Everyone of us likes watching movies and if a movie is worth keeping in our collection, we also look forward to its official DVD/Blu-ray release. After we’ve brought the movie DVD, we either want to keep a copy of it in our computer for archival purpose or want to watch it on our growing collection of portable media devices.

Now, you might be wondering how to rip and encode your DVDs for keeping them safe and watch them on your iPod, iPad, Android, iPhone or other portable device? Handbrake is one such good free tool to rip and encode your DVDs for keeping them safe.

Handbrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multi-platform, multithreaded video transcoder, available for MacOS X, Linux and Windows. Let’s take a quick read and know more about Handbrake.

How to use Hadbrake? Quick Overview

First of all you’ll need to download Handbrake. For downloading the software, visit www.handbrake.fr and click on download for Windows/Mac OS/Linux. After download completes, install the software. The installation process is easy and fast.

Now, insert the DVD you want to rip, into your computer. Click on “Source” and choose the video folder on the DVD. Handbrake will now scan the DVD for titles and chapters. After the scan is complete, choose the encoding preset (about which we’ve talked later in Functionality) and click on Start.

Depending on the preset chosen by you, length of the movie and speed of your machine, in a few minutes or hour, you’ll have the movie saved on your computer as a file. You can now sync this file to your portable device and watch the movie.

Handbrake User Interface

The user interface of Handbrake is very clean and is well laid out. You’ll find all the important functions available in the form of buttons at the top. The presets are organized in expandable lists, available at the sidebar. The outputs are organized in clean labelled tabs.

Handbrake Functionality

Handbrake is a very good tool for both novice users as well as advanced users in video encoding. Novice users will like the encoding presets offered by the software. Though we found most of the presets are for Apple devices optimized for the highest quality, screen size, and file type.

Advanced users will find Handbrake very useful because of the control it offers when you mess around with the encoding settings. You can customize everything, from file container settings to the videos aspect ratio and size, which is really overwhelming. Further diving in, you’ll be able to choose the video filters, video quality and codec, audio codecs, mix down settings, bit rate, and sample rate settings. If you’re really want to take control, check out the advanced tab!

Handbrake options lets you configure all the aspects of the software.

Conclusion

Once you start using Handbrake and see the results, we’re confident you’ll fall in love with Handbrake just like us. Handbrake is the best video transcoder we have used till date and offers the best features and performance. The icing on the cake, its open source, free and available on all platforms (Windows, Mac, and Linux)! Thanks for reading.

Nero is one of the most popular CD/DVD/Blu-ray Burning software, but the professional version comes at a premium price. Most users don’t need all the advanced features offered by the premium Nero Multimedia Suite. Users only wants a basic solution for CD/DVD copying and burning features. Keeping the basic need in mind, Nero released Nero BurnLite, a free version for CD/DVD/Blu-ray Burning app, which many users call as the Nero Free Version.

This free version of Nero provides the basic CD/DVD/Blu-ray copying and burning features, which most users actually needs. You can download using links at the end.

Nero also launched Nero Kwik Media Free which included apps to give you the most unusual and customizable experience for your videos, music, photos and data. Nero has rechristened Nero BurnLite and renamed it to Nero Kwik Burn. The new version is faster and better than what it was earlier.

Nero Kwik Burn offers the same great features of Nero BurnLite plus more from your burning, ripping and copying activities. Nero Kwik Burn lets you share your music, photos and videos to CD, DVD and Blu-ray Discs. Users can easily drag-and-drop files to copy iTunes playlists, rip your MP3 files and burn all your digital content.

Features of Nero Kwik Burn

• Burn photos, music, videos and data onto CD, DVD and now Blu-ray Disc
• Drag and drop files to copy iTunes playlists
• Copy unprotected CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray Discs
• Rip MP3 files for sharing and storing.

Download Nero Kwik Media which includes Nero Kwik Burn

My Technology Guide readers will love this giveaway as they have to do nothing to win this! Thanks to LotSoft, the developers of the application, we were able to get unlimited licenses for the BDlot DVD Clone Ultimate. The application is a DVD clone software which can also backup and rip DVD’s. We will talk about the giveaway at the end of this article, but first, lets see how good is BDlot DVD Clone Ultimate.

Now, coming to the user interface, when you start the application, you will notice big buttons to do a full DVD disc backup or a DVD title backup at the top. When you click on those buttons, the program automatically changes the options that are available for the task. After inserting a DVD, it fills up information about the DVD, including cover art, name, studio, director and performers automatically.

The program supports all known copy protections like CSS, CPRM, CPPM, RC, RCE, APS, UOPs, SONY ARccOS, Rip-Guard, Disney X-DRM protection etc. It comes with GPU acceleration which can greatly improve the decryption and copying speed. Most of the time you simply have to click on the big Run button and the program will take care of everything.

The unique Sector to Sector copying and GPU accelerating technologies helps speed up tasks such as DVD Cloning, Data backup, ISO burning etc. Though the program will work depends largely on the speed of the DVD drive, the processor, computer memory available and if the video card can be used for GPU acceleration or not.

