a comprehensive printed manual, which is a great help even if the printed screenshots do not always correspond with what you see on screen. Sadly the book is a luxury Studio 4 users have to do without, though a useful printed tutorial comes with both versions.

Also consider:

Ableton Live 6 digital audio workshop

Although based on the ideas of Dance and DJ music with their use of loops, Ableton Live 6 can easily be applied to all sorts of new musical ideas

Sony Acid XMC 6 music creation software

Although Acid XMC is a no-frills product, it is still capable of producing good-quality recordings

O-Generator music software

A great package that could help improve existing musical ability

All music software reviews

Review: Nero 7 Premium Reloaded authoring software

Tim Smith — 2006-11-20T00:00:00.000Z

Tim Smith, Personal Computer World, Monday 20 November 2006 at 00:00:00

This latest version of Nero offers far more than basic CD burning

Nero will be a familiar name to many thanks to basic versions supplied with many new computers. Nero 7 Premium Reloaded offers much more than basic disc burning, including its own desktop search engine and the ability to share media with other devices.

The getting started window is quite small and understated without hiding anything useful. Tasks are divided into six different categories including a favourites list of the most commonly used. This is a much better way of working than having to remember which program does what and similar to that used by Roxio Creator 9.

A drop-down menu at the top of the window allows filtering of tasks for CDs and DVDs. You can also toggle between the normal list of tasks and what Nero considers to be expert tasks such as mixing an audio CD.

Blu-ray and HD DVD support are both included out of the box, making Nero ideal for backing up large installations as well as fitting more videos or music onto one disc. The software is also capable of creating full backup of Windows on a bootable disc.

More advanced users can expand this window to show the individual applications. The manuals for the different applications can be found in this section too.

Adding files to a data disk is simple and each folder or individually selected file is shown in the list. The contents of a folder can be seen as well so there is no loss of detail. A coloured bar at the bottom of the screen shows how much space is free on the CD and Nero will prompt for a DVD if there is not enough space on a CD.

As well as plain data, CDs and DVDs with music, photos and videos can be created. The options are not quite as polished as those available with Roxio Easy Media Creator 9 but quite adequate for personal use.

There are Digital Rights Management limitations as we were unable to include protected WMA files in an mp3 jukebox DVD. Nero Mobile will edit photos and videos so they are suitable for phones and PDAs.

Desktop search is added in the form of Nero Scout, using technology from Yahoo. It is added to the Task Bar so that it is always available. As text is entered possible search results are displayed. A wide variety of file types can be indexed including Office files, pdf and HTML. The same search string can also be used for an internet search.

Indexing takes place in the background and is paused when something is happening in the foreground. This does prevent the software from interfering with other tasks but it would be helpful to have an option to force a full scan. We also encountered some stability problems on changing the program settings but this did not affect the ability to scan.

Nero also caters for other means of access as well as ordinary desktop computer use. Nero Home makes the computer useable at living room distances in a similar style to Media Center. The red theme might be a bit much for some but there is an alternative supplied. Nero Home can be used with a TV card for time-shifting and recording programs.

Other utilities include one for selecting the speed and spin down time for the optical drives in the computer. Although slower speeds mean slower transfer rates, they also mean quieter operation, something worth experimenting with for Media Center computers in the living room.

Nero is also supplied with its own Voice over IP (VoIP) client called Nero Sipps. As installed this can only make calls to other Nero Sipps users but the manual does claim that it can be used for low cost calls to landlines.

We were unable to find any information to this effect on the Nero website. However, the Sipps software is freely available from Nero so there is no reason why friends and family cannot install it themselves.

A helpful touch is the ability to set a second audio device for playing the ringtone for incoming calls; ideal for anyone who uses a USB phone.

Also consider:

Roxio Easy Media Creator 9

Just as Office takes care of all word processing needs, Roxio Creator 9 is the complete multimedia package

Roxio MyDVD 8 Premier media management software

If you want to make DVDs for your friends, family or yourself, Roxio MyDVD 8 Premier offers an easy way to professional results.

