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Nero 9 -- freeware version!


CoffeeFiend

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You can now get a basic version of Nero 9 for free!

It only does burning and disc copying, none of the extra stuff, much like imgburn. imgburn is great too, but it always seems to have various issues when I use it (strange error messages, problems locking drives for exclusive use, sync issues and what not) Great for those of us who don't burn other stuff and don't want all the multimedia junk.

Get it here 55 MB download.

Edit: unfortunately, there's only the "user friendly" thing (start smart), not the regular interface. Oh well.

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Wow this is a surprise! Looks like they are finally responding to the competition :)

Just tested it and as you said it only does 2 things, funny thing is ImgBurn does more such as burning/creating image files and audio cds. This will be good if people want Nero but don't want to pay for it, otherwise I would still reccomend CDBurnerXP.

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Is this equivalent to the "basic" thing that came as the OEM version with CD or DVD burners? I remember for most of the OEM versions you could download a thing called "NeroVision Express" that supplied a lot of the more basic functions required to burn media disks. Is there an equivalent for this version or is that it (I wonder if it would work with the older versions?)

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funny thing is ImgBurn does more such as burning/creating image files and audio cds.

I can't say I'm worried about Audio CDs in 2009 as I've moved on to mp3's 8 years ago. Those things are 100% obsolete as far as I'm concerned. What matters to me is "advanced" disc modes, like bootable/UDF and so on.

Is this equivalent to the "basic" thing that came as the OEM version with CD or DVD burners?

Back then, this was usually the previous version or so, with a serial that tied it to that specific DVD writer, but it wasn't missing stuff as far as I remember.

This is just a "try the absolute most basic features" version, where they hope you'll curse and swear enough, and then go spend $100 for the real thing instead.

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Nero is still around? ;)

Well, it's not like there's a perfect replacement from anyone...

Then again, I had hoped for this to be kind of lite "nero lite" (nero without all the useless crap) but free. Too bad.

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imgburn or nero lite are the only real options now. bloat is bad.

Well, there's some acceptable "bloat", but when your disc burning app has like 3 whole different interfaces, and has evolved into a burning app plus also:

  • a packet burning app (which always sucked): InCD
  • yet another separate app to copy discs: Disc Copy Gadget
  • CD cover designer (I don't think I've ever even launched that app)
  • Then the lightscribe stuff...
  • a benchmark app (discspeed)
  • a drive speed tweaking app (drivespeed)
  • an app just for disc/drive info (infotool)

Ok, this might be acceptable so far. It's all burning related. But unfortunately that's not where it ends:

  • a photo editing suite (imagxpress)
  • a photo album/viewer thingy (photosnap)
  • a MCE replacement (live) with extra gadgets
  • not one but two separate encoding apps (recode and vision)
  • a WMP replacement (showtime)
  • two separate sound editing & whatever apps (wave editor and soundtrax)

My guess is, Nero 10 will also come with a full office suite, a database, and a CAD app. Nero 11 will build onto that, and add a GPS app, a MIDI sequencer and an encyclopedia. Nero 12 will bring new features such as a set of minesweeper/solitaire-style games, a translator and vector graphics editor. v13 will tackle on a large text editor, a disk defragmenter, and a network tracing tool. v14...

Nero 6.6 (not that long ago) was like a 30MB download. Now Nero 9 comes on DVD and uses 1.5GB of disk space (that's about 750x more than imgburn) i.e. more than XP does -- just for a burning app! It's way past the "everything and the kitchen sink too" stage. Here it's not merely bloat, it's beyond morbidly obese.

I wish they'd go back to what they do well: making Nero Burning ROM, and just that (basically what you get in Nero Micro or whatever). Make it work great, make format support better, make it integrate better with the Win7 taskbar (and other Win7-related improvements), etc. I would buy it. But right now, v8 is likely the last version I'll ever use. AFAIK, Nero 9 brings zero new features as far as disc burning goes (v8 added some, like DL DVD-RW support)

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