The DRU-800A's software bundle is very similar to what Sony has included with their previous DVD writers. The CD that comes with the drive contains a number of applications from Nero including Nero Burning Rom SE, NeroVision Express 3, Nero Recode 2, Nero ShowTime 2,InCD 4 and BackItUp.
Nero Burning Rom SE - Nero is the main CD/DVD mastering program included with the DRU-800A. This robust software lets users do a number of things including create various types of CD's and DVD's or make copies of existing discs. Even though Nero can do some very advanced disc mastering, it also includes a wizard that will get novices going in no time.
As you can see, the version of Nero Burning Rom included with Sony's new DVD±RW drive is 6.6.0.8. You can download the latest version of the software from Nero's website.
Nero Express 6 - With Nero Express, Nero has taken the features and performance people have come to expect from Nero Burning Rom and combined them with a user friendly interface. While the interface has been simplified, Nero Express still supports more advanced features like VCD and DVD creation, CD/DVD duplication, overburning, CD-Text and realtime audio filters
NeroVision Express 3 - NeroVision Express 3 is the latest version of Nero's video authoring application. Using a user friendly interface very similar to that of Nero Express, NeroVision Express makes it easy for users to capture, edit and then burn their favorite videos to VCD, SVCD or DVD or export it to Nero Digital format.
NeroVision Express also lets users add things like transitions, custom backgrounds, animated menus and text effects. You can even use it to turn your photos into custom slide shows.
Nero Recode 2 - This new program from Nero can copy unprotected DVD videos onto recordable DVD media. If the source disc is larger than 4.7GB, Nero Recode 2 has the ability to remove unwanted material and compress the contents so that it will fit onto a single blank DVD disc.
Nero Recode 2 will also let you convert your DVD movies to Nero Digital. Using Nero's own MPEG-4 audio and video encoder, an entire DVD movie can be compressed so that it will fit onto a CD. Better yet, Nero Recode 2 does this without any loss of quality.
Nero BackItUp - If you're looking for a way to quickly and easily backup your data, Nero BackItUp is the answer. This new program from Ahead Software lets you backup your data to CD/DVD, hard disc, image recorderor another computer on your LAN.
Nero ShowTime 2 - Nero ShowTime is Nero's software DVD player. Along with support for DVD's, ShowTime can be used to play back VCD's, SVCD's and miniDVD's as well as any MPEG or AVI files you might have on your hard drive.
Nero Media Player - Nero Media Player features on-the-fly encoding of audio CD's to MP3, HE-AAC, TwinVQ, WMA, and WAV format.The MP3 encoder uses the latest audio codec technology from Fraunhofer.While most of the plugins are unrestricted, the MP3 encoder included with this version of the program is limited to only 30 audio tracks.If you need to encode more you will probably want to upgrade to Nero's NeroMIX.
InCD 4 - InCD is Nero's packet writing software. Like Roxio's Drag-to-Disc or Sonic's DLA, it allows a person to use their CD-RW drive as a big floppy disk. The person can then drag and drop files onto a CD-RW or DVD±RW disc. Many people consider InCD to be one of the best packet writing tools because of its simplicity and performance.
Like Sony's previous DVD writers, the DRU-800A definitely isn't short on features. The drive supports most CD and DVD formats and offers some pretty impressive specs. The DRU-800A is capable of 16x DVD±R, 8x DVD+RW and 6x DVD-RW writing speeds and a maximum DVD read speed of 16x. More importantly, it's the first drive from Sony with the ability to write to both DVD+R DL and DVD-R DL media. The DRU-800A also includes features like a 2MB buffer, Power-Burn buffer underrun protection and support for bitsetting. Sony tops all this off with a great software bundle from Nero. With all this it's easy to see why the DRU-800A gets a 9 out of 10 for its features.
