Esmas Player is a truly multimedia application that provides the user with almost any tool they may need to enjoy image, music and video files on the computer.

The program's interface is suspiciously similar to that of iTunes, which makes us wonder why is it that developers weren't able to come up with a more original design. Similarities to iTunes don't end here, though: as you'll see, you can organize your library, play your favorite songs, edit tags, listen to podcasts, synchronize contents with your portable music device and even buy music online. Some people may find this resemblance somewhat uncomfortable – like a cheap imitation – but it's also a way to make the program look familiar and be easy to use from the very beginning.

Leaving comparisons aside, Esmas Player goes a step forward and also enables you to organize photos and videos, and also features extended functionality such as a disc burner, a DVD player and support for online TV channels and radio stations. During our tests, however, I had the impression that some of its functions were not properly implemented or at least not as easy to use as I expected. Also, though the program's language can be set to English, both the installer and documentation haven't been translated from Spanish yet.

In all, Esmas Player works fine as an all-in-one multimedia organizer, but it still needs some improvements in usability – as well as adding the necessary distance between iTunes and itself in order to avoid odious comparisons.

Download Esmas Player 11026 in Softonic

Nero is a mammoth multimedia solution that does just about everything from CD and DVD burning to audio and video editing. This latest version is a bit of a disappointment as it doesn't really bring anything drastically new from version 7. The main improvements are an updated design and reinforced security. Let’s look around at the features available in Nero 8.

This latest version is Windows Vista certified and if you have Microsoft’s latest OS installed you’ll be able to enjoy the Nero sidebar gadget and sleek, clear Vista interface, such as the “Glass” window for StartSmart. Nero Home, the multimedia manager with a DVD menu-like interface, has been slightly improved. Apart from handling all your photos, videos and songs it can also play radio stations and, if you have a TV card set up, play and record TV stations. Furthermore, Nero can stream content to your brand new Xbox 360.

The StartSmart interface is your gateway to all the Nero tools. You can select the individual applications from the left sided menu or choose the file you want to work with (data, audio, photo and video or backup) from the main menu. It’s best to choose the disc type, CD or DVD from the drop-down menu at the top to get the most relevant possibilities. Even though StartSmart gives quick access to all the Nero applications, we found the whole interface too small and cluttered. The window can’t be resized and you need to scroll through to find the tools you need. RSS feeds added to version 8 feel a bit clumsy. They don't show items in a proper feed list and only seem to link back to the Nero help and support pages.

Before it became a full multimedia suite though, Nero was renowned for its burning tools, essentially due to its flagship program, Nero Burning ROM. With it, you can adjust the disc type, set restrictions and control the writing speed. SecurDisc technology has also been added in the latest version to encrypt your CDs or DVDs. If you don’t want to get bogged down in the details, use Nero Express instead to burn your project and design your own disc cover quickly.

Another of the classic Nero apps that has been improved is Nero Showtime. This DVD player boasts support for HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, and will save you from upgrading when these formats become the norm. Just use Nero InfoTool beforehand to check if your system can handle these new formats. The program has also seen the introduction of AVCHD playback and authoring technology used in camcorder videos. Support for Windows Media Format DRM is also part of the deal and you can encode videos to play on your iPod, mobile or PlayStation Portable (PSP) thanks to Nero Recode.

Nero’s strength lies in the wealth of multimedia tools it offers to users. You can do just about everything from managing your media to burning CDs and DVDs or editing and watching high quality videos. The latest release has added a number of significant improvements to handle all the latest technological advances like Windows Vista, iPods or the Xbox 360.

Ironically, Nero´s power also contributes to its downfall. Nero packs so many applications into one package that it’s very easy for the common user to get lost in the menus. The size of the suite(600 MBs) and its draining of PC resources also means that you’ll need a high-spec PC to run it smoothly.

It's a bit surprising that Nero decided to jump to version 8 as there's nothing really that new in this latest outing. Once more, Nero will cater to those users looking for a full multimedia suite and not worried about eating up their PC's resources.

Download Nero 8.3.6.0 in Softonic

With this software you can burn CD-R, CD-RW DVD+R/RW DVD-R/RW discs. It offers the following main features:

• Writes all kind of mediums apart from double-layer DVD (follows in next version)
• Burn audio-CDs with and without gaps between tracks
• Burn on the fly / Burn-proof
• Supports most IDE, USB, Firewire and SCSI drives
• Rip Audio-CDs to harddrive, obtain track-information (ID3-tags) from Internet
• Burn and create ISO-files
• Customizeable with many settings
• Data verification after burn, create bootable discs
• Bin/nrg->ISO converter, simple cover printing and much more

Download CDBurnerXP Pro 4.1.2.789 in Softonic

Zortam MP3 Media Studio is an all-in-one MP3 application that contains an MP3 organizer for performing a range of tasks quickly and easily. Features of the program include searching and cataloging MP3 files into an MP3 library, and editing ID3v1 and ID3v2.3 tags (ID3 Tag Editor).