X-oom Movie Clone 4 Media management software

X-oom Movie Clone 4 works well enough but to use it fully is legally dubious

Review: Ableton Live 6 digital audio workshop

Terry Relph-Knight — 2006-10-11T00:00:00.000Z

Terry Relph-Knight, Personal Computer World, Wednesday 11 October 2006 at 00:00:00

The latest version of Ableton’s advanced looping and recording software

The previous version of this DAW (digital audio workshop) software, Ableton Live 5, is already such a mature and well-crafted product that it’s hard to see what improvements could be made in version 6.

However, the new version doesn’t disappoint, retaining all the unique character of the earlier product, while adding some powerful new features, such as multi-core and multi-processor support, sound-to-picture Quicktime movie import and a new sound library – The Essential Instrument Collection. New, improved devices include EQ 8 and a Dynamic Tube Simulator and Saturator for adding warmth and dirt.

In use, version 6 initially looks much like the previous versions, with the familiar minimalist 2D graphics in two views for Arrangement or Session.

A new deep-freeze feature helps minimise CPU load, but cleverly without losing the ability to use the majority of editing features for that track while frozen. There is also the option to flatten frozen tracks into audio.

Instruments and effects can now be grouped in Racks. These Racks can be saved and re-called along with a simplified set of controls for tweaking the sound.

A new device for Live 6 is the Sampler. Described as the big brother of its predecessor Simpler, Sampler allows multi-sample playback, in-depth manipulation of sampled sounds and imports a wide range of sample formats.

New project management tools help with organisation, transfer and archiving projects. Live sets, Live clips, Racks, presets and the audio samples and movie files they use can all be organised into project folders.

As well as these new features, many of the existing tools have been improved, for example there’s instant Midi-adaptive mapping support for many popular control surfaces.

If you have any involvement in using computers to record and create music, particularly in live performance where it is perhaps un-paralleled, Ableton Live 6 is a product you shouldn’t be without. If you already have a previous version, version 6 is definitely worth the price of the upgrade.

Also consider:

Sony Acid XMC 6 music creation software

Record, mix and burn your tracks with this easy-to-use utility

X-oom Podcast Studio 1.08

All you need to create your first podcast

Avanquest Radio Tracker

Automatically record music played on Shoutcast radio broadcasts

All audio mixing, editing and creating reviews

Review: Sony Acid XMC 6 music creation software

Terry Relph-Knight — 2006-09-05T00:00:00.000Z

Terry Relph-Knight, Personal Computer World, Tuesday 5 September 2006 at 00:00:00

Record, mix and burn your tracks with this easy-to-use utility

Sony acquired the original Acid from Sonic Foundry in 2003. Since then it has slowly developed Acid, and the company now markets a range of audio recording/looping software based on the original concepts and technology.

There are three products in the range. First up is the professional-level digital audio works (DAW) Acid Pro 6, followed by the mid-range Acid Music Studio. The product we're reviewing here is Acid XMC, which is aimed at beginners.

Sony Acid XMC supports recording and looping unlimited audio or Midi tracks with automatic key and tempo matching. It also comes with over 600 royalty-free, music loops. However, any effects required must be applied outside XMC because it doesn’t support them.

This stripped-down approach is ideal for the basic-level market, keeping costs down and the software simple. CD clips can be captured directly from Acid XMC and finished edits written either directly to audio CD or output in a variety of formats including mp3s.

Installation is uncomplicated, and only requires the entry of a 23-character serial number.

There is the usual prompt for registration, but unregistered users can still access updates. At the time of writing, the shipped version, 6.0b, was the latest.

Once launched, Acid XMC opens with a set of demonstration tracks already loaded and a splash overlay screen labelled ‘Show Me How’ that links to a set of tutorials. Unfortunately the online product help is generic to all three Acid products and frequently mentions procedures and features that aren’t possible or present in XMC.

The interface is a single window of clean and crisp 2D graphics split horizontally into a linear track view at the top and a tabbed, track properties and file explorer at the bottom.

Unlike some basic music software, Sony Acid XMC is not a toy, but a serious introduction to audio recording and looping. It could easily be used as an ideas notepad for later transference to more powerful software.