Features of BDlot DVD Clone Ultimate :

1. Can create perfect DVD Backups of Raw Content.
2. Removes all known DVD copy protections, such as CSS, CPRM, CPPM, RC, RCE, APS, UOPs, SONY ARccOS, Rip-Guard, Disney X-DRM protection, etc.
3. Clone Entire DVD to Blank DVD: Lets you backup full content of DVD-5 or DVD-9 movies as a DVD folder or ISO image on your PC hard drive or USB drive.
4. Lets you backup the “Main Movie” in the DVD or only certain chapters from the DVD.
5. You can burn ISO file or DVD folder to a blank DVD or re-writable DVD.
6. Built-in virtual DVD drive allows you to load and unload any ISO image file for processing.
7. Compatible with Windows 7 (32 & 64 bit), Vista (32 & 64 bit) and Windows XP

BDlot DVD Clone Ultimate is very easy to use and requires very little user interventions. The options available for the tasks are easy to understand and the help file is very extensive. It covers all the functions of the program along with How-To’s.

Giveaway

We have an unlimited amount DVD Clone Ultimate licenses. To win this giveaway, you don’t have to do anything, you don’t need to subscribe us (even though we will like it if you do as you will receive our updates in your email!) or do any other stuffs.

Simply, download the program from the developer website, and enter the license code BU-TUUPTTZU-HBRSRO after installation to activate it. But do remember, you have to register using the license code on or before August 7.

Nero Kwik Media includes the best of Nero BurnLite 10, to organize and manage your media files, including photos, videos and songs.

The quick, easy and free Kwik Media Manager is powered by apps of your choice to give you the most unusual and customizable experience for your videos, music, photos and data.

It can be used as an all-in-one free media management application. It lets you easily find, organize, edit, play and share your music, photos and video clips. You can sync these files between your computers, tablets, mobile phones and online social networks. It’s unique integrated app store lets you buy apps or download free apps to extend its capabilities, very clever move by Nero! From Nero Kwik Media FAQ:

Nero apps are exciting, helpful features that enhance your Nero software. Designed to seamlessly integrate with your existing software, apps are the easiest way to get more out of your software by selecting the ones that best suit your needs. Choose from a variety of free and for-purchase apps.

You can read all the FAQ’s related to this product here.

Kwik Media Manager comes with basic editing tools like automatic red-eye reduction, slideshow creator, video clipper and disc burner (free for a limited time).

Features:

• Move all the files your heart desires to and from your PC and mobile devices
• View HD video projects on DVD and watch Hollywood Blu-ray movies on your laptop
• With just a few clicks, you can create a CD mix from your favorite playlists
• Play back your favorite jams from your laptop and rip Audio CDs to add to your computer
• Easily organize photos of friends and family by faces
• Browse and organize photos, music and videos in one place
• Conveniently create projects to burn and share straight from your library
• Make quick and easy edits of photos before sharing or adding to slideshows
• Upload your photos, music and videos to social media websites with just a few clicks
• Add exciting, animated background themes to slideshows
• Sync your music playlists as well as photo and video album contents from your PC to any mobile device with USB mass storage

Download Free Nero Kwik Media Manager

Grooveshark lets you listen to music online for free. It has one of the best collection of music. You can also subscribe for paid account that comes with more features. For accessing the free music streaming service, till now you need to open web browser and then open their website. But now you can bypass the website and enjoy free music using the official Grooveshark Desktop App. The application is based on Adobe AIR. It provides you with the same set of features without you having to open any browser.

The user interface is similar to the web interface. You can login to your account, play music from your playlist, set playback and other settings, etc. If you have saved your playlists in your account online, you can easily retrieve it using the desktop app. The desktop app is useful tool for all Grooveshark users.

Nearly all the music on Grooveshark has been uploaded by users. All music users uploaded is transcoded into an MP3 file with a maximum bit rate of 192 kbps. Grooveshark Radio is a great way to discover new music. You can select a song (or multiple), then click the Radio button on the lower right side of the screen, and Grooveshark will continuously add similar songs based on the song/songs already in your queue. If you don’t like a song the radio chooses for you, simply hit the button in the corner of the song box and you won’t hear that artist again in this radio session. If you really like a song, hit the button to hear more of that artist and artists like them

Even though you will not find any announcements about the app, but a lot of discussion about the app and bugs related to it is going on at the Forum.

Download Grooveshark Desktop App [Official]

CopyTrans TuneSwift is a utility to easily backup, transfer and restore your iTunes library. TuneSwift suite allows you to transfer your iTunes library to a new computer in one click, be it Mac or Windows. It allows you to transfer the backup to another computer, or you can even restore your backup on the same computer later. The backup archive file created contains music, books, apps, playlists, etc. TuneSwift uses incremental backup technology which means it appends the previous backup and saves the recent changes only instead of creating a full backup every time.

To use CopyTrans TuneSwift, download TuneSwift and install it. Once installed, open the app and you will find three big buttons: Transfer, Backup, and Restore. The Transfer utility lets you select your iTunes library and choose the OS where you want it transferred. If you select the Windows option, it will then ask you if you want to transfer your library on a new computer, on a different directory within your computer, or on an external hard drive. For successfully transferring to Mac, TuneSwift first requires you to transfer your files to an external drive hard drive.

