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Nero 11 Second Look - The BackItUp Rescue Environment

MyNeroUserWithNicknamevoyager529@nero.com (voyager529) — 04 Oct 2011 13:27:11 GMT

Hey Everyone!

So it's that time again - the time when I pick a piece of Nero 11 apart and tell you all the good and all the bad I've found thus far. Today, I tackle Nero 11's BackItUp module. As before, this is probably going to be a bit more technical than some of the other blog posts out there, so my apologies about that - feel free to ask questions if I was unclear about something =).

As a bit of a background, I remember using Nero BackItUp all the way back in version 6 when it was first released, and did sector level backup, which meant that in order to back up my entire hard disk onto a single CD-R (which, in the days of Windows 98 and 4GByte hard disks, was entirely possible), I had to repartition my hard disk first, otherwise I'd have to provide four CD-R's to represent the empty space. This was especially problematic when I restored from it later on, only to have to edit my partition table with a hex editor and a Texas Instruments calculator in order to get my storage space back. That, my friends, was one of those experiences which made me summarily dismiss BackItUp for the last five iterations. But times have changed, software has been updated, and as an MVP and the self-proclaimed "Yahtzee" (the host of Zero Punctuation, go watch an episode if you never have) of Nero software, I felt that it was my job to give it another go.

I started up the BackItUp module, and as expected, got the welcome/help screen. Good stuff, fairly straightforward. This was extremely encouraging. The single biggest thing I was looking for was essentially a replacement for Acronis True Image, the software I've been using for backup functionality for several years. My use of the software is roughly 90% bootable recovery media, and 10% building that recovery media, so I figured that seeing how Nero fared in that context would be a worthy blog post. So I grabbed a spare Gateway laptop (vintage 2008) off the shelf here at work and proceeded to make a boot disc...

The first thing I found a smidge odd was that BackItUp wanted to know whether I was burning the media to CD or DVD. Being as the image on the DVD was only 100MBytes or so I didn't see why it particularly mattered, but it was an interesting side note just the same.

When I booted the media, I noticed that it was very Linux-y in its usage. I'm not terribly surprised by this since the boot disc is Linux based, but I found that Acronis's boot media did a much better job at 'hiding' the underlying Linux kernel, whilst BackItUp allows for boot switches and a command shell. I'm pleasantly surprised at this, and as it turns out, it became necessary later on.

If you're planning on backing up to a USB external drive, have a Plan B ready. The laptop/Maxtor external hard disk combination I tried wasn't detected by BackItUp; I rebooted twice to verify the case. I found this odd because both Acronis 2010/2011/2012 and Ghost Enterprise 11.5 (the DOS-based one) both see the drive on that laptop no problem. While it's perfectly possible that I'm simply the unlucky sap who got a poor combination of USB hard disk and USB controller, make sure you've got something else around to back up to: A network storage area, for example...

Lucky for me, my laptop has plenty of hard disk space and Filezilla Server installed. While I would love to see an update to BackItUp that includes a "backup target" module that will streamline traversing a firewall and make network configuration unnecessary, Filezilla FTP server is a great piece of open source software that can come in extremely handy at a time like this. I fired it up and pointed BackItUp to the FTP server...or so I thought.

When it comes to the networking config, the GUI seems a bit "whimsical". When I first started the BIU environment, it told me that it was configuring via DHCP. This was good, because it meant that it detected my network card. However, it didn't detect the wireless card. This is fine, and par for the course for these kinds of tools, but note that you'll need a good old fashioned ethernet cable if you plan on backing up via LAN. Once I did that and switched it to DHCP, it immediately said it was successful...only to not have an IP address leased by the machine. I tried this a couple times, to no avail. I tried manually addressing using the tools available there, but oddly I only got the error message "Could not determine Broadcast Address". I hadn't any idea why a tool of this nature would need a broadcast IP, or why it couldn't figure one out on a /24 subnet, but alas, that command shell ended up coming in handy.

I went to the command shell and typed the following command:

>>ifconfig

This showed me the list of network adapters it saw, along with their IP addresses. The one I was interested in was the one whose IP started with "169.254", in this case, the interface designation was "eth2". The way I set this up was to directly connect the two laptops together via an ethernet cable, then enabling Internet Connection Sharing on the destination laptop using the WLAN connection to force DHCP on the hardwired interface. If you're going to attempt this method, you'll need to ensure the following criteria are met:

-The destination laptop is running Windows XP/Vista/7, Home Premium or better for the latter two.

-The wireless connection has an established connection to share.