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X-oom Podcast Studio 1.08

All you need to create your first podcast

Review: X-oom Podcast Studio 1.08

Paul Rowlingson — 2006-09-01T00:00:00.000Z

Paul Rowlingson, Personal Computer World, Friday 1 September 2006 at 00:00:00

All you need to create your first podcast

With podcasting now pretty much mainstream, there a plethora of software tools to help you create, edit, manage and publish your podcasts.

Podcast Studio from X-oom aims to be an all-rounder. You'll find sections for recording and editing, a subscription manager and various tools for ripping, converting and transferring.

A slightly dated interface presents you with seven options: Direct, Manage, Record, Rip, Edit, Convert and Transfer. Each option does pretty much what ‘it says on the tin’, but all with little aplomb. Everything looks the same and, to be honest, is a little uninspiring.

This isn't a huge problem as Podcast Studio is aimed at the beginner end of the market, but a little more encouraging assistance in the form of optional wizards would have been welcome.

Podcasts can be recorded in three formats – Mp3, Ogg and Wav, with a decent number of options on altering bit rates and other settings. A number of jingles that can be inserted into the recording are provided. You can also make use of the Rip and Convert tools to insert audio from other recorded media.

Once recorded, switching to the Editor provides you with options for adding and removing gaps, normalising, adding echo, fading in and out, and other basic operations.

After recording and editing podcasts they can be uploaded to a web server via the included FTP client. An RSS feed can also be generated for web visitors to subscribe to.

Although Podcast Studio can take you through the whole process of creating, editing, publishing and managing podcasts in the one program, it really doesn’t do enough with any of its elements to particularly impress.

With little scope for real control in any one element there’s little to stop you becoming bored.

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Avanquest Radio Tracker

Automatically record music played on Shoutcast radio broadcasts

Review: Audible online audio book store

Marc Delehanty — 2006-05-12T00:00:00.000Z

Marc Delehanty, Personal Computer World, Friday 12 May 2006 at 00:00:00

Download and listen to bestselling books and more on your PC or portable audio player

For those who want to broaden the range of material on their portable audio players beyond the Top 40 hits, websites like Audible are a boon.

The UK sister site to Audible.com, Audible offers a wide selection of audio books for download on either a one-off or subscription basis.

Once you've paid for a book, it's available to download indefinitely from your online account.

You can find extensive samples of each book on the website, which allows you to vet them before buying.

This is most welcome given the possible scope for a sub-standard narrator to ruin a listener's enjoyment of an otherwise great book.

This feature makes excellent use of the online retail environment and sets Audible apart from conventional book stores.

In contrast to competitors such as Simply Audiobooks, Audible's books are available in four formats, varying in file size and, as a consequence, quality.

The levels of quality are designated (in ascending order) as telephone, AM radio, FM radio or mp3.

This will be a major advantage for dial-up users, as downloads of unabridged novels with a playing time of six-plus hours, at mp3 quality can run up to 100MB, which can take a long time to download.

Streaming of the audio books is an added bonus and is available in any one of the four quality levels.

Most, though not all, titles can be burned to CD, providing more flexible playback options.

Prior to signing up it's important to ensure you have an audio device capable of playing Audible's proprietary file formats.

Audible has a list of compatible players, but not all can play each of the four quality formats mentioned above.

For example, the Creative Muvo can only play AM and FM radio.

Beyond books, you can subscribe on a monthly or yearly basis to a number of newspapers and periodicals including The Times, the Wall Street Journal and Scientific American.

Although you are encouraged to download Audible's software you are not prompted to install and run the download manager prior to beginning a download, which can lead to some confusion.

Every so often, when navigating the site we came across broken images, links and even streams.

Given the potential of this service it doesn't deserve to be let down by such easily rectifiable flaws on the website.

Audible faces some stiff competition in the form of Apple's iTunes, whose financial clout enabled the company to secure exclusive rights to the Harry Potter series of books.

Despite this, Audible remains affordable, boasts a range of 8,000 titles and is certainly worth checking out, especially now that there's a free trial period and an Ipod Shuffle for members who commit to a 12-month subscription.

System requirements:

Compatible audio player

Internet connection