The Backup utility archives all your iTunes media files in a single file, which you can then use to restore to other PCs or to fix your broken iTunes library. You can also export your iTunes library from your iOS devices like the iPad and iPhone and create your own backup which you can then restore to iTunes.

Features:

• Transfer iTunes from one computer to another
• Move your iTunes library from PC to Mac
• Back up the entire iTunes library including purchases
• Restore iTunes to PC or Mac, anytime and anywhere
• Free until March 15, 2011

To know more Check out Copytrans TuneSwift website. To get the full licensed version of CopyTrans TuneSwift, download the setup from here. Then use the TUNESWIFT-ACTI-VATE-ME license key to unlock and activate the full version of CopyTrans TuneSwift. This offer is valid only up to 15 March 2011.

iSkysoft Studio is offering a free license of “iMedia Converter for Windows” worth $49 for Free to everyone till 27th Dec, 2010.

iMedia Converter for Windows is a total media converter which combines ripping DVD disks and converting audio and video files, making it easier for windows users to rip DVDs, convert videos (such as MP4, MOV, AVI, WMV, FLV) and extract audio from DVD and video for playback on mobile players like iPod Touch 4, iPod Nano, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, Apple TV, Zune, PSP, Creative Zen, Archos, HTC and other portable devices. Also it helps you remove DRM protection and wipe off restrictions from enjoying video and audio files. It gives a full support of Windows 7.

Features:

• Rip DVDs to audio/video formats
• Remove DRM protections and restrictions
• Trim, crop and edit and make special personalized video
• Convert videos for playback on all popular media devices including iPod Touch, iPod Nano, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, Apple TV, Zune, PSP, Creative Zen, HTC, etc.
• Add subtitles to video
• Save snapshots from movie or video as a JPG image
• Adjust output file parameters such as Resolution, Frame Rate, Encoder and Bit Rate
• Merge several files or the split segments into one complete file

How To Receive The Free License Code?

• Visit the iSkysoft Facebook fan page, click on the “Like” button.
• Click on the “Windows Software” tab if it is not selected.
• Enter your First Name, Last Name and E-Mail address.
• Click on the “Send Me Keycode” button, you will receive an email with the free license code.
• Download iMedia Converter for Windows, install and activate it using the free license code that you received.

Thanks to Jinlei Huo for the tip!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all our readers!

One of the most popular media player VLC has updated to version 1.1.5. The latest version fixes many bugs and security issues including the Windows SMB security issue. It also comes loaded with a handful of noteworthy changes. VLC 1.1.5 can now play live .webm streaming video, wrapped in Google’s WebM video container.

VLC has now added support for Channels.com. You can find it in the Media Browser Box under Internet, which can be found in playlist window. VLC has included more than 1,000 popular shows from Channels.com.

If you are a fan of classic gaming and love to play your favorite in-game music from Atari, Famicom, and Sega, you will simply love this new feature of VLC. It now supports playback of a variety of video game audio using the Game Music Emu engine. Another feature which Intel users will like is VLC now supports GPU HD decoding using Intel IGP on Windows, using DxVA2.

Interested users may want to check out the change log here.

[ Download VLC Media Player 1.1.5 ]

Yesterday we reviewed the latest version of AudialsOne 8, an all-in-one solution to all your entertainment needs. It has improved a lot since the earlier version. You can read the review at following link:

AudialsOne 8 Review

Yesterday we promised about AudialsOne 8 giveaway. RapidSolution Software the developers of AudialsOne 8 is providing us 3 FREE licenses of AudialsOne 8 for giveaway to our readers. Each of this license costs $59.90 but if you take part in our exclusive giveaway, you can get it absolutely FREE!

Simply follow these simple steps to be an eligible participant for the giveaway lucky draw:

Subscribe to My Technology Guide Newsletter which is FREE. You can subscribe us using following link:

Subscribe to My Technology Guide Newsletter

Leave a comment below. While leaving your comment, make sure to use the same email address registered for My Technology Guide email newsletter, otherwise you won’t be eligible for the giveaway.

Note: For new subscribers, don’t forget to click on the confirmation email sent to you by FeedBurner to start our email subscription. If we find that your subscription is incomplete than your entry for the giveaway will not be considered.

We’ll choose 3 random lucky winners and each lucky winner will get FULL version license of AudialsOne 8.

Winners will be announced on 20 November, 2010.

It will great if you share the word about the giveaway with your friends and colleagues, so that they too can take part in the giveaway.

Good Luck Everybody!

Update: Winners will be announced within 24 hours. We apology for the unwanted delay. Thank you all for participating, no new entries will be considered for this giveaway.

Update: This giveaway is over, winners are announced here. Thank you all.

AudialsOne 8, the latest version of AudialsOne, is released few days back. We were very impressed by the earlier version of AudialsOne 4. Let me first give you some overview about what AudialsOne is capable of. AudialsOne gives you instant access to over 50,000 Internet radio stations along with millions of songs, international video, music and podcast portals. It offers unbeatable capabilities for targeting and downloading unlimited quantities of the free entertainment you’re looking for.

