Customer Reviews

Roxio Toast 5 Titanium [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Toast was one of the first programs I bought for my OS X iMac, and I've certainly not regretted handing over the money in the slightest. It works perfectly with an Iomega external USB drive on my iBook and G3 iMac, and also with the Superdrive on my G4 flat-screen iMac.

Why get Toast when OS X will already burn CDs and DVDs? I wanted it mostly for its VideoCD features - before I was lucky enough to have an iMac had a Superdrive, I wanted to make discs that could be played in home DVD players. Thanks to iMovie and Toast, that's exactly what I did: made lots of home movies in VideoCD format. Toast even provides a plug-in for iMovie and QuickTime to make the entire process remarkably painless. OK, so the quality of VideoCD wasn't a match for DVD, but it's pretty close to VHS quality and darn good fun.

After that, well, almost every time I burn a CD I reach for Toast. It's just so easy to use, and flexible - I can be sure that a CD I burn will work on my PC system as well as on my Mac for example. Recent updates to Toast add new features: be sure to download any patches!

The version with Jam is aimed more at professional musicians who want to create audio CDs that can act as masters for duplication - certainly not a feature I need (you don't want to hear me sing).

If you want a reliable, flexible, easy to use way of writing CDs and DVDs on your Mac, this is the solution. It even comes with other utilities that simplify converting old LP albums to CD audio.

Good value for money.

I'm taking back some previous bad words about this program. The problem was that I had just mastered iTunes which, at the time, I thought could not be improved upon for burning CD's. Moreover, using a freeware download, I was able to digitize analog signals from vinyl LP's and cassettes, so why had I purchased Toast?

Since then, I've had a chance to give Toast a fuller audition. To overuse those worn-out words by Amazonian enthusiasts: "simply amazing." Toast is as efficient, quick, user-friendly, and intuitive as any program you're likely to encounter (I honestly believe even my parents could have figured it out). Unlike iTunes, Toast does not require that you record music to hard disk before burning to CD, and the bundled program Spin Doctor not only is saving me loads of time in recording analog sources but permits filtering and audio enhancements as well.

Just a couple of recommendations: Don't try to keep moving back and forth between Toast and iTunes for CD burning. I know my iMac won't let me do it due to extension conflicts, and who wants to enable and disable extensions each time you use the program? Keep iTunes for organizing, cataloging, playing; use Toast for creating digital files from analog and then burning anything digital. Also, unless you have lots of time on your hands, beware of getting carried away with the filtering feature (which Toast allows you to monitor in real time). There's no end to the touching up and experimentation you can do. I've discovered that removing a trace of surface noise or tape hiss simply isn't worth the cost in either high frequencies or time and labor.

Toast is a really nice software package, although quirky at times. All the blame can't be placed on Toast. It, like so many other software titles, adds extensions to your Mac which can conflict with so many other extensions. Still, if your Mac is reasonably conflict free, you should be able to burn CDs or DVDs with fervor. The interface is clean, although not intuitive enough. (Click-and-hold a button for options is not an obvious method.) Toast does a very good job of burning Mac data, PC data and hybrid data CDs. Audio burning has also been improved in this version and, Toast can now recognize an audio image file to find track breaks. Previously only Jam was smart enough to recognize individual tracks in an audio image.
Some tips: Increase the memory allocation to the application. Give Toast a large buffer (64K). Try to avoid disk-at-once recording. DAO is good for "live" recordings, where you don't want an audible gap between tracks, but it taxes the system. If you can stand to have gaps between the tracks, track-at-once is more reliable. Use test mode to determine if your system is able to transfer data quickly enough for the speed you've requested for a burn. DAO and high-speed burning require data to be transferred at very high data rates. You may find you need to burn at a slower speed to achieve reliable burns. The "Toast CD Reader" extension is only needed if you intend to use your CD burner to read existing data or audio CDs. If you only want to burn CDs with your burner, you can safely run without the extension.
Background burning is a nice feature, but, if you are using the system for other tasks while burning, you are at risk for data underruns. Also, if your source is MP3 files, remember, MP3s must be converted before actually being written to your new CD. This too can add to the delays in data transfer. If you have the disk space, convert MP3 files to AIFF files before burning and use the AIFF files with Toast for more reliable results.

