Audio DVD/Blu-ray authoring software.

[Bryn]

I have been using Audio DVD Creator to compile and burn stereo audio DVDs for a few years now, and am generally very happy with it. However, it does not work under Windows 7 or 8, so I have to revert to an aging XP laptop to use it. I now want to be able to compile and burn surround recordings, and to Blu-ray as well as DVD. It looks like Cirlinca HD-Audio Solo Ultra might be just the thing. Does anyone here have experience of this software?

[richardfinegold]

I had bought an external DVD/Blu Ray burner manufactured by LG, and I believe that was the software that they used. I found it hard to use but that may be because I was using a cheap Dell Laptop that I borrowed from work (I use Macs at home but the LG is only compatible with Windows), which has many other programs on it and has limited processing power). I was able to create a couple of Music only Blu Rays but there are gaps in play, some dropouts, and the discs didn't always open play in various Blu Ray players.

[Gweefry]

I bought the Cirlinca DVD-Audio Standard and have been quite satisfied with the software - it's fairly intuitive and does what's needed quite seamlessly. If you're not looking to use Blu-rays I would have thought that the Ultra edition wouldn't be necessary. If it's of any help, this is the help sheet summary of specs:

Support input audio file formats WAV PCM, AIF, MP3, FLAC, CUE Sheet, WMA including
lossless (with no DRM), M4A/AAC (iTunes file).
Import iTunes and Windows Media Player playlists.
Export formats supported: DVD-Audio, music DVD-Video, Universal DVD disc.
Support multi-channel track in multiple mono channel files or one multi-channel file.
Support gapless transitions between tracks.
Support up to 9 groups, up to 99 tracks per group, for a maximum total track count of 314 per DVD-Audio disc.
Sampling frequency of audio sources for import, playback and record : 44.1kHz, 48kHz, 88.2kHz, 96kHz, 176.4kHz and 192kHz, in 16 bit or 24 bit sample size.
Still picture support. Each track can be associated with one or more (up to 20) still pictures in BMP, PNG or JPG file format, for slide show like presentation with video capable players. DVD-Audio Solo will automatically resizes still pictures to fit screen format selected.
Built-in CD ripping with access to the Internet FreeDB service to query the CD album, artist and track names (requires an Internet connection). Rips to the Flac/wav/wma/aac file formats.
Built-in audio player to preview audio tracks before burning.
Built-in recording capability to record from external audio sources like LP turntable through a capable sound card for up to 192KHz/24bit.
Rip DVD-Audio disc, limited to non copyright protected and non MLP encoded DVD-Audio discs.
Play DVD-Audio disc, limited to non copyright protected and non MLP encoded DVD-Audio discs.
Integrated DVD writing engine to write directly to disc.
Export audio project directly to DVD, or save the disc image to an ISO file on the PC hard disk for later writing to DVD disc.
Save/Load Audio project descriptions to/from a file to restore projects across executions. Build aggregate projects from smaller projects, e.g. load a group from an existing project.
Move tracks within a group with drag & drop. Move tracks across groups with cut & paste.
10 application skins to choose from.
Tooltip for quick help on using DVD-Audio Solo.
Write to DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R DL (Double Layer) recordable
DVD discs at up to 8X. Average time to write a full 4.3Gb DVD disc is 12mn at 4X.
Support NTSC and PAL video systems.
Support 4:3 and 16:9 screen formats.
Requires Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, 7 or 8; with a minimum of 20Mb for installation,
1Gb of RAM and 15 Gb of free hard disk space for temporary files.

[Bryn]

Thanks Gweefry, though what I was really after was feedback based on personal experience of the software. Product descriptions from those who sell it are not always entirely to be taken at face value. I have, however, now downloaded and installed the trail version. It's just a pity that it is limited to 5 hours of content, which leaves rather too much unused capacity on even a single layer Blu-ray when burning 96/24 stereo files. Still, beggars can't be choosers.