After we got our hands on the latest version, the first thing that we did was check out what is new and what has improved since our previous review. We noticed a lot of improvements in the program that can be seen spread throughout the user-interface, the way it records multimedia content like songs, video, podcasts, and remove DRM from media.

Installation

Installation procedure is very simple for AudialsOne 8. It also provides the option to install it as a regular program or do a portable install. It is a nice option if you want to carry AudialsOne with you in a USB flash drive. Definitely a boon for portable application users.

Features

After the installation is completed, which we noticed took less time then the earlier version of AudialsOne, we launched AudialsOne and just like earlier versions, AudialsOne greeted us by showing the splash screen.

The user-interface feels much more polished than earlier versions and now accessing different functions are lot more easy for end-users, as you can see from the screenshot below:

As you can see above, the first tab that is default is the Radio tab. If you don’t want to waste any time and want to record some music from your favourite genre, simply select your genre of choice and click on the Start Recording button. If you have your favorite internet radio station in mind, from which you want to record, simply click on the Stations button. Select the radio station and click on the Record button present at the top of the Manage Stations window. Scheduling is also possible by clicking on the Schedule button. You can also Favor, Delete, Ban or visit the radio stations website from this window. If you have a manual list of Radio Stations, you can also import that using the Load button.

You can use the Search tab to search for music or videos of a particular artist or song.

One of the most notable feature of AudialsOne, also present in the earlier version, is the WishList. Using Wishlist, you can search the web or your local music collection for music and videos by artists that you have specified. You can compile several wish lists, and switch between them. AudialsOne saves all your wish lists automatically and records music of the selected artists automatically.

Capture is the new proper name given to the tab Web. As the name suggests you can capture media from the web as you browse sites like Last.Fm, Pandora, YouTube, etc from your browser. If you are a fan of Podcasts, AudialsOne comes with a very powerful Podcast support. You can subscribe from an already extensive list of Podcasts or add your own.

AudialsOne 8′s Converter tab is what you should be looking for if you want to DRM free your media. It is very powerful and accurately removes DRM from media while keeping the quality intact. You can remove DRM from AudioBooks, DVDs and other media.

Other improved features of AudialsOne 8 are Organizer, Media Converter. You can organize all your multimedia files and categorize them into Artists and Genres. You can let AudialsOne automatically reorganize all your media. Using the latest version you can even import and export from the Cloud Storage, Esnips.com, MP3Tunes and TunesBag. It also includes a ring-tone creator, if you want to create ring-tones for your mobile device. The in-built burner allows you to burn tracks to a disc.

Ease of Use

AudialsOne 8 is fully feature packed and it has improved a lot since the earlier version. Everything is well laid out and is just a click away. Even though AudialsOne comes packed with so many functions, still its very easy to use, thanks to the well thought design of the user interface. It allows you to easily find millions of streaming music and video from around the web to view, listen to or download to your local drive. On the fly conversion of the downloaded media is also a plus.

Performance

We can easily find a notable performance improvement from the earlier version of AudialsOne.

Support

RapidSolution Software offers free customer support for AudialsOne through a variety of channels that includes FAQ, a dedicated forum for each of their products and email support answered within three working days.

Conclusion

AudialsOne is still one of our favorite online media downloader and recording solution. With the latest avatar, we are very happy to see the improvements done to it. This time we will award AudialsOne 8 a rating of 4.5 out of 5.

Discount Code

RapidSolution Software is giving our readers a 40% discount if you buy AudialsOne 8 using the link below:

AudialsOne 8 40% Discount

AudialsOne 8 Exclusive Giveaway

We are also going to held a giveaway of the latest version of AudialsOne 8. More details about the giveaway will be published in our next article. The giveaway is live now. Visit AudialsOne 8 Giveaway page here.

If you are looking for a good video converter for converting videos to and from different formats including formats supported by your handheld and mobile devices, then MacX Video Converter Pro is a good choice. Even though the name of the software may suggest that it is only for Mac users, but the good news is it is available for Windows users too.

As a part of “Thanksgiving” promotion, Digiarty Software, the makers of MacX Video Converter Pro, are giving away MacX Video Converter Pro free to all until 15 November, 2010. MacX Video Converter Pro is available for download with full license for both Windows and Mac OS X.

With built-in support for 420+ video/audio codecs and advanced HD video decoding engine, MacX Video Converter Pro owns powerful capabilities to convert among all HD video and SD videos and transfer to Mac, PC, iMovie, iTunes, iPhone iPad, iPod, etc. It also enables users to download YouTube videos and convert to other format or create VOB files from video for burning to DVD.

How to Get MacX Video Converter Pro for Free?

You can either visit the giveaway page and download the corresponding version for your operating system or you can download from the direct download links below and register using the license keys shown along.

Mac users can download the full version of MacX Video Converter Pro by click “Download for Mac” button at the giveaway page or by using direct download link here, and use the license code: AY-DSJGNKY-6E7E777 to register the app.

Windows users can download the full version of MacX HD Video Converter Pro for Windows by click “Download for Windows“ button at the giveaway page or by using the direct download link here, and use the license code: BO-UMUJUMYT-FBOBXO to register the app.

