Roxio's Easy Media Creator series has been around for so long that it's almost impossible to imagine computer life without it. The main advantage of Easy Media Creator has been the convenience of having a range of media capture, copy and convert applications all contained within one handy piece of software.

The issue in the past has been whether the individual programs have been able to stand up to the competition (particularly where it comes to burning DVDs and copying music) and whether you're buying a Jack-of-all-trades or a serious deck of cards. With the Creator 10 Suite, Roxio is hoping that the improvements and additions will deflect any such criticisms.

Whether it's music, movies or photos that you need to import, catalogue, edit, copy or transport, Easy Media Creator 10 has a facility that will meet virtually any need, and this time around it's designed to be entirely Windows Vista friendly. This means that you also have a handy sidebar gadget so you can capture radio programmes on the Internet as well as any PC audio, plus you can use drag-and-drop for audio/video conversion.

The Roxio Control home screen has been revamped with the main function icons in the left-hand column, the most frequent tasks on the right and Web links in the centre (where you can also display all the applications and utilities in detail. It's dead easy to navigate around and, if you've used Easy Media Creator before, you'll recognise many of the individual packages like MyDVD, CinePlayer, Creator Classic, PhotoSuite and Label Creator.

In terms of what's new, the headlines include an emphasis on portable devices and the awareness of innovations like HD, Blu-ray and smart mobile phones. On the music front, Multi-Ripper allows multiple drives to be used to rip CDs to MP3s and other digital formats, music can be copied from iPods and multiple format songs can be simultaneously converted into one favoured format.

Slideshows and movies can now have a SmartSound soundtrack added with a specified length, HD video can be captured and edited and an especially welcome development is a resizing auto-fix for your mobile phone photos. With the advent of mass social networking, it's not surprising that you can now upload your created videos to YouTube with a single click.

DVD playback has been enhanced as well, with support for Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and ProLogic, plus a new VGA Optimiser facility on CinePlayer that is supposed to sharpen up your graphics on your TV display.

The chances are that many of these novelties and improvements may only have an occasional relevance for you but it's great to have the range available. Having said that, even ‘simple' copying and burning have been made faster and all your copied CDs and DVDs will now be automatically catalogued, which will save hours of fruitless hunting about through your PC folders.

Verdict
Pretty much the ultimate, comprehensive collection of media copying, burning, sorting, cataloguing and transporting software available, with a host of new extras and improvements, for an accommodating price.

Company: Roxio

Contact: 01908 278100

Tags: dvd ipod youtube windows vista compact disc roxio dolby digital high-definition video