The program can also be used for converting audio CD to MP3 and WAV format (CD Ripper) using CDDB (Internet Compact Disc Database), complete with support for ID3v1 and ID3v2.4 tags. You can normalize your MP3s (Mp3 Normalizer), search for song lyrics from the internet (Lyrics Finder), and preform a batch lyrics and cover picture update from the internet.

Zortam also facilitates converting WAV to MP3 files and vice versa (WAV/Mp3 Converter), managing M3u playlists (Playlist manager), renaming files using ID3 tags (Mp3 Renamer), searching for duplicate MP3 files, (Find Duplicate MP3s),and listening to MP3's using your favorite player.

Download Zortam Mp3 Media Studio 8.30 in Softonic

The Cheetah DVD Burner provides an easy-to-use interface for burning DVDs. The application boasts a number of handy features to make the process of burning CDs even quicker and easier. You can carry out the following projects:

• Burn a Video DVD from an ISO, Bin/Cue, or Video_TS folder
• Backup your data on 8.5 GB DVD+R discs
• Backup your data on DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM
• Burn a standard CD or CD-RW
• Creates Red Book compatible audio CDs from mp3, mp2, avi, ogg, wma, and wav files
• Extract audio from an Audio CD
• Copy a Data CD
• Copy an audio disc
• Burn Bin/Cue image files
• Builds ISO Images from selected files for burning at a later date
• Convert audio files from mp3, mp2, avi, ogg, wma, and wav files
• Erase CD/DVD discs

It has the following features:

Features:

• The Cheetah DVD Burner passes the Video DVD Verifier tests and Mastering Applications like the most known Philips Video DVD Verifier
• Create Bootable CD/DVD from .img files
• Supports use of high write speeds - Designed for high data rates
• Support for hardware buffer underrun protection systems, like BURNproof, JustLink, Power-Burn, SafeBurn, SeamlessLink etc
• Burn Multi-Session Data CD/DVD with all types of media
• No further writing is possible after the disc is burned
• Performs a binary compare with the source files
• Burn Joliet directories with 64 char file names

Download Cheetah DVD Burner 2.33 in Softonic

If you have some AVI videos that you would like to watch on your TV as DVD movies, you need AVI DVD Burner.

With AVI DVD Burner you can convert any AVI files into DVD format in just a couple of steps. Simply locate the source AVI files, select the appropriate format to convert them to DVD (PAL or NTSC, depending on your DVD region) and let AVI DVD Burner take care of everything else.

There are two features in AVI DVD Burner that I specially liked: one is the support for subtitles, which can be embedded in the converted file straight away, and the other is the built-in recording tool with which you can burn your DVD right after converting the AVI file.

On the downside, I think AVI DVD Burner misses having a more complete settings menu, as well as the possibility to create and save customized conversion profiles.

AVI DVD Burner lets you easily convert AVI videos to DVD format and burn a DVD disc with the resulting files right on the spot.

Download AVI DVD Burner 2008 4.60 in Softonic

Copying DVDs (for your own use, of course) is becoming increasingly difficult as manufacturers improve the security encoding on DVDs. AnyDVD however claims to be able to crack any DVD encryption code and judging by the number of downloads, Softonic users are certainly endorsing it too.

The beauty of AnyDVD is that it simply works in the background to automatically remove the copy protection of a DVD movie as soon as it's inserted into the drive. In this way, it can decrypt data without actually saving it to your hard-disk. You can watch the DVD at the same time or just insert a disk and let AnyDVD do its stuff. When you insert a disk, you are automatically prompted whether you want to decrypt it. When it has finished inspecting the disk, the program prompts you to backup the DVD using your preferred backup tool such as CloneDVD or Power DVD Copy.

The programme goes much further than this though. A handy bonus is that you can also remove the RPC region code, thereby making the movie region free and viewable on any DVD player. This is especially useful for those who buy many of their disks abroad or travel a lot. If you want to create a stripped-down version of a DVD, it can also remove unwanted movie features, including subtitles and extras for example. The programme also moves beyond decryption and allows you to control the speed of your DVD drive. This is useful if you’re having trouble playing a DVD properly or if the noise of your drive is causing annoyance. Finally, there’s also an option to display the frequency of your monitor for both NTSC and PAL displays although you probably won’t use this unless you’re having serious display issues.

