One of the first pieces of software I got when I made the move to Mac OS X a few years ago was Roxio’s Toast software. Back then Toast was an amazing all-in-one media software bundle at the time and it has only improved in the years since. Well, Roxio has just announced the latest version of the software, Roxio Toast 11 Titanium and Roxio Toast 11 Pro, and they are impressive.
As the company explains,
A major update to Rovi’s marketing-leading digital media software, Roxio Toast 11 helps greatly enhance and extend Mac OS and iLife® applications with new capabilities and feature enhancements for capturing, copying, converting, and enjoying personal digital media and entertainment. Toast 11 serves as a powerful media hub that makes it simple to take virtually any piece of digital media – regardless of format or where it resides – and share and enjoy it practically anywhere and on any device.
Toast 11 has been redesigned from the ground up and sports a new interface that users will find modern and intuitive. More importantly, the overhaul of this long-time Mac standard offers refined workflows along with built-in video tutorials that make it easier for existing Toast users and those new to the program to quickly complete a broad range of media tasks.
These are some big downloads. Toast 11 is a 381 mb download but Toast 11 Pro is a whopping 2.48 GB! That’s worth noting if your cable is metered. With those large downloads however come some impressive software.
Among other things, the software has a new, easier to use, design and adds a number of features that people have been asking for.
These include the ability to record to multiple drives simultaneously, a streamlined product update mechanism (the old method forced you to go to the Web site and do a number of obnoxious backflips along the way), and the ability to save custom video profiles, which is very useful for those that are often converting video for a particular device.
In addition, the new version of Toast lets you directly upload media to sites such as YouTube, Vimeo, and Facebook. Roxio’s new “VideoBoost” speeds up H.264 (high definition) video conversion or encoding.
But there are more features that make the upgrade worthwhile. Chief among them are Internet audio recording; the ability to capture, save, and convert Web-based video content; the ability to spread a large amount of data or audio tracks across many discs (called “disc spanning”), one-click backup of HD camcorder footage; dual-platform compatible disc creation, and TiVo-to-Go support.
The company even goes so far as to explain why someone who owns iLife still ought to get a copy of Toast 11. As they explain,
For Mac owners that have yet to try Toast, here are several examples of situations where the software is a must-have toolkit that enhances the capabilities of iLife applications:
I have file types that I want to send to my iPad/iPhone but iTunes doesn’t recognize them
I need room on my TiVo but don’t want to lose my recorded shows
I want to copy a short video clip from the DVD of my wedding
I wish it didn’t take so long to copy video from my HD camcorder to my Mac
Anyone know what a “MKV” file is or how I view it?
I would like to burn my HD video to Blu-ray Dis
Toast 11 Titanium will be available direct from Roxio on March 15th for $99.99. An
accompanying Blu-ray Disc plug-in, which is required to author Blu-ray Disc video, is sold separately for $19.99.
All of the aforementioned functionality is part of Roxio’s Toast 11 software. There is also a Toast 11 Pro package and it extends the functionality even further. The $149.99 Pro version adds support for Blue-ray discs and “four award-winning digital media applications for making stunning video, photo, and audio projects”. Those four are
Adobe® PhotoShop® Elements 9 – the latest, full-featured version of the #1 selling consumer photo-editing software for the Mac. The application delivers powerful options that make it easy to create extraordinary photos, quickly share your memories in online albums and unique print creations, and automatically organize and help protect all your photos and video clips.
SmartSound Sonicfire™ Pro 5 – for creating an ideal soundtrack to accompany videos and slideshows. Use Sonicfire Pro’s unique automatic “Mood Mapping” feature or select from a library of included music tracks and adjust the mix and feel of the score to match your videos and slideshows.
BIAS SoundSoap™ SE – remove unwanted noise like wind, hisses, scratches, and pops from LPs, cassettes, or almost any audio, music, or video soundtrack. Also includes a plug-in for correcting audio in HD videos.
FotoMagico™ 3 – turn pictures and video into high-quality slideshows with a few simple clicks, and present them in high definition with the latest version of FotoMagico. Innovative text, transition, and alignment tools ensure astonishing results.
Personally I am most excited by FotoMagico 3. I’ve had an advance copy of the software and am impressed with it so far. There is SO MUCH to it that I have only begun to scratch the surface. We’ll have a closer look once we’ve used it a bit more but we can already say with certainty that this is an impressive upgrade.
Both versions will be launching on March 15th. Roxio Toast Titanium 11 is $99.99. (The Blu-ray plugin is $19.99 more.) Roxio Toast 11 Pro, which is priced at $149.99.
The full release follows.