-At least one of the computers has a gigabit ethernet card in it; 10/100 cards can't auto-negotiate the wire pairs and thus need a specially crimped "crossover cable". As long as at least one of the NICs are gigabit, doesn't matter which one, a standard ethernet cable will work.

If these criteria aren't met, you're best off connecting through a router or similar, and assigning an IP within the network on that device if you encounter similar difficulties leasing one automatically. In order to assign a static IP address from the command line, here's what you do:

type: "ifconfig" on the command line to see what designation your ethernet port has gotten. If you see one with the IP address of "169.254.x.y" (where x and y are random numbers between 0 and 255), that's your interface. take note of it - in my case it was "eth2".

next, type" ifconfig eth2 192.168.137.10", if you're doing the Internet Connection Sharing trick above. If you're going through your router, try the same thing, but with the IP address of "192.168.1.222" or "192.168.0.222" until the machine in Nero BackItUp can see the rest of the LAN. Oddly enough, running this command automatically determined the subnet and broadcast addresses without needing to be specified, so there's definitely something up in the network config GUI where the left hand and the right hand need to be reintroduced to each other.

So, after figuring all THAT out, I proceeded to make my first backup, using normal compression and 1899MByte chunks. I was pleasantly surprised to find that SFTP was also a supported protocol in addition to regular FTP, so props there. It proceeded to go extremely fast on the upload; faster than Acronis or Ghost have done in the past, so again kudos to outpacing the competition. However, I did have an issue the first time around where it dropped the connection to the FTP server and failed to pick it up again, hovering at the 63% completed mark for 10 minutes before I decided to reboot.

The second time around, it did complete the imaging successfully, but dropped the connection during the verification stage. Since the backup completed successfully, I decided to do another little expedition, namely to see whether selective restoration was possible. One of the big issues that the open source imaging products like PING and Clonezilla haven't addressed yet is that their sector-level backups are all-or-nothing affairs. If you need to restore a particular file out of an image, there's all kinds of fancy footwork required. By contrast, the commercial offerings allow users to browse the images and extract particular files at will, without having to do a complete restore in order to do it. Nero BackItUp has a middle of the road method of doing this. While Acronis treats their image archives in a very similar manner to the way Windows treats ZIP files and Shadow Copies (i.e. transparently through the Windows file explorer), BackItUp does require the user to go through the "restore" process and choose files and folders via the internal file browser, instead of through Windows Explorer. It's not a terrible setup, and it's vastly superior to the sector-based backups that don't allow file restoration at all, but ironically enough the one file format most worthy of a file association that immediately opens BackItUp doesn't have one and as such was a bit less intuitive that I would have liked.

I decided to reboot again and see what would happen if I used a regular shared folder ("Samba") instead of FTP to see what would happen. One thing I did find odd was that while file splitting was mandatory for FTP transfers, it wasn't even optional for SMB. The option to split files is always a good thing, since it makes it easier to do uploads later, or archive to disc or to span across multiple volumes. It certainly wasn't a dealbreaker though. Another technical note, if you're like me, you're used to browsing network shares using a pair of backslashes (e.g. \\computer\folder). Since this is Linux, you'll have to substitute the protocol for the pair of backslashes, and forward slashes thereafter (e.g. smb://computer/folder). This one failed as well, but due to user error: the battery died. However, once completed, it did verify successfully without any hiccups or failures. As such, I'd recommend using SMB if you can.

My summary is this: As far as the full disk backup process goes, it works. It works quickly and it does selective restores. I'm glad that it does it, but there is clearly still some polish to be made. The GUI for network configuration needs to work, the USB controller drivers need to work, and the FTP connection needs tweaking. Acronis has all of these things down to a science, which means that they stand out when seen side by side. As such, it ultimately boils down to this: If you've got Acronis, don't stop using it for Nero, because some things are better streamlined. If you've got Nero, the feature set isn't so absymal that it warrants saying "get Acronis instead".

Joey

Free Nero Kwik Media Software Enhanced with Photo Products Service

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 08 Nov 2011 17:28:29 GMT

Karlsbad, Germany (Nov. 8, 2011) – Just in time for filling those Christmas stockings, Nero® has added a new service to its free Nero Kwik Media software to help users design and print beautiful, customised photo books, calendars and greeting cards.

“If you’re a PC user, making a high-quality photo book, calendar or greeting card with other services can be time-consuming and difficult,” said Martin Stein, senior vice president of global products at Nero. “First you have to import your photos from your camera to your computer; use a different application to remove red-eye or crop your photos; then upload them to an online service -- all before you can ever begin designing your project.”