The only drawback of AnyDVD is the number of daily updates that are released. Whilst this is obviously a good thing in terms of keeping it up-to-date with the latest encryption methods, the update alerts can be rather annoying and are prone to slowing your computer down.

However, this is a small price to pay for a programme that seems able to crack all but the toughest disks and for anyone who likes to create backups of their favourite DVDs, it’s an essential addition to your software collection.

Download AnyDVD HD 6.4.5.6 in Softonic

If you've been labelling your burned DVD and CD discs with a marker pen then stop - use Discus instead to create some truly original CD covers.

Discus allows you to create and print CD and DVD labels, CD case covers and inserts, DVD box covers and inserts, and more. Discus supports all direct printing onto discs via printer but this depends on whether your own printer supports this option. The great thing though is that Discus allows you to import your own photos and artwork or use one of the many predefined templates provided with the program.

The key thing you'll notice with Discus is the speed at which it does everything. It loads instantly and requires no installation - Discus can be run directly from the EXE file. As regards design and control, there's not a great deal of creativity that it allows itself. It's better to create something in Photoshop and then import it into the program. However, you can perform special text features such as curved and angled text to fit the contours of the disc.

A super fast and easy way to create your disc covers, Discus is one of the quickest ways to give your CD's and DVD's a personal touch.

Download Discus 4.06 in Softonic

Plato DVD Copy is exactly what its name states: an easy-to-use tool to copy your DVD discs.

The most outstanding feature in Plato DVD Copy is its simplicity: even users with no previous experience in copying DVD discs will be able to use it in no time. The program has a plain interface with no configuration settings, except for a few choices when it comes to select the content you want to copy (extras, subtitles, etc.)

With Plato DVD Copy you can choose to copy DVDs from a physical disc or a source directory, and also copy it to another directory or burn it straight away on a new disc. Plato DVD Copy can even compress contents to fit a single-layer disc.

What more advances users will miss in Plato DVD Copy is definitely having more options like frame rate selection, a range of codecs to choose from, compression method to use and so on.

Plato DVD Copy is the perfect tool for those who have never copied a DVD before, though more experienced users will miss a bunch of advanced settings.

Download Plato DVD Copy 7.76 in Softonic

Sometimes the best thing about a DVD is not the movie in itself, but the soundtrack. And if you have any favorite soundtracks, you can now extract them with Plato DVD to MP3 Ripper.

Plato DVD to MP3 Ripper analyzes the content of the DVD disc you insert into the computer's player and displays a list on its interface where you can select exactly what fragments you want to rip to MP3.

Despite its name, Plato DVD to MP3 Ripper enables you to rip the DVD's audio track to two other formats (WAV and WMA). The program includes several configuration profiles for different quality results, each one of them with a few settings: bitrate, volume, frequency, etc. Though you can adjust the settings on each profile, Plato DVD to MP3 Ripper can't save it as a custom profile.

If the soundtrack is your favorite part of a movie, convert it to MP3 with Plato DVD to MP3 Ripper and you'll be able to enjoy it anywhere.

Download Plato DVD To MP3 Ripper 7.85 in Softonic

With the increasing popularity of digital cameras, the need for programs that help us share our pictures is also growing. As digital photos cannot be stuck onto the pages of traditional albums, the perfect solution is creating a digital album, something you can do very easily with MemoriesOnTV. Even if you're not the computer-savvy type, you'll find yourself very comfortable when using this application and the results are really attractive.

MemoriesOnTV divides the process of creating a digital photo album into five easy steps, represented in the menu bar located between both panes: import, music, effects, menu and burn. To begin with, simply drag and drop files from the bottom pane onto the top one to add content to your photo album. The only downside would be the fact that you cannot resize the bottom pane, so if you have a large directory structure you're going to be scrolling a lot. After choosing pictures, you can work on selected photos individually: double click on any of them and the photo will be displayed in a separate window, along with a complete editing menu. You'll be able to fix colors and brightness, add a caption, change background color or apply any of the many special effects featured in the program. You may move to the next photo and continue working this way. However, unless you want to personalize every single detail of every single image it's not really worth it, as it's going to take a huge amount of time. Besides, the program can do it automatically! Just keep on reading and we'll show you.

