It should be straightforward. All you want to do is burn a data CD, after all. But some of the leading disc burning packages have become so bloated with unnecessary extras that it may take quite some time to locate the function you need. And even then, you’ll often have to work through complex options and confusing settings before you can get anything done.

Ashampoo Burning Studio 10 takes a different approach. It’s relatively lightweight, concentrating solely on core disc burning functionality, so your PC won’t be weighed down with unrelated tools that you need use. A single central menu allows you to quickly jump directly to the function you need. And straightforward wizards walk you through each task with ease, so you’ll rarely need to consult the documentation.

Don’t assume that this simplicity means that Ashampoo Burning Studio 10 is lacking in features, though – there’s plenty of power here. The program comes with all the usual features for burning data and audio discs. An exceptionally powerful movie authoring tool helps you create your own video discs. You’re able to create discs with autostart capability, that might pop up to display a menu of options. And there’s also a backup tool, strong disc image capabilities, a disc cover and label designer, Blu-ray support and more.

Core features

Normal disc burning tasks are very straightforward. If you want to burn a new data disc, say, you’d click Burn Files and Folders > Create a New Disc, then drag and drop the files or folders you’d like to burn. Then click Next, choose the drive with the blank disc, click Write, and watch as your disc is burned.

Burning an audio CD works in almost exactly the same way, with an almost identical interface: once you’ve used one, you’ll immediately feel at home with the other.

While there are a few options to configure how the program works, they avoid jargon, instead spelling out explicitly what they’ll do. So, for example, instead of providing a checkbox that simply says “Normalize tracks”, Burning Studio 10 uses “Normalize the volume of all tracks. This will make the volume of all tracks on the CD roughly equal”. It really is a program just about anyone can use.

And elsewhere are all the core features you’d expect from a disc burning tool. So you can copy CDs, DVD or Blu-ray discs; erase rewriteable BD-RE and CD-RW discs; create MP3 or WMA discs (CD, DVD or Blu-ray); and rip CDs to MP3, WMA or WAV files, assisted by Burning Studio 10‘s integration with the Gracenote media database.

Video discs

Ashampoo Burning Studio 10 sees a major revamp in its video authoring tools. The program now includes a single editor for both DVD and Blu-ray editing, and can be used to burn and build Blu-ray HD and Full HD video discs (16:9, PAL and NTSC).

When creating a video DVD, you’ll start in much the same way as any other project, dragging and dropping the videos you need onto Burning Studio 10. The program will accept any video formats that you can view in Media Player.

You can also get creative by building your own movie, dragging in clips and stills, adding music, logos and subtitles, even a few stylish transitions for a professional look.

There are only a few sample menus on offer at the moment, and they’re all fairly basic 2D designs. They look good, though, and can be extensively reconfigured with your own choice of images, buttons, text and music. And your menu backgrounds no longer have to be a still image: you’re able to use a theme, slideshow, even another movie, a very useful addition.

Encoding options are notable by their complete absence. You don’t get to choose quality settings, bit rates, encoding modes, audio formats or anything else: Ashampoo Burning Studio 10 will manage such complexities itself, automatically adjusting movie quality to ensure everything will fit on the disc. We missed having the extra control, but there’s no doubt it’s a simpler approach. And encoding speeds were reasonable, too, with Burning Studio 10 delivering similar performance to Nero Vision Xtra.

Autoplay Editor

Burning Studio 10 now includes an Autoplay Editor, which allows to build data discs with interactive menus that launch automatically when a disc is inserted. (Unless the viewer has turned autoplay off, anyway.) These could include links to files on the disc, documents, web pages and more, anything that might help the recipient of your disc make more sense of the contents.

Your menu comes in two formats: browser based or standalone, the latter adding a small executable file and DLL to your disc (around 8MB in total). Both are easy to build.

You’re able to add a splash screen, and a background. This may be customised with images, text and shapes. Then you can add buttons, and assign each one an action: buttons can execute files, open a folder, change the current menu page (you can have as many as you need), launch a website, send an email or close the menu system.

What you can’t do, unfortunately, is save your menu layouts for use in another project. Which means you must either save and later modify the entire project, or start again each time from scratch. Still, this is a welcome addition to Burning Studio 10, providing an interactivity that’s hard to achieve in any other way.

Other features

Other new features in Burning Studio 10 include much improved media handling. When building audio discs you can now play audio files and CDs from within the program, for instance, making it easy to check tracks quickly. The integrated movie player for previewing your videos is now easier to use, and the new video disc preview tool precisely emulates your video disc menus so you can see exactly how they will look and behave.

A revamped CD ripping module improves your productivity by ripping tracks from multiple CDs, one after another. The program can automatically create artist, album and track folders according to your requirements, and will copy the ripped files to the appropriate place. And there’s now support for 24 and 32-bit audio tracks for CDs, delivering improved sound quality.

And when you’ve completed a project, it only takes a minute or two to produce a suitable cover. The integrated designer supports DVD cases, booklets, slim, jewel and Blu-ray cases, as well as discs. Drag on a custom theme, or add your own background, text and images, send the project off to your printer and in a moment or two it’ll be ready to use.