Review: Roxio Copy and Convert 3 media tool

A quick and easy way to create and manage your audio and video

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Price: £20

Manufacturer: Roxio

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Verdict

Pros: Easy to use; support for modern formats like DivX and Blu-ray
Cons: Tools aren’t particularly comprehensive; not a large degree of control over media
Overall: Despite being relatively cheap and easy to use this is a fairly limited suite of tools and will only appeal to casual users or beginners

Paul Lester, Personal Computer World 16 May 2007

Roxio’s Copy and Convert is effectively a cut-down version of its impressive Easy Media Creator suite, focusing specifically at format conversion and video and audio burning.

You’ll find a similar interface and tool layout, which splits things into a series of categories to handle the multimedia content on your PC.

All the basics are here, such as burning and creating images, cloning non copy-protected DVD video and compiling your own DVD discs of assorted content. In terms of audio you’ll find conversion and ripping, along with similar DivX creation and conversion for video. A disc gallery indexes the files and tracks on media discs, and a further set of assorted tools help you create and print both Lightscribe and Labelflash discs as well as printed media.

This is about the extent of the package, so it only offers a limited range of features not already available using the default Windows applications such as Windows Media Player. There are a few nice touches though, such as the ability to edit audio tags before you convert or transfer tracks, conversion and burning of Blu-ray high definition video and the ability to import from multiple discs at once.

You can also convert video directly to specific formats including portable players such as iPod, PSP or your mobile phone. Despite this, you’re not given a large degree of control over what’s going on in comparison with rival software. There’s no batch video conversion and only a fairly limited set of options in terms of controlling the quality and end format. We also found the DivX conversion tools to be quite slow, particularly when processing large files.

Although reasonably priced, this is a package for casual users who don’t have the experience or inclination to get involved with more in-depth editing and control. All of the tools are pretty easy to use but there are only a handful of features here that you can’t already do with the tools supplied with Windows or by using freeware alternatives.

In providing a no-fuss application for this corner of the market the suite succeeds, but if you’re expecting a decent level of control over your media you'd be better off looking elsewhere.

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