The next step in the process consists of adding a soundtrack to your album. You'll be able to choose the music files you want to use in your project by just dragging and dropping them on the program's interface or clicking on the button with the plus sign. Don't worry about calculating the song's length; MemoriesOnTV features an excellent sync tool that will adjust the duration of both music and photos, making them fit perfectly.

Now it's time to add special effects to your pictures. This is where you can set the program to choose the effects for you (if you select the "random" option) and also apply them automatically to all pictures, instead of having to edit them one by one. You can choose both photo effects and transition effects. The amount of options available for each of them is certainly gorgeous.

The last step before actually finishing the project is choosing a menu template, that is, the image you will see when viewing your photo album on your PC or TV. Once again, you have a wide range of options to choose from, though the preview pane is so narrow they're hard to see. Fortunately, you have the possibility to preview the whole project as you work your way through the different steps. Once you've created the menu screen, end your project by saving it as a video file or burning it to a disc directly from the application itself.

MemoriesOnTV is definitely one of the best choices to create digital photo albums for novice users as it doesn't require any special knowledge. You'll be amazed to see how well your pictures look on your TV, with the appropriate background music and some smashing visual effects.

Download MemoriesOnTV 4.1.0 in Softonic

CDRoller is a powerful, easy-to-use and low-cost toolset for CD/DVD data recovery. You'll be able to save corrupted files quickly and very easily.

Key Features:

• Effectively retrieves the data off the discs created by "drag and drop" CD/DVD writing software
• Recovers CD and DVD data created by standalone devices
• "On-the-fly" unpacks the files initially compressed by Roxio (Adaptec) DirectCD.
• Retrieves back up files from the discs recorded in several stages (multisession discs)
• Includes a bult-in UDF Reader
• Finds and retrieves the lost files on UDF discs
• Identifies the lost files on ISO/Joliet discs with the damaged file system
• Rescues the data from scratched, damaged or defective discs
• Provides direct access to the hardware, bypassing the Windows File System
• Digitally extracts audio tracks into a wide set of wave formats
• Tests CD/DVD readability
• Extracts ISO Image file
• Catalogs files and folders into CD/DVD library
• All features are integrated into a common and easy-to-use intuitive shell

CDRoller supports industry-standard ISO 9660 file system, including Microsoft's extensions for long file names support, so-called Joliet extensions. CDRoller also supports the discs formatted in UDF file system, including versions 1.02, 1.50, 2.0, 2.01 and also so-called UDF Bridge format.

Download CDRoller 7.61 in Softonic

Backing up your drivers is one of the best things you can do to your PC - if the worst happens, you know that you can always restore damaged and corrupt drivers in seconds.

In most cases when Windows is running slower, faulty driver installations are to blame. The problem is that Windows automatically stores versions of older drivers just in case you want to roll back but sometimes it these conflict with the new ones. Drivermax basically backs-up and restores driver in a very attractive and well presented interface. It has a powerful export wizard to help you export the drivers you need to backup by copying the required files to a folder or compressed ZIP file. After reinstalling Windows, the program can ensure that all drivers are reinstalled within 5 minutes according to the developers. While the process is nowhere near this quick - or straightforward because many drivers may not work properly first time round due to the special way they need to be installed - it is on the whole very easy to use and efficient. It certainly saves you the hours of searching and installing that you'd usually have to go through. The Import Drivers wizard is similarly straightforward and will take up to 10 minutes depending on how much you've got installed on your PC.

A powerful driver installation and restore tool that is easy enough for beginners and does the job in decent time.

Download DriverMax 4.3 in Softonic

With the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray formats becoming increasingly dominant, it's important to have a burner that can handle them all.

The problem with most new burners is that they come at a cost and Astroburn is no exception. The full version will cost you a few dollars but this demo allows you to perform basic burning of small files. Unlike big name programs such as Nero, Astroburn is one of those programs that's easy to use and allows you to carry out a wide array of functions.

You can burn discs, create and record ISO, copy discs, erase rewritable disks and create music CDs. The interface is incredibly stripped down featuring a drag and drop burning process that's easy to use. The fact that the interface is so basic should not give the impression that it's not particularly powerful though.

However, it doesn't always burn as it should do. Normally CD burners automatically optimise burning for the speed of your drive but it seems that Astroburn requires you to configure this yourself. If you don't define the right speed , the buffer is too slow and you'll suffer from the dreaded "buffer underrun" problem. The support page is useless because it simply gives you a phone number for technical assistance rather than an FAQ.

Nevertheless, if you need a simple solution to burning HD-DVD and Blu-Ray and don't mind paying a bit for the pleasure, Astroburn is a worthy option.