“Nero Kwik Media streamlines the whole process so you can get started faster and spend more time having fun and being creative,” he added. “It provides everything you need to import and edit photos and create high-quality gifts, all in one application.”

With Nero Kwik Media, consumers can complete a high-quality, ready-to-order photo book, calendar or greeting card in minutes. Photos in the Nero Kwik Media library can be tagged and filtered using facial recognition technology so they can be located quickly. Once the preferred photos, cover materials and background theme are selected, the software pre-populates the entire project.

Best of all, everything in Nero Kwik Media photo products can be customised so consumers have complete creative control. Pre-configured background themes and layouts can be edited and changed. A huge selection of themed clip art images, image masks and photo book styles can be applied easily to give every project a personal touch.

Create one-of-a-kind keepsakes to show grandparents how their grandchildren have grown throughout the year
Keep family traditions alive with pictures of relatives cooking their favorite dishes; include hand-written recipes to make a personalised cook book
Make bed time fun by creating customised children’s books with pictures of the kids and your own story lines

The free Nero Kwik Media software enables consumers to manage, sync and share their photos, videos and music across PCs, Android smart phones and tablet devices. It also contains easy-to-use tools to edit and enhance photos, create entertaining slide shows, burn content to DVD and Blu-ray discs, and post photos and videos to Facebook, YouTube, Flickr and other online social networks with just one click.

Photo products ordered through Nero Kwik Media are printed regionally with the highest quality materials. They typically ship within five to 10 business days.

Visit http://kwikmedia.nero.com/eng for details.

Nero for Ever for Burning for Elevator!

MyNeroUserWithNicknameCorgiov@nero.com (Corgiov) — 19 Oct 2011 16:13:42 GMT

With Nero 11 burning reaches new levels. Burn to multiple media with Nero Burning ROM is easier than ever. Make a video and a Blu-ray HD or DVD is easy with Nero Video. Thanks to Nero RescueAgent never miss your data. However, you can also use Nero BackItUp to prevent the loss. Nero is the best burning suite and data management. Try the free version of new Nero Kwik Media: you can enjoy some of the features that you will find in the final version.

Nero Video - First Successful Project

MyNeroUserWithNicknamevoyager529@nero.com (voyager529) — 25 Oct 2011 21:08:35 GMT

I'm a bit hesitant to write this blog entry, simply because it's going to be mostly positive, and that's generally a stark contrast to my normal blog entries whose inspiration comes from the likes of Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw and Simon Cowell.

A friend of mine asked me to do her a solid, namely to make a camera dump from her video camera and generate a DVD from them. Previously I've used Adobe Encore for this task. I tried Nero at first, but the way I did it ended up spitting her back into the menu every time a clip ended. Clearly continuity breaks didn't bode well for her, which led me to Encore. While the "Create Chapter Index" was a handy feature, as well as it auto-generating chapter points after every clip on the timeline automatically, it was extremely petulant when it came to audio formats...and when I mean petulant, I mean it all but refused to generate a working DVD *with* audio. So, I decided to head back over to Nero and see what I could see.

What was likely the cause of my first round of headaches was that my first round in Nero, I believe I tried having all of the different MPEG files as separate titles, instead of putting them on a timeline of some sort. Given my additional experience with the process in general, I figured that putting them on a timeline before authoring the DVD may help. While I thought that the load time for Nero Video was a bit long, it was on par with Premiere, so I gave it a pass. While I'm being pedantic, I didn't like the fact that the project files area was given so little screen space before editing started - there's no need to have 'properties' and 'effects' expanded before the files are imported. Additionally, there's no way to consolidate the properties panel with the rest of them - they can all be collapsed, which is what I ultimately did, but I'm busy nitpicking because these are roughly the biggest complaints I have.

I then batch dragged them to the timeline, and created the chapter points. I think that this is where my biggest nitpick is - there's no facilitation of doing this. Yes, I can advance between cuts using page up / page down, but I didn't see anything that lent itself to being a button to click to add chapter points. The only place I found it was in the right-click menu on the timeline ruler, in a position whereby I found myself having to reposition the mouse cursor every time I set a chapter point. There was no automated means of adding chapter points (some good ideas would be to be able to set them every X minutes, every cut, every other cut, etc.), and/or have a dedicated button somewhere in the UI to place them so that it can be PgDn, Click, PgDn, Click, PgDn, Click, etc. It took a little time to do this, but ultimately it was the most difficult part of the project.