Toast just keeps getting better and better with each version that's released.

You really don't have to read any instructions... just dragging and dropping files, disk images or mounted disk drives/partitions onto the Toast interface makes everything intuitive.

Burning a CD couldn't really be much easier with the level of control (naming your CD, changing how it will appear when opened, etc.) you get in this application.

Creating a CD image on your desktop goes by FAST so if you're on a slow network, you can make an image on your desktop, then burn from that without worrying about user loads on your network.

Naturally, this software will also burn/copy PC-only and PC/Mac hybrid discs in addition to Mac-only CDs. This is a professional industry-grade package. For CD burning software, you can't get much better than this product.

This software is compatible with virtually any kind of burner, including burners meant only for PC's. It replaces Apple's burning extensions with Roxio's superior version, which allows programs like iTunes to burn CD's on burners that it wasn't supposed to support. You can master DVD's, VCD's, Hybrid PC-Mac discs, HFS+ hybrid, audio cd's, MP3 cd's, CD-i, ISO 9660, multi-track CD-ROM XA, device copy, disk images, enhanced music CD, mac os extended, the list goes on. Converts iMovies into VCDs to watch on your DVD player. Allow's the creation of disk images for those with only a burner that wish to duplicate disks. It allows amazing cross-platform compatibilty. Overall the greatest burning software ever made.

I bought Toast Titanium so I could record LP records and cassette tapes to CD. Spin Doctor has turned out to be an extremely poor application.It will not allow me to turn down the recording volume enough to prevent distortion. The application crashes constantly while I'm setting up beginnings and endpoints of the digitized music. Roxio support told me to delete a file which did not help. With Mac OSX 10.2.3 you can not listen to the music as you digitize it. Roxio support says this is due to Mac going to OSX and that they have no plans to fix it. There is no "help" icon. If information is not addressed in the hard copy instructions you are out of luck. This appears to be a quick and dirty application for OS9 that doesn't function well with OSX 10.2.* or later. Spin Doctor was the entire reason that I bought Toast and frankly iTunes (V3) is easier to use than toast when it comes to organizing and using music.

I used my new iMac with superdrive for almost four months before I discovered this program. It took a bit of research for me to learn why I needed this program when OS X comes with its own built in CD/DVD burn software. If all you need to do is burn discs for backup and make music CDs and DVDs - you don't need Toast. However, if you want to make PC-compatible DVDs or CDs or want to burn DVD-R's that will play in a DVD player without using the iDVD application, then you need Toast.

Basically anything I have wanted to do with a CD/DVD burner, this sofware supported it. I had no problems with install and it has worked flawlessly since I installed it. The user interface is highly intutive and I have not had to crack open the help more than once. Highly recommended.

I just bought a Mac G4 and it came with a burner, but the only way to burn things is through itunes, which is OK, but toast towers the competion with it's old style jukebox graphics and it user friendly file formatting. It also comes with a cd labeler for your discs. I like the fact too that you can burn stuff in the background while other programs are open. Shhhhhhh, don't tell anyone this when you get it, especially for work. This would ruin the chance for a break. Titanium Toast is the best and most diverse program I've seen. I highly recommend it. ....

I am very impressed with all this software has to offer. It is also very easy to use.
I am transferring all my old records, cassetes, and open reel tapes using the Spin Doctor program.
It provides me with filters to clean up noise as well as enhancing filters that make great sound improvements
to my old analogue stuff.
It also is very easy to burn CD's and make cool labels for them. I got a good price from Amazon and a rebate which makes it an even better deal but if you pay full price it is still a bargain.
Some of the software included I haven't used yet so I won't comment.

I absolutely love Toast 5.0 It allows me to make iMovies on my Mac, transfer them to QuickTime, and burn cross platform disks. This is especially great in education, where I use Mac, but three fourths of my students use Windows based platforms. We can do multi-media projects and they are accesible to almost anyone. I was worried that the Apple 'disc burner' software would put Toast out of business, but for anything but the most basic burn, Toast is still the best.