Hi All,

Please help me in selecting the right product. I bought a Dell computer (with FireWire, USB, DVD writer ) which came with Sonic MyDVD LE v7 Sonic DigitalMedia LE V7 and Movie maker 2. I have not fully utilised the system yet (I have not tried the Audio part yet). But I am happy with the rest. With DMS I can copy DVD disks, copy data to DVD etc. With Movie Maker 2, copy video from DV and VHS tapes on to hard disk in AVI format and then to DVD disks using Digital Media Studio. Now I would like to go beyond the basic. S/W that I buy should not upset the current setup and I do not wish to loose the current facilities and I do not wish to face any incompatibility problems either. After reading a Sonic email MyDVD offer, I thought of going for My DVD. Then I received another email offer from Sonic to upgrade to EasyMediaCreator 8. After that I am confused and unable to decide which one to go MyDVD or EasyMedia Creator. Then I visited Sonic website to see if it would help me to select the product. That made the situation even worse - more confusion. http://www.sonic.com/products/Consumer/ has links to EasyMedia Creator , MyDVD Record Now and Digital Media Studio v7 . Would Digital Media Studio would have all the features that are available in EasyMedia Creator , MyDVD and Record Now? I am advised (without giving me much details) that I should go for EMC 8. If I go for EMC 8, will EMC8 co exist on my computer with Digital Media Studio which is already on the system? Should I uninstall DMS ? Does EMC8 has Record now and DLA built into it?

Thanks

Thiru

I'm probably not going to answer all your questions but here is a start. The LE editions have limited functionality if you want to do more, buying one of the other full function programs is a good Idea. Remember that perhaps not all projects that you now have on your hard drive will be compatable with any upgraded programs. The files (avi, mpg2, images and music) should be compatable. Several people who frequent the boards do have multiple video editing programs so you may be able to keep the Sonic programs as long as you need them.

You didn't post anything about your computer so whatever you buy, make sure that your computer far exceeds the minimum specs. EMC V8 requires a very good video card and if your computer has a built in card, it may not allow you use all the features in EMC 8. You may want to post your specs to get an opinion on it working with EMC 8.

Probably what is confusing to you is that almost the same product may have different names.

The software you got seems to be those programs that Sonic had before they bought out Roxio so that MyDVD V7 from Sonic is not the same as the MyDVD that comes with the EMC 8. (EMC 7 had a program called DVD Builder). MyDVD in V8 is much closer to DVD Builder. By the way, that program is used to build the discs such as menus and navigations to the individual movies.

Another important thing is that EMC 8 has a packet writing program called Drag to Disc. The Sonic DLA is not the same. You can have only one packet writing program on the computer at a time so if you have a lot of discs you made with DLA, keep that because you may need it to read the discs. You can do a custom install of EMC 8 and not install D2D. A packet writing program is one where you have to be careful to use it for what it is good for, short (very short) storage of information. There are a lot of horror stories about discs made this way suddenly going blank. You can use a program called Creator Classic to make data and mixed content discs for storage. (You would use Music Disc Creator for music discs).

To copy non-protected DVD, in EMC 8, you would use Disc Copier

You would leave MM-2 on your computer since you are familiar with it to capture and store those AVI files. EMC 8 has a program called Media Import to do the same thing. You should be able to import those files into VideoWave to play with them. You indicated that you wanted to do more; VideoWave provides a lot of options in transitions, effects, music tracks (multiple), overlays (multiple), images and videos in the same productions, and a lot more. As mentioned above you would then use MyDVD V8 to create the menus, add the movies and eventually burn the project to the disc.

I think I have answered a lot of your questions but the bottom line is really what you need and what you want to do. If you do decide to buy, consider EMC 8, deluxe edition. It has all the functionality you would need for just about everything.