Menu templates are likely a challenge to decide when being created, since there's no guarantee how many of what will be necessary. In some cases, text labels work fine, in others, six motion thumbnails are necessary. Which templates are needed for the chapter menus are always luck of the draw, so consider this a feature request for version 12 to have different layouts per template. Additionally, since this menu only consisted of the chapter index, having the main menu was unnecessary, but I saw no obvious way to delete it and head straight to the first index page.

All of THAT said...Nero did a fantastic job of making the video with a working audio track, and spent more time rendering the motion menus than it did transcoding the video. I must say...I'm actually pleased with the way it turned out.

Now I need to dig deeper for the next blog =)

Joey

Kim's App Of The Month: Nero Kwik Play

MyNeroUserWithNicknameKim-Media-Fan@nero.com (Kim-Media-Fan) — 18 Oct 2011 15:27:06 GMT

You can import, organize and create it, and now with the Nero Kwik Play app, you can play it. No worries when it comes to various video formats, because the app is smart enough to play back your favorite jams and movies from one place. Enjoy crystal clear Dolby stereo and surround sound for the ultimate in home movie viewing and music listening.

Take Nero Kwik Play for a spin today!

Nero 11 Makes It Easy To Share, Sync and Optimize Photos, Videos and Music

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 05 Oct 2011 15:46:01 GMT

Karlsbad, Germany (5th October, 2011) -- Nero 11, the new multimedia software suite from Nero®, is now available for consumers who want to make the most of their photos, videos and music.

Nero 11 was reconstructed to offer improved device support, greater functionality and substantial usability improvements. Its main applications now have consistent user interfaces and a new Nero MediaBrowser provides one-click access to the user’s photo, video and music library from every application. Easy-to-follow start screens offer at-a-glance overviews and video tutorials for each application.

The integrated applications in Nero 11 can be used to:

Organise and wirelessly sync iTunes playlists, videos and photos between PCs and Android devices
Create impressive-looking videos and photo slide shows for sharing on Facebook, YouTube and Flickr
Provide full system back up security with just one click
Optimise and convert videos for iPad, Android smart phones and other devices
Burn high-quality Blu-ray and DVD discs
Design and order professionally printed photo books, calendars and greeting cards

New features and capabilities introduced in Nero 11 include:

Nero Kwik Media:

Wirelessly sync photos, videos and music between PCs, Android smart phones and tablets
Create and order professionally printed photo books, calendars and greeting cards

Nero Video:

Storyboard- and template-based Express Editing mode provides sophisticated editing capabilities without the complexity of a multi-track timeline
Support for NVIDIA Cuda, AMD App Accelerator and Intel Quick-Sync-Video GPU accelerated hardware for faster video encoding
Import and continue working on projects from Microsoft Windows Live Movie Maker

Nero BackItUp:

New Nero LIVEBackup provides automatic and continuous back up security with just one-click
New incremental drive backup support saves space and time
Automatic detection and configuration of NAS devices
Shadow Volume support for full system back up
Option to back up only photos, videos and music in the Nero Kwik Media library

Nero Recode:

Completely redesigned, easy-to-understand interface
Pre-defined, fully customisable profiles for optimal video and audio playback on the most popular devices, including iPad, iPhone, Android devices, PSP, Playstation 3 and XBOX 360
Support for all of the most popular file formats, including MKV
Create batch encoding jobs from multiple files, discs and folders

Nero Burning ROM:

New SecurDisc Surface Scan feature ensures greater reliability of Blu-ray, DVD and CD discs

Quotes from Martin Stein, senior vice president of global products

“Nero 11 helps you do more with your photos, videos and music faster. It is the only software you need to access and organise your photos, videos and music across all of your devices; create impressive videos and slideshows; optimise videos for your iPad or smart phone; back it all up securely with just one click; and share your memories with friends and family on an online social network, Blu-ray disc or photo book.”

“Nero 11 is a fully integrated suite for syncing, organising, creating, converting and sharing photos, videos and music.”

“Nero 11 was completely rebuilt with straightforward interfaces, pre-configured settings and clear instructions that help users of any skill level produce results quickly. Best of all, it grows with a user’s skills and needs. Advanced users can have a deeper level of control over every setting when they need it and want it.”

About Nero

Nero creates software applications and platforms that help consumers simply enjoy their photos, videos and music. Its free Nero Kwik Media platform enables consumers to access, enhance and share their digital content across PCs, smart phones, tablets and online social networks. Nero also produces a top-selling multimedia software suite, which contains powerful applications for media management, video editing, video converting, file back-up, content syncing and disc burning.