Download Astroburn 1.0.8.0 in Softonic

Ultra DVD Creator is a powerful and handy tool to create DVD VCD SVCD Video Disc from almost all formats of video files including AVI DivX XVid MP4 MPEG DAT ASF WMV MOV QT, So you can play movies on your home DVD Player. It is a revolutionary and versatile DVD creator.

With this software, you can convert any video files to DVD VCD SVCD compatible mpeg file and burn to CD or DVD disc.Use this software to create VCD/DVD from your digital video recorder, Webcam, or downloaded files. You can create video VCD/DVD disc freely without any special knowledge in this field, every thing it left you is easy.

Download Ultra DVD Creator 2.4.0622 in Softonic

Movie DVD Maker is a high speed and easy-to-use video DVD VCD SVCD maker, creating DVD VCD SVCD disc from all video files, so you can play your movies at your leisure on your home DVD player.

Supports a wide selection of input formats: AVI, DIVX, XVID, MP4, MPG, WMV, ASF, MOV, QT etc. Converts your movie files to DVD VCD SVCD format using our fast High-Quality Mpeg1/2 encoder and then burn to DVD VCD SVCD Disc with High-Speed burner engine.

Download Movie DVD Maker 2.4.0622 in Softonic

Game Jackal has been designed to enhance your gaming experience in a number of subtle and not so subtle ways.

The most useful application of it for most gamers will be to avoid having to insert a CD-ROM when you are playing a game. You can create profiles on your desktop for separate games with "One-click" profile creation option. This involves right clicking on any game icon and selecting "Convert to Game Jackal Profile". The wizard them takes you through a process that means that the next time you start your game, you won't have to do so much clicking and exchanging of CD-ROM discs. This obviously saves time and wear and tear on your disks. You can use Game Jackal to launch all your games if you want using this option which is a nice way to tie them all together and see what you've got installed on your system. For parents however, the most useful aspect of Game Jackal is that you can prevent adult games from reaching young eyes. "Guardian Control" allows you to place limits on who can and can't use certain games and with games such as Grand Theft Auto 4 featuring some of the most explicit language and gaming yet, this is no bad thing.

For serious gamers or concerned parents, there's something for everyone in Game Jackal that will enhance your gaming experience or at least, set your mind at ease.

Download Game Jackal Pro 3.0.1.6 in Softonic

Image for Windows is an affordable, reliable drive image backup and restore utility that creates and restores snapshot images of entire partitions or volumes. The backups can be saved to a set of files on a local or network drive, or directly to most CD or DVD drives (which will create a bootable restore disc). When needed, you can simply restore the snapshot image and the partition or volume will be back as it was before.

Using the free PHYLock add-on utility, you can continue to use your computer while the backup is locked to a point-in-time. This eliminates the inconsistencies typically experienced while backing up a partition that is in use.

Download Image for Windows 2.13 in Softonic

Bulk Rename Utility is a utility which allows you to easily rename files and directories, based upon extemely flexible criteria. Add date-stamps, replace numbers, insert strings, convert case, add auto-numbers, process folders and subfolders....plus lots more.

Bulk Rename Utility is easy to use and has a small memory “footprint” so can be left running all the time without consuming all your memory. It started life as a Visual Basic application, but as its popularity has grown it has been completely rewritten in C++ (MFC) to be robust and lightweight - and very, very fast! It casn easily handle folders/discs containing well over 100,000 entries, and it can rename 1,000's of entries in seconds.

Download Bulk Rename Utility 2.7.0.3 in Softonic

With an ever growing collection of digital photos, many computer users are in search of an appropriate tool to manage them.

Photo Manager 2008 can be the answer to this search. This complete application works as a photo manager, viewer and editor, plus including some extra tools to make the most of your photo collection.

The program features a classic interface divided into several areas that contain your system's folder structure, image preview and a task list. You can view your photos in thumbnail lists or full screen, apply a series of basic edition effects, create an HTML photo album to share your pictures online, see and edit EXIF data in each image, print several photos on a single sheet of paper and find duplicate images, among other possibilities.

Despite the array of tools included, Photo Manager 2008 generally falls short of expectations. Its editing capabilities are a bit limited – at least when compared to other similar programs – and it also lacks functionalities that you can easily find in other photo editors.

Photo Manager 2008 is a photo editor and viewer with which you can organize, view and edit your pictures, though it lacks advanced tools you find in other similar apps.

Download Photo Manager 2008 1.0 in Softonic