The news is better than first expected for Mac users interested in Disc Burner, Apple’s alternative to disc mastering software like Toast (see MacCentral’s coverage from Thursday for more details). Nemechek said that contrary to his first report, Disc Burner will indeed be supported by Toast 5 Titanium, once the 5.0.1 update is released. 5.0.1 is expected to be released some time in April, and will contain fixes that will enable both Disc Burner and iTunes to be fully supported when used with Toast’s own system extensions.
Toast 4 doesn’t work when the current versions of iTunes or Disc Burner are installed. System extensions that enable the Apple software to burn CDs conflict with Toast’s own system extensions. Users can create separate extension sets for Toast and for iTunes or Disc Burner; they then must activate the appropriate extension set in order to get their CD-R drives working with the corresponding software. As we reported yesterday, Toast 5 Titanium’s initial release will provide limited support for iTunes. Nemechek advised that 5.0.1 is expected to fix the outstanding problems both with iTunes and Disc Burner. Nemechek said the directions to make this work smoothly will be documented in the 5.0.1 update, once it’s released.
Toast 5 Titanium includes CD Spin Doctor, which enables you to transfer music from an analog source — a turntable or tape deck, for example — onto CD. A stereo Y-cable is included that enables you to hook up your Mac to your home entertainment system (presuming, of course, your Mac has a mic jack). You can then use Toast 5 Titanium to burn music from LPs, cassettes, or other analog sources straight to CD. CD Spin Doctor also helps to eliminate noise like pops and hisses, and can boost bass and treble.
Toast 5 Titanium also includes Qdesign MVP, an MP3 player application. The software supports conversion between different audio file formats, plays back music and video files, and lets you build and manage playlists as well. Previous versions of Toast have provided the ability to burn MP3 files to disc as CD Audio, but Toast 5 Titanium also introduces the ability to burn MP3 files to disc in their native format.
Support for DVD’s is also included in Toast 5 Titanium. The new software supports DVD-RAM, DVD-RW, and DVD-R drives, including the new Pioneer mechanism used in Apple’s Power Mac G4 “Superdrive” configurations. And unlike Apple’s iDVD software, which is designed specifically to transfer visual media onto DVD-R discs, Toast also supports data formats. This enables Superdrive and other recordable DVD drive users to backup and archive regular data from their hard drives, not just movies and pictures.
And yes, Toast 5 Titanium has been fully carbonized, and will support Mac OS X.