Nero World Premier - Nero 11 Platinum.

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 29 Sep 2011 09:05:02 GMT

Make the most of your photos, music, and videos in HD. Nero 11 is your 360 degree multimedia software solution for all photo, music and video management, editing, sharing, portability and backup security.

click here to watch the included content

It's official. 1 + 1. Nero 11. Coming soon.

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 14 Sep 2011 14:58:49 GMT

We hope you are all as excited as we are. It's official now.

When you want the best all-in-one multimedia solution, you want Nero. Now in its 11th edition. Coming soon.

Nero Customer of the Year 2011

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 30 Aug 2011 13:24:54 GMT

Nero has some of the most dedicated customers in the world. In recognition of this fact, every year Nero picks and rewards the most supportive Nero customer.

It was a difficult decision, because we have so many dedicated Nero customers! But, while we value each and every customer, we could only pick one.

We proudly announce Hans-Joachim as our Customer of the Year for 2011.

Hans-Joachim lives in Germany. He is a self described video fanatic – a title we appreciate as it was a video on YouTube, in which he explains the new Chroma Key feature of Nero Vision that brought him to our attention.

After we watched his first video, we immediately contacted Hans-Joachim. He joined the Nero MVP program and has been an active participant in many activities with Nero:

Attended web sessions to meet and discuss Nero products, with product managers and developers
Beta tests
Visited Nero at CeBIT
Answers posts in the MyNero Forum on a daily basis
Visited Nero headquarters in Karlsbad during Nero MVP days

Employees from throughout Nero’s offices: Karlsbad - Germany, Yokohama - Japan, Glendale - USA, and HangZhou - China, prepared thank you notes for Hans-Joachim. The notes were bound into a large book which was presented to Hans-Joachim at an employee event in Karlsbad, Germany. One of Nero’s great partners, Toshiba, donated a lap top computer which was presented to Hans-Joachim as a token of our appreciation.

Jürgen Kurz, Nero CEO, when making the presentation said, “Hans-Joachim’s passion for Nero is only matched by the passion of the employees who develop our products. We are truly fortunate to have such dedicated customers. Each and every customer is important to Nero, but on this occasion, Hans-Joachim is the most valuable.”

In behalf of all Nero employees and customers around the globe, we congratulate Hans-Joachim on being named Customer of the Year and thank him for all of his efforts!

How to add music files from external playlists to your library

MyNeroUserWithNicknamekristopherbarton@nero.com (kristopherbarton) — 01 Sep 2011 14:00:58 GMT

In Nero Kwik Media you can easily import music files from your hard drive or almost any device to your Nero Kwik library.

To get started, please open Nero Kwik Media.

Click the Options button on the top right and afterwards the option External Playlists. In the opened Options window you can now choose if you want to import iTunes or your Windows Media Playlist. Select the option you like and press ‘OK’.
If you want to have you iTunes Playlists displayed, click the green arrow that is displayed at the right hand side of the iTunes entry when you hover over it with your mouse pointer. Now you can transfer the media files of your iTunes playlists to your Nero Kwik Media library or even to external devices, like your mobile phone or tablet.
If you select Show Windows Media Player Playlist the option Windows Media Playlist appears below Playlists in the left navigation tree. If you click the green arrow the playlists are displayed. You can then manually add the playlists to your media library via drag and drop.

You have successfully added music files from external playlists to your library!

How you are creating Video-DVDs from VGA material on the fastest way

MyNeroUserWithNicknamehg-dude@nero.com (hg-dude) — 27 Aug 2011 12:54:04 GMT

Most low price cameras like this model are recording videos in VGA quality (640 x480 resolution) in M-JPEG mode, stored as AVI files on a memory (SD) card, not like a video camera in a continuing stream, but as a lot of small sequences, each of some seconds of lenght. To put them together in edting it uses a lot of effort. But there is another way reducing expenditure to an absolute minimum.

Import all the files which you would like to link together (in the sequence you like) to one video stream into NeroVision 7 "Content" . Attention: Files in vertical recording format need a preprocessing (rotating) as described in part 2 of this blog. Mark all files and export the stream as MPEG-2 video as shown below

These files you can import now in a new project as titels under "Content" or under "Edit".

The settings under "More" in the "Recording Format Options" for these Video-DVD projects (including that for exporting) should all be "Automatic". Except the Video Mode in the register card "Common", which should be set to that of your region, the "Quality Settings" should be "High Quality" and that for the "Length" to 100. The video mode of the exportet files is NTSC, but it will be automatically converted in the final transcoding process, if the video mode of the project is PAL. The final transcoding step will be very fast, provided that Smart Encoding is activated (automatical or manually).