Thanks to Sarah of (MacXDVD Software) Digiarty Software for the tip!

Liked this promotion? Don’t forget to take part in our own latest giveaway contest! Click Here!

Digiarty Software is running a Halloween special giveaway, where you can get fully functional WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe from Oct 29th to Nov 4th. It is available for both Windows and Mac users. The Windows version costs $29.95 and the Mac version costs $35.95 but now you can get them absolutely free.

WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe builds 160 video codec and 50 audio codec, a perfect multi-functional combination of HD Video Converter, DVD Burner and Website Video Downloader. Without any third-party codec, it can support Multi-track HD video M2TS, MKV, AVCHD, HDTV BDAV and MPEG-TS video movies. It also supports converting all the High Definition and HD-Camcorder videos, to both portable and console players, such as iPad, iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, PS3, PSP, Xbox, Zune, PDA, Blackberry, Nokia, Android, Zen, etc,.

Supporting Multi-CPU and Hyper Threading, WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe offers up to 15x real-time video converting speed.

How To Get WinX HD Video Converter for Free?

To grab free license of WinX HD Video Converter, visit this giveaway page.

• Windows users click on the “for Windows download” button to get the Windows edition of WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe. Register with the free license code: AF-TQTGYQYW-JXPQKM
• Mac users click on the “for Mac download” button to get the Mac edition of WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe. Register your copy with the free license code: WINXMC-2010-1029-GIVEAWAY

Thanks to Viola of Digiarty Software for the tip!

WinX DVD Ripper Platinum can rip DVDs to all popular video formats such as AVI, MOV, FLV, WMV, MPEG, MP4, 3GP, etc. It can rip different DVDs (including encrypted DVDs) to Sony PSP, Apple iPhone (iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4), iPod, iPad, iTouch, Apple TV, Zune, Mobile phone, etc. WinX DVD Ripper Platinum supports multi-core CPU and is fully compatible with Windows 7.

WinX DVD Ripper for Mac is an all-in-one DVD ripper designed to make perfect 1:1 DVD copy to hard drive and rip your DVD movies on Mac OS to iTunes, MOV, MP4, FLV, etc that playable on iPad, iPod, iPhone, Apple-TV, PSP and much more. It also supports extracting music from the DVD files and saving as MP3 format. With this Mac DVD ripper, Mac users could backup DVD collections to Mac or portable devices without any quality loss.

Both Windows and Mac version of WinX DVD Ripper Platinum fully supports normal DVDs, CSS protected DVDs, Sony ArccOS DVDs and all region 1-6 DVDs. Moreover, we are so proud to tell you that this DVD ripper is the unique DVD ripping program which supports and will be continuously updated to support decrypting DVDs with the latest copy protections such as Alice in Wonderland, The Princess and the Frog, Avatar, Twilight New Moon, 2012.

Major upgrade in WinX DVD Ripper Platinum v6.0:

1. Output MP4 video with AAC 2 Channels, AAC 4 Channels and AAC 6 Channels supported.
2. Support AVI container, keeping original DVD AC3/DTS 6 Channels audio track.
3. Output WMV and MPEG video with original DVD AV3/DT 6 Channels audio track.
4. Improved WMV encoder support. Backup DVD to WMV with AC3/DTS audio and stream to PS3 & Xbox 360.
5. Significantly increase H.264 encoder speed. Better support for Multi-core CPU.
6. Optimized the support for iPhone 4, iPad, iPod 4 and other iOS 4 video players.
7. New software UI.

This software normally costs $29.95 but to celebrate Halloween, Digiarty Software is giving it away for free. You can download WinX DVD Ripper Platinum absolutely free from the giveaway page.

After downloading, Windows users use the license code: AA-TDUPTDYO-MIBQER to activate the full version. Mac users, after downloading the full version can use the license code: WINXDRM-FREE-GIVEAWAY to activate the full version.

This giveaway offer will end on Oct 28, 2010.

Thanks to Viola of Digiarty Software for sharing the news about the giveaway.

The folks behind one of the World’s favorite media player VideoLAN Media Player (VLC) are developing a video editor called VideoLAN Movie Creator(VLMC). VLMC will be cross-platform just like VLC media player and will work on Windows, Linux, and Mac platform.

It is under development stage at this moment. If you are feeling adventurous and want to test it then you can download a pre-release version from the VideoLAN Movie Creator website. Please keep in mind that this is an early release, and that it has lots of bugs.

Watch the two demo videos of VLMC created by the vlmcteam:

We reviewed about iSkysoft Video Converter few days back and we promised that we are coming up with a giveaway of the same. iSkysoft Video Converter is an “all-in-one” video converter that will help you easily convert all types of videos from one format to another one or extract audio from any video.

By the term “all-in-one” I meant to say that iSkysoft Video Converter supports almost all popular input and output formats, and can convert WMV to MPEG, AVI to MPEG, WMV to MPEG etc. and supports video formats including MP4, AVI, RM, WMV, MOV, 3GP, MPEG, ASF etc., and audio formats including MP3 WAV, WMA, AAC, AC3, OGG, APE, M4A, etc.

