Alternatives for Nero Burning ROM?

December 28, 2007 1:40 AM

More burning, less fiddling: alternatives for Nero Burning ROM?

Holy cow this app has become nothing but bloatware. Upon starting the install for Nero8 the installer has the audacity to ask if I want to install the Ask Jeeves toolbar? WTF NERO? The custom install has me check-marking a dozen or more optional apps and features? Give me a break.

All I want to do is burn cds and dvds!

So, my question is: what are the good, honest, slim products out there which allow you to burn CDs and DVDs with no fuss and don't require hundreds of megabytes of storage to do it. I prefer GNU products, but have no problems about quality, no-nonsense commercial products either. What are the cool kids using*?

My environment is Windows XP and Server 2003. My burners are dual layer DVD-+RW*!@#@#litebrite-waka-waka models from Lite-On. Completely generic, middle of the road, fine working drives.

*Please don't tell me just to mount my images, I already do that for most things, but I live and work in an environment where I occasionally need to burn CD and DVD images.

posted by wfrgms to computers & internet (12 answers total)

I heard about InfraRecorder and downloaded it, but haven't had the opportunity to test it.
posted by Gyan at 1:49 AM on December 28, 2007

cdburnerxp.se
infrarecorder
posted by drea at 1:49 AM on December 28, 2007

Imgburn
posted by Lord_Pall at 1:57 AM on December 28, 2007

I used Imgburn for a while. I like Nero better though, much faster UI. Just don't install anything. It works really great. Imgburn is a little clumsy. Actually, a lot clumsy.
posted by sully75 at 2:05 AM on December 28, 2007

DeepBurner is about as simple as it gets.
posted by IronLizard at 2:13 AM on December 28, 2007

I'm a big fan of burnatonce. It's painfully simple and easy to put together a data cd using an .iso file or just by selecting files, compiling an audio cd is really simple too.
posted by phredgreen at 4:27 AM on December 28, 2007

Another vote for CD Burner XP Pro
posted by TuxHeDoh at 6:09 AM on December 28, 2007

I liked burnatonce a lot, but a while back the licensing on the DVD burning stuff changed, and since BAO hasn't been updated in well over a year, DVD burning now requires a lot of manual editing to set up (this is a one time thing, but still a huge headache).

CDburnerXP Pro is what I use now.
posted by anaelith at 7:00 AM on December 28, 2007

Another vote for DeepBurner.
posted by Arthur Dent at 8:53 AM on December 28, 2007

Go back to Nero 6.
posted by mphuie at 9:06 AM on December 28, 2007

personally, I go burnatonce for cd images, ONES for data/audio/DVDs/etc.

VideoHelp has a ranked listing of burning tools that I always find useful whenever I'm looking for new software.
posted by fishfucker at 12:22 PM on December 28, 2007

Seconding mphuie - go back to Nero 6, or 5.

There's a reason each newer version of Nero becomes more and more bloatware, and it isn't because they are improving the burning engine or fixing its long-standing problems (e.g. the bugs in dual-layer burning). It's because the basic engine is good enough, yet to continue surviving they need people to continually upgrade - hence, each year they release a bigger version number with more bloated shiny. Stick to the older versions; you get effectively the same burning engine without the added crap.

FWIW, I use an old version of Nero for day to day CD / DVD burning, and Imgburn for DL DVDs.

(Not saying the Nero engine is good - that way lies arguments. But it's certainly good enough, and the UI in earlier versions is such that it's not worth dicking around with the alternatives for a possibly mythical 1~2% improvement in burn quality.)
posted by Pinback at 2:57 PM on December 28, 2007