The result is a DVD of a quality better then VGA of VHS-Tapes. Only camera movings may be sometimes a little bit jerky in PAL.

As I don't have HD equipment, I couldn't try with that material, but I think the processing described above would be similar. The important step is, to convert all files which are not of MPEG-4 format to MPEG-2 or 4.

I wish you a successful working.

REVISED EDITION OF THIS BLOG IS AVAILABLE ASAP !

Take a look lateron once more.

How to Act on a First Date

MyNeroUserWithNicknameEveDanda@nero.com (EveDanda) — 21 Aug 2011 18:21:59 GMT

The key to a successful first date is to relax and just be the real you. If you try to act in a way that you think the other person will like, then they may start liking someone who you are not, and in the end you will wind up breaking up and getting hurt, so honest truly is the best policy, and in the end if you are just being you and it does not work you, you know they were not the one for you.

Dating is like gambling at poker, sure a good bluff may win you a hand or two but you are not going to win the World Series of Poker by bluffing, only by playing the best you can. This is no different from dating if you make things up to try and impress this person they are not liking you but are liking the fake you and eventually they will see the two are no the same.

Try to think back to the things you talked about when the both of you spoke on the phone and see if you learned anything that may help you decide where to go for your date, but if you do not have enough information about them to know what they may like you sometimes have to gamble and throw the dice, and hope you don’t crap out.

The most important thing to do on a first date is to have a good time, the bigger a deal you make of it the harder it is going to be and the higher the chances of you making a jerk of yourself. If you are nervous before the date take a few minutes and take a few deep breaths and if this does not help then I recommend you do what I like to do in the casinos when my nerves are bothering me I simply have a drink. The alcohol in one drink will usually calm me down enough to concentrate.

The key to having a nice first date is simple:

Take her/ him to a nice place, quite but not too quiet, you should be able to hear each other but other distractions are also good for those uncomfortable moments.

Do not take her/ him to a place where your friends hang out, this will make her/ him feel as if they are being ganged up on or they may feel out of place and resent you for making them feel that way.

It is very important to have the whole night planned out already before the date and have a backup idea just incase. The tricky part is making it look like it was not all planned. Let's say you decide that you are going to take her for dinner, then after you want to take a walk on the beach do not just say hey after dinner let's take a walk on the beach. I would recommend you wait till after dinner and ask her if she wants to take a walk to burn off dinner and then take her to the beach.

Then when you are on the beach take her/his hand while walking, this makes a physical connection between you and makes it easier later on when you go for your first kiss.

Just remember that dating is a gambling sometimes you are going to get a bad hand and eventually if you play your cards right you will find the right person and win the jackpot.

Usually by the time you have a first date you have either already meet someplace, or have at least talked on the telephone or over the internet, and there should at least be some amount of interest in each other or why would you have agreed to the date in the first place.

How to create / personalize a slide show with Nero Kwik Media

MyNeroUserWithNicknamekristopherbarton@nero.com (kristopherbarton) — 16 Aug 2011 21:34:37 GMT

With Nero Kwik Media you can easily edit slide shows and burn them to a Disc of your choice.

To get started, please open Nero Kwik Media.

Click the Create a slide show button. Then click the Photos library entry in the navigation tree on the left. The photos browsing screen is displayed.
Hover the mouse pointer over an item (detailed browsing view) or whole stack (overview) that you want to add to your slide show. A check box is displayed in the upper left corner.
Select the check box to select the item.
Repeat the last steps to make your selection.
Click the Create Slide Show button on the lower task bar. A window is opened.
Enter a name for your new slide show in the input field and click the OK button. The new slide show is displayed in the Slide Show screen. The Story Board shows all items you selected. You can navigate through the items of the thumbnail strip using the Left and Right buttons.
If you want to add more items to the slide show:
Click the Add photo and video to the slide show button. The Add files to slide show window is opened.
Choose the desired photos or videos and click the Add button.
Click the Close button. The photos or videos are added to the end of the slide show.
If you want to change the order of the items in your slide show, drag any thumbnail on the strip to the desired position.