You can read the review from the link below:

iSkysoft Video Converter [Software Review]

This week, we’re giving away 5 copies of iSkysoft Video Converter worth $180 (approx.) in total! Would you like to get one? Read on to win.

How do I win a copy?

It’s very simple to take part. Just follow the underlined steps.

Step 1

Join our Facebook page by clicking the Like button or you can follow us on Twitter, if you prefer. If you’re already following us, you may skip this step.

[twocol_one]Facebook

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[twocol_one_last]Twitter

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If you are not into social networking and don’t have any account in Facebook or Twitter, then subscribe us. If you are already a subscriber, you may skip to the next step.

Step 2

Leave a comment below and tell us what will you use this software for? While leaving your comment, if you are a subscriber, make sure to use the same email ID which is registered for My Technology Guide newsletter. If you are following us through Facebook or Twitter, then in the Website field, use your Facebook or Twitter URL. Otherwise you won’t be eligible for this giveaway.

Step 3

This is important. Share the post among your friends. Use the Share buttons below to share.

[box type="note" style="rounded" border="full"]The winners will be chosen randomly and the result will be published on September 11, 2010.[/box]

[box type="info" style="rounded" border="full"]My Technology Guide would like to thank Jinlei Huo from iSkysoft (iSkysoft is a subordinate brand of Wondershare Software Co., Ltd.) for his generosity while participating in this giveaway. If you are a software developer or a company and if you are interested in sponsoring? We’d love to hear from you. Get in touch with us.[/box]

[box type="alert" style="rounded"]Don’t forget to participate in our other running Giveaway: Active Running 1, Active Running 2![/box]

iSkysoft Video Converter is an “all-in-one” video converter that will help you easily convert all types of videos from one format to another one or extract audio from any video. By the term “all-in-one” I meant to say that iSkysoft Video Converter supports almost all popular input and output formats, and can convert WMV to MPEG, AVI to MPEG, WMV to MPEG etc. and supports video formats including MP4, AVI, RM, WMV, MOV, 3GP, MPEG, ASF etc., and audio formats including MP3 WAV, WMA, AAC, AC3, OGG, APE, M4A, etc.

iSkysoft Video Converter lets you set video brightness, contrast, saturation, crop video, trim video, batch convert your video files, and even merge multiple files into one file. With iSkysoft Video Converter, you can convert your videos to any format and put them on the most popular portable players. You can even extract audio only from a video.

Using the app is very easy, you just have to add the files (or put a folder that contains the files, or import from a device) you want to convert (batch processing is supported), select the output format you want to convert the input files to, customize optional output settings or edit or crop the files, and hit the big “Convert” button to start the conversion process. It supports drag and drop so you can also easily drag and drop your media files into the app for conversion.

iSkysoft Video Converter also comes with a very basic video editor. You can use this video editor to trim videos, crop videos, adjust image quality like brightness, contrast, saturation and apply fancy effects like embossed, negative, and old film and watermark.

It also comes with a simple video cutter using which you can cut videos.

All in all, iSkysoft Video Converter is a good video converter that is feature rich and also comes with NVidia CUDA Support, and if you have the hardware that supports it, then you may decrease the conversion time.

You can download the trial version of iSkysoft Video Converter using the download link below:

[box type="download"]Download[/box]

WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe builds 160 video codec and 50 audio codec, a perfect multi-functional combination of HD Video Converter, DVD Burner and Website Video Downloader. Without any third-party codec, it can support Multi-track HD video M2TS, MKV, AVCHD, HDTV BDAV and MPEG-TS video movies.

It also supports converting all the High Definition and HD-Camcorder videos, to both portable and console players, such as iPad, iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, PS3, PSP, Xbox, Zune, PDA, Blackberry, Nokia, Android, Zen, etc. Supporting Multi-CPU and Hyper Threading, WinX HD Video Converter Deluxe offers up to 5x – 18x real-time video converting speed.

Features:

• Support Multi-track HD Video
• High Definition and Standard Definition Video
• Burn Videos to DVD and Create DVD Disc
• Support Blu-ray, M2TS, BDAV
• Multi-Core and Hyper Threading
• Support HD-Camcorder Video
• Website Video Downloader
• Easy to Use with Professional Setting and Optimized Profiles
• Extract Audio and Images from Video
• Automatically Fix Incorrect Video Data
• Support Both Portable Player and Console Player

How do I win a copy?

It’s still very simple to take part. Just follow the underlined steps.

Step 1

Join our Facebook page by clicking the Like button or you can follow us on Twitter, if you prefer. If you’re already following us, you may skip this step.

[twocol_one]Facebook

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[twocol_one_last]Twitter

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If you are not into social networking and don’t have any account in Facebook or Twitter, then subscribe us. If you are already a subscriber, you may skip to the next step.

Step 2

Leave a comment below and tell us what will you use this software for? While leaving your comment, if you are a subscriber, make sure to use the same email ID which is registered for My Technology Guide newsletter. If you are following us through Facebook or Twitter, then in the Website field, use your Facebook or Twitter URL. Otherwise you won’t be eligible for this giveaway.

Step 3

If you want your friends or relatives to participate and win too, don’t forget to share the post. Use the Share buttons below.