Roxio Toast 11 Now Available
Must-have Mac Software for your Media-Loving Life
Santa Clara, Calif., – 3/8/2011 – Rovi Corporation (NASDAQ: ROVI), today launched Roxio® Toast® 11 Titanium for Mac®. Toast 11 is a major update that helps extend Mac OS and iLife® applications with new capabilities and feature enhancements for capturing, copying, converting and enjoying personal digital media and entertainment. Toast 11 serves as a powerful media hub that makes it simple to take virtually any piece of digital media – regardless of format or where it resides – and share and enjoy it practically anywhere and on any device.
Toast 11 has been redesigned from the ground up and showcases a new interface that we believe users will find modern and intuitive. More importantly, the overhaul of this long-time Mac standard offers refined workflows along with built-in video tutorials that make it easier for existing Toast users and those new to the program to quickly complete a broad range of media tasks.
“From personal photos and home movies, to streaming Internet radio and user-generated content on YouTube™, people are enjoying media in many forms and from a variety of sources,” said Corey Ferengul, EVP of Products at Rovi Corporation. “The pain often comes when attempting to move a piece of media between devices or platforms. This is where Toast really shines – it gets the media you love where you want it, effortlessly.”
For existing users, Toast 11 adds many requested features such as recording to multiple drives simultaneously, a streamlined product update mechanism, and the ability to save custom video profiles, which is very useful for those that are often converting video for a particular device. The latest version now also offers built-in features for directly uploading media to social networking sites such as YouTube™, Vimeo®, or Facebook® and technology optimizations, dubbed VideoBoost, that help dramatically speed H.264 (high definition) video conversion or encoding.
New or exclusive-to-Toast features include: Internet audio recording; the ability to capture, save, and convert Web-based video content; disc spanning (automatically spreading a large amount of data or audio tracks across many discs); one-click backup of HD camcorder footage; dual-platform compatible disc creation; and TiVo-to-Go support.
Toast 11 Titanium is available directly from www.roxio.com starting today and is priced at $99.99. An accompanying Blu-ray Disc™ plug-in, which is required to author Blu-ray Disc video, is sold separately for $19.99.
Introducing Toast 11 Pro
Also launching today is Roxio Toast 11 Pro. Toast 11 Pro includes everything offered in Toast 11 Titanium as well as the Blu-ray Disc Plug-in and four award-winning digital media applications for making stunning video, photo, and audio projects. Included components in Toast 11 Pro are:
· Adobe® PhotoShop® Elements 9 – the latest, full-featured version of the #1 selling consumer photo-editing software for the Mac. The application delivers powerful options that make it easy to create extraordinary photos, quickly share your memories in online albums and unique print creations, and automatically organize and help protect all your photos and video clips.
· SmartSound® Sonicfire® Pro 5 – for creating an ideal soundtrack to accompany videos and slideshows. Use Sonicfire Pro’s unique automatic Mood Mapping® feature or select from a library of included music tracks and adjust the mix and feel of the score to match your videos and slideshows.
· BIAS SoundSoap™ SE – remove unwanted noise like wind, hisses, scratches, and pops from LPs, cassettes, or almost any audio, music, or video soundtrack. Also includes a plug-in for correcting audio in HD videos.
· FotoMagico™ 3 – turn pictures and video into high-quality slideshows with a few simple clicks, and present them in high definition with the latest version of FotoMagico. Innovative text, transition, and alignment tools ensure astonishing results.
· Blu-ray Disc® Plug-In – author HD video content onto standard DVDs and Blu-ray Discs. Take high-def (HD) video footage from AVCHD™ camcorders, TiVo® and EyeTV® and create Blu-ray Discs or even standard DVDs with HD content that can be played on Blu-ray set top boxes or PlayStation® game consoles.
Toast 11 Pro is available directly from www.roxio.com, starting today and is priced at $149.99.
Both Toast 11 Titanium and Toast 11 Pro will also be offered at major North American online and retail outlets including the Apple Store, Amazon, Best Buy, and Office Depot.
About Rovi Corporation
Rovi Corporation is focused on revolutionizing the digital entertainment landscape by delivering solutions that enable consumers to intuitively connect to new entertainment from many sources and locations. The company also provides extensive entertainment discovery solutions for television, movies, music and photos to its customers in the consumer electronics, cable and satellite, entertainment and online distribution markets. These solutions, complemented by industry leading entertainment data, create the connections between people and technology, and enable them to discover and manage entertainment in an enjoyable form.Rovi holds nearly 5,000 issued or pending patents and patent applications worldwide and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, with numerous offices across the United States and around the world including Japan, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, and the United Kingdom. More information about Rovi can be found at http://www.rovicorp.com.