If you want to personalize your slide show, please proceed as follows:

Click the Themes button in the Personalize Slide Show area on the left of the Slide Show screen. The Personalize Slide Show window is opened with the Themes tab displayed. Three tabs are available in the window, corresponding to the buttons in the Personalize Slide Show area. You can choose from the various templates, add titles or adapt the volume of the background music.
Choose a template on the left of the Themes tab. An animated preview is shown on the upper right of the tab.
If you want to enable the pan-and-zoom effect for slides, select the respective check box. The check box is selected by default.
Click the Titles tab. The tab is displayed.
Add your desired text for the intro title into the Opening title input field. Other text attributes such as font and alignment are defined by the template and cannot be modified.
Add your desired text for the outro text into the Closing title input field. Other text attributes such as font and alignment are defined by the template and cannot be modified.
Click the Music and Duration tab. The tab is displayed.
If you want to change the display duration of still pictures in your slide show, add the desired duration into the input field. Default duration is 3 seconds.
If you want to specify the volume level of the audio added by the template in contrast to the volume level of all other audio tracks which are already available in the timeline (e.g. sound of video file), move the slider in the Volume mixer area. If you do not move the slider, both Video sound and Theme music have the same audio level. If you prefer to mute the theme music, select the check box below.
The theme music is used by default. You can also select the Use own music option button if you prefer your own music. Click the Add music button to browse your library and add the desired track.
Click the OK button. All changes are added to the slide show.

You have successfully created and personalized a slide show!

Kim’s App Of The Month: Nero Kwik Faces

MyNeroUserWithNicknameKim-Media-Fan@nero.com (Kim-Media-Fan) — 18 Aug 2011 12:57:52 GMT

Playing "Name that Face" can be fun, but when you’re organizing a library of photos, then suddenly it’s not a g ame. With Nero Kwik Faces, you never have to second-guess who’s who in the photos, because the smart detection feature automatically identifies the same people in photos so you can tag photos by name or search for photos by people. Now that’s what I call picture perfect.

Automatically detect and identify people in photos
Conveniently sort your photo library by "people"
Easily tag pictures adding names to your photos
Find people you’re looking for to create personalized slidshows and DVDs

How to edit photos with Nero Kwik Media

MyNeroUserWithNicknamekristopherbarton@nero.com (kristopherbarton) — 26 Jul 2011 03:54:29 GMT

With Nero Kwik Media editing photos has never been easier! To get started, please open Nero Kwik Media.

1. Choose Edit Photos from the Enjoy your Media menu. You can now browse through your photos and double-click the image you want to edit. This will open the Editing Photos screen.

2. To edit your photos, click the Modify button. The Modify window in which you can choose from several effects, adjustments and enhancements presented on three correspondent tabs opens. Whether you want to remove a common “red-eye” effect from your digital photos or add a flashy effect to your image - Nero Kwik Media has just what you need.

3. To crop your photos, click the Crop button. This will open the Crop window in which you can choose from several templates that are defining the aspect ratio of a crop frame. You can also change the size of your item manually. To crop manually, move the mouse pointer from the Crop window to the content area. It changes into a cropping tool. Click, hold, and move the cropping tool to directly see which part of the photo will be cropped. The width, height and position of the cropped area can be adjusted after the cropping tool has been released. Once you are happy with the defined size, click the Apply button to cut down the item.

4. By clicking the button Undo edited steps/Redo edited steps in the lower right area the last editing step is reversed/repeated. Independent of the number of process steps you already performed, you can always undo your previous editing until you reach the original again. You have successfully edited your photo!

Kim’s App Of The Month: Nero Kwik Burn

MyNeroUserWithNicknameKim-Media-Fan@nero.com (Kim-Media-Fan) — 19 Jul 2011 15:36:55 GMT

Burning or copying a disc shouldn’t burn you out. Nero Kwik Burn, the convenient app for Nero Kwik Media, lets you drag-and-drop to burn files and make copies of your content all from the same place, without hassling with settings.

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

Wanna learn more? Check out this great introduction on The Windows Club

First Nero MVP Days @ Nero Headquarters in Germany

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 28 Jun 2011 16:13:35 GMT

Nero invited four Top MVPs to visit the offices in Karlsbad, Germany on June 9th and 10th. This marked the first ever visit to Nero headquarters by the MVPs. It has always been of highest importance for Nero to listen carefully to our customers and to improve Nero products and services accordingly. The Nero Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Program is designed to let expert-level Nero users contribute their knowledge and valuable opinions to the enhancement of Nero products and services.

Nero MVPs are typically in contact with Nero on a weekly basis, receive firsthand information on new features and products, share their knowledge about Nero with other users in the My Nero forum, write and post reviews about Nero products on various channels and platforms, and create tutorials on how to use the coolest features Nero software offers.