[box type="info"]The winners will be chosen on a first come first serve basis! The first 50 commenter will be the winner. So, try to be in the first 50 commenter’s to win the free license![/box]

Spread the word about the giveaway to your friends and have fun!

[quote style="boxed"]If you are having any questions on using the software, you can comment below. Digiarty Software will assist you with your queries.[/quote]

My Technology Guide would like to thank Viola from Digiarty Software, Inc. for generosity while participating in this giveaway. If you are a software developer or a company and if you are interested in sponsoring? We’d love to hear from you. Get in touch with us.

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate, formerly was known as Daniusoft Media Converter, is a multimedia software application by Daniusoft, which according to the developer, “is a massive working platform which cuts in the scope of multimedia decoding & encoding, legitimate copyright circumventing, DVD decrypting & authoring and media file transferring for personal use.”

By the tag “Ultimate” in Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate, you can easily understand that it is not just another video converter out there. It comes geared with up to 6+ independent components, like Video Converter, DVD Ripper, DRM Removal, DVD Burner, Device Transfer, YouTube Downloader. All this is packed in a neat package whose download size is only 22 MB approx.

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate comes with fully loaded support for a number of video formats. You will find support from the standard formats like AVI, MP4, MPEG, MOV and MKV to HD video formats like HD AVI(VC-1, MPEG-4), and MTS/M2TS/TS/TRP (AVHD H.264, VC-1, MPEG-2 HD). The audio formats supported by Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate is also fully loaded.

On the main screen of Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate, you just have to drag and drop the videos, select the format into which you want to convert the video, then click on the big Start button (on the bottom right) to start the conversion, while you sit back and enjoy a cup of coffee.

Alternatively, you can also manually add the video/audio files or get it to read directly from a DVD and rip it to your desired video/audio format. You can also add the URL of a video file, get it to download the videos (from YouTube or any other video sites) and add them list of files to be converted. You can also merge all files into a single file.

The software supports a lot of mobile devices too and have custom profiles for some of the popular mobile devices. Device support includes products from Apple which includes the latest iPhone 4, iPhone 4 HD, iPad, iPad HD, HTC, Motorola, Nokia, Blackberry, Microsoft Zune, Archos, Creative ZEN, SanDisk Sansa, and other popular mobile devices including Android models, gaming devices that includes PSP, PS3, PS3 HD, Xbox 360, Xbox 360 HD, Wii, NDS, and portable media players.

If you want to convert and transfer songs from your PC to your mobile device and is not sure what audio or video formats are supported by your device, simple select your mobile device model from the list of output formats and the software will take care of the rest. It can also transfer your songs to your iPod, iPhone, Zune, PSP, Blackberry, Nokia, etc.

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate also includes a DVD authoring part, but it lacks many important features. You cannot set chapters, manually set the bit rate, etc. apart from choosing one of the predefined profiles available.

Lots of people search the Internet for “How to remove DRM from your Audio/Video files”. The good news for those people is Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate comes with a DRM removal part that can remove the DRM license from the files, that includes iTunes “Fair Use” .m4p music .m4v video .m4b audiobook, or the “Play for Sure” of Windows Media protected .wma .wmv files, or even BBC iPlayer WMV, Audible Audiobook AA. Similarly, it supports easily ripping CSS copy protected DVDs.

One thing that I will like the developers to look seriously into is the video conversion process. In my test, I tried to convert a HD music video which was around 90 MB in size into MKV format (using the normal video quality). Before conversion, Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate predicted the size of the converted file to be around 50 MB. But, I was really surprised to find the size of the converted video to be around 400 MB after completion of the task! This is something the developers should really fix.

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate also comes with a very basic video editor. You can use this video editor to trim videos, crop videos, adjust image quality like brightness, contrast, saturation and apply fancy effects like embossed, negative, and old film and watermark.

It also comes with a video cutter, using which you can obviously cut videos.

Verdict:

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate does have its own share of good and bad features, but overall Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate is a good multimedia software that consists of a lot of additional features other than being just a video converter.

For:

• Wide support of around 150+ audio/video formats.
• Custom profiles for many popular mobile devices, gaming devices and portable media players.
• Apple iTunes not needed for transferring songs to iPod, iPhone, and other Apple products.
• Removes DRM from media files that includes “Fair Use”, “Play for Sure”, etc. DRM protections.
• Multithreaded technology that helps in toughest computing tasks like Hi-Def video encoding for sharing on DVD.
• Easy to use video editor and video cutter utilities.

Against:

• YouTube Downloader not working.
• Lack of features in the DVD authoring part.
• Some bugs in video conversion.

Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate License Giveaway [Expired]

Winners of this giveaway are announced at: Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate Giveaway Winners Announced

We have 5 licenses of Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate, each of which retails for $59.95 courtesy Daniusoft. We are going to give these away to 5 lucky persons selected by a random draw. If you are interested in winning one, simply become our subscriber, and just leave your name and email address (used for subscription) in the comment form below and hope for the best.

Update: The results of the draw will be published on August 1, 2010.

Daniusoft is offering support for My Technology Guide readers through its Facebook Page. If you have any queries related to Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate, you can ask your question.

