It comes with Vista Premium - so is it a premium product?

DVD Maker is included with Windows Vista Home Premium Edition, or any higher version. Does this mean the other makers of DVD authoring software have something to worry about? Well, not really.

DVD Maker is a basic program for putting video files and digital photographs on to a DVD. In use it's simple, mainly because there are so few options to confuse and it has that typical Windows look to make anyone feel at home. Just select some images or videos and tweak a few settings and it's ready to write to DVD.

Slideshows can have an initial menu screen, either one of a number of predefined menus or using an image provided by you, with a choice of eight different transitions between images.

You can also add background music and change the text styles of menus. That's about it, though. Where it's likely to trip you up is in your choice of video files. DVD Maker is unable to transcode files for you; it needs suitable MPEG-2 files.

This shouldn't be a problem with videos that you transfer from your camcorder (DVD Maker doesn't download from camcorders, but Windows Import Video handles this). However, most AVI files, especially DiVX or MPEG-4 that you download or output from other programs will need to be transcoded first.

DVD Maker isn't intended for that, though. It's for creating DVDs from your own material, and it does this well. Don't expect Windows DVD Maker to be your one-stop shop for DVD authoring.

Roll your own menus

Menus can be customised beyond the 20 standard choices that the program gives you. You can add your own image or video as the menu background and apply an audio track. This is probably all the customisation DVD Maker needs.

Adding more options would make the program more difficult for new users to get to grips with and its simple structure certainly dispenses with the need to read up beforehand. The menus looked good on a standard DVD player (although menu buttons were displaced in the Windows DVD player), but the scenes menu was unresponsive for several seconds before the button highlights appeared.

DVD Maker's achievement is that it's one of the easiest editing suites around, although it's still nothing to write home about. It's a basic program that creates decent DVD videos and slideshows in a short space of time.

Basic isn't necessarily bad, but if you only want minimal features, why should you have to hunt through layers of menus and options to find them? There's a demand for "drop here, click this" DVD authoring, and DVD Maker meets it to some extent.

One problem with the lack of choices is that before long everyone will be giving you DVDs of their holiday snaps, or their children opening Christmas presents, all using exactly the same presentation. Once you know the program, you'll be able to spot a DVD that's been made with DVD Maker a mile off!

If it's included with your copy of Vista, give it a try, but don't be surprised if you start coveting some of the other programs on offer after your first few DVDs. After all, tinkering with videos of family and friends is an addictive hobby!

Score

• 4 / 5

For

• Very easy to use
• Doesn't cost anything

Against

• Very basic features count

Verdict

Specification