Nero regularly invites MVPs to web meetings in order to gather feedback and suggestions as well as exchange information.

The topics of web meetings cover areas such as product introductions, beta tests, and open discussions about Nero applications and related technology. Depending on the web meeting topic select Nero employees participate, including product managers, developers, technical engineers, support specialists, and social community managers.

During the Nero MVP Days the four invited Nero Top MVPs had direct contact with Nero’s key players regarding products and services. Not only did they receive top treatment, but each MVP was given a coveted 320GB Toshiba STOR.E Art external hard drive which was sponsored by one of Nero’s Top partners: Toshiba.

Nero MVP Days MVPs met with:

Product managers
Developers
Social media managers
Other key position holders at Nero

MVPs and Nero discussed:

New features
Usability
Market trends
Customer feedback
Community and social media trends

MVPs contributed to:

Meetings
Presentations
Media interviews
Beta tests
Hands-on live sessions

Benefits for MVPs:

Insight to the heart of Nero at our headquarters
Direct contact with key players at Nero
Firsthand news and information

Benefit for Nero:

Feedback from top Nero users
Direct input from professional users regarding products and usability
Opportunity to say “thank you” to Nero Top MVPs

Wanna learn more about the MVP Program? Follow this link.

How to Add Names to Faces in Nero Kwik Media

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 07 Jul 2011 11:47:43 GMT

With Nero Kwik Faces you never have to second-guess who’s who in the photos again, because this smart detection feature automatically identifies the same people in photos so you can tag photos by name or search for photos by people, not just by file name.

To get started please open Nero Kwik Media.
Please select one photo from your Nero Kwik Media library and press Edit.
Click the Add Name to Face button on the lower task bar. The Add Name to Face window is opened. Each recognized face is automatically marked with a rectangle.
Enter the person’s name in the Add Name input field below the rectangle and press the Enter key on your keyboard.
If a person’s face on your photo was not automatically recognized and you want to tag it:
- Click the Add Face button. A highlighted rectangle is displayed in the content area.
- Drag the rectangle over the face of the person you want to add. You can resize the rectangle by dragging its edges or corner. The highlighted rectangle is adapted.
- Enter the person’s name into the Add Name input field below the rectangle and press the Enter key on your keyboard.
- Click the Add button in the Add Face window. All changes are saved to the photo. The face category in the main page now lists all photos with recognized names in stack groups sorted by the people in your pictures.

You have successfully added a name to a face!

How To Import Videos And Photos From A Digital Camera To Your PC With Nero Kwik Media

MyNeroUserWithNicknameNero@nero.com (Nero) — 16 Jun 2011 12:30:40 GMT

Nero Kwik Media gives you the opportunity to easily import your videos or photos from a mobile device such as a digital camera (DSC) or AVCHD camcorder to your computer. Conveniently, there is no need for any apps to be activated and it doesn’t matter whether the device is known to the Nero device database or not.

To import media files from the selected source, proceed as follows:

Please open Nero Kwik Media.
Connect the device to your computer.
Click the Devices > [Device name] entry in the navigation tree on the left. The device browsing screen is displayed.
If you want to check or change the import options (i.e. the target directories): Click the Import Options button. The Options window is opened with the import options displayed. If you import files to the library, the files you import will be copied to the folders you choose in this area. If you want to change any storage directory, click the respective Browse button to browse it. By clicking the OK button all files will be imported by default in the selected folders.
If you are using e.g. a smartphone and you want Nero Kwik Media to import files only from the camera folder (DCIM) of your connected device and if you want to erase the original files from the device after the import, select the respective option button and check box.
Click the Import button. The importing process is started. A status bar is displayed in the lower left of the main window to show the progress of the importing process. When the importing process is successfully completed, the files are automatically displayed in the respective browsing screen.

You have successfully imported media files from the selected source!

For future import procedures Nero Kwik Media will only import new pictures that haven’t already been imported into the Media Library, so you don’t have to worry about browsing and selecting the right media anymore - Nero Kwik Media will do the job for you!

How to publish a slideshow or video to a community with Nero Kwik Media

MyNeroUserWithNicknameKim-Media-Fan@nero.com (Kim-Media-Fan) — 09 Jun 2011 09:49:11 GMT

Hi everyone,

It is my pleasure to take over this week's Tutorial Thursday and introduce one of Nero Kwik Media's functionalities to you.

Check out this video and learn why publishing a slide show or video to an internet community has never been so easy.

Feel free to share your comments!

Sincerely,Kim