Linux users always miss out on one feature that their Windows counterparts enjoy while listening to music. Most of the time, while listening to music using music players like Audacious, BMP, XMMS, etc in Linux, users misses out the equalizer presets that is present in most of the Windows music players like of Winamp, iTunes, Windows Media Player, etc.

For any die-hard music-aficionado who loves to listen to music and cannot compromise with quality, can never forgive a player that doesn’t comes with an equalizer preset. If you are a music lover who don’t likes to compromise with music and likes to have equalizer presets for fine tuning his music, there’s a simple trick to import the Winamp equalizer presets into your Audacious, BMP, XMMS, etc Linux music players.

Simply follow the steps below:

Run the following commands one by one in your terminal and you will have the equalizer presets of Winamp in your favorite Linux music player.

Step 1: Download the Winamp equalizer presets using the following command in your terminal:

wget http://www.beastwithin.org/users/wwwwolf/code/xmms/winamp_presets.gz

Step 2: Import the downloaded Winamp equalizer presets into Audacious, BMP, and XMMS respectively using the commands as follows:

gunzip -c winamp_presets.gz > ~/.config/audacious/eq.preset
gunzip -c winamp_presets.gz > ~/.bmp/eq.preset
gunzip -c winamp_presets.gz > ~/.xmms/eq.preset

In case you don’t need all of them or haven’t installed any of the above mentioned player then you don’t have to run the command for that player. For example, if you don’t have BMP installed in your machine, then you don’t have to execute the command gunzip -c winamp_presets.gz > ~/.bmp/eq.preset into your terminal.

Enjoy your music and don’t forget to tell us about your experience using equalizer presets in Linux music players!

Mediaraptor is a superb application that can find millions of music videos and songs from social media websites for you. It can then record and convert the music video, or simply find the MP3 format of the song, depending on its search results. It can then convert them, according to your choice, in a more portable formats or in standard WMV and MP3 format. Unlike Tunebite and Radiotracker, the two other products from Audials, Mediaraptor is pretty much very useful out of the box. Mediaraptor can save video tracks from several social media sources, including MySpace, Esnips.com, YouTube, Hulu, and others.

On starting Mediaraptor, you will find the user interface quite similar as seen in Tunebite, Radiotracker, and the ultimate of them all, AudialsOne, divided into two parts.

On the left, you can search for the artists whose songs you want to convert and save the files and Mediaraptor will automatically fetch and tag your files correctly from the Internet. You can also create a Wishlist to simultaneously watch a thousands of internet radio stations. You can also record media content directly from the browser as you surf the media sources.

On the right, you will find an in-built media player to play your recorded media, that also displays you lyrics, cover art and other details. You can easily burn your media files to a CD, create ringtones for your phone, and export the file to play in an external player like Winamp, iTunes and Windows Media Player. You can also synchronize your portable media players.

You will also find the Organize feature that we have seen in the other products of Audials. When you click on Organize you will be able to manage your music and video collection present on the computer easily. You can reorganize all your media files with just a few clicks. You can easily add correct ID3 tags, cover album, song lyrics, and other details to your existing media collection.

Mediaraptor is the best app for the music lovers to fill up their hard drive with tons of music and videos downloaded straight from the social media sources, and organize them too.

Unfortunately, there is a bit of legal ambiguity when using Mediaraptor. Mediaraptor is a very powerful app and it’s ability to find MP3 files that others may have illegally posted to social network sites is the main cause of concern here. You can be safe if you keep in mind while using Mediaraptor that even though it may find these illegal MP3 files too while searching, but you’re not supposed to download those files to your own PC. To stay on the right side of the law, just use Mediaraptor to grab the official music videos from places like YouTube and ignore the MP3 side of this app. For more information about the legal aspects of using Mediaraptor, please read here.

Mediaraptor is available in three versions:

• Mediaraptor Free that can record up to 40 tracks or videos per session and convert them to MP3 or WMV, respectively. You can use it for free without registration.
• Mediaraptor Premium which can grab an unlimited amount of music from social media sites and video clips from places like YouTube and retails for $27.
• Mediaraptor Platinum that can do targeted searches and multiple file format conversions, available for $40.
• Finally, if you want the joint functionality of Radiotracker, Tunebite and Mediaraptor, you should go for AudialsOne, retails for $60.

How to win a free license of Mediaraptor Platinum 4 worth $40?

Rapidsolution Software has been very kind to sponsor 10 Mediaraptor Platinum licenses to be given away at this blog. Its simple and the same rule applies like our previous giveaways and our present running giveaway of Emsisoft Anti-Malware 5.

First you just need to be a subscriber of this blog and secondly, leave a comment on this page using the same email address used for subscription.

You can take part in this giveaway until July 20, 2010 (12:00 pm, GMT -7). The winners will be randomly picked and announced on July 21, 2010, the same day when we will announce the winners of Emsisoft Anti-Malware 5 giveaway.

[ Visit Mediaraptor Website | Download Mediaraptor ]

[ Take part in Emsisoft Anti-Malware 4 giveaway too! (Expired) ]

For our latest giveaways, click here.