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CD Architect 5.0
By
Read G. Burgan
When Sonic Foundry first introduced CD Architect in the late 1990’s, it
quickly became the software of choice for those of us who needed to burn
audio CD-Rs. It was easy to use and powerful.
In 2000, Sonic Foundry quietly announced that it would no longer support CD
Architect. While those of us who had come to rely on it could continue to
use it, the program would not support new CD burners.
For the better part of two years Sonic Foundry tried to put a good face on
its decision by suggesting that CD Architect users could get the same
features in its Vegas software. As good as Vegas is, it is not CD Architect
and many of us held on to our old copies of CD Architect and the host
application Sound Forge 4.5 while using Vegas to import the CD Architect
files so we could burn them on newer CD burners.
It was all fairly clumsy and anything but satisfying. Many of us felt
betrayed by Sonic Foundry whose product we had embraced into our work lives.
All that changed a few months ago with the introduction of CD Architect 5.0.
Aside from the support of current CD drives, what has changed? That’s like
asking what’s the difference between a model-T Ford and a 2003 Lincoln
Continental?
First, unlike the previous versions, CDA 5.0 is a stand-alone application.
While the general screen appearance is similar to the earlier versions, all
kinds of new features have been added.
Since I don’t have room here to highlight all of them, let me mention my
personal favorites and those that have particular applications for those of
us in the broadcasting industry.
Like its predecessor, CDA 5.0 has all of the tools that you need for
importing WAV files from your favorite audio editor or audio CDs. And you
can import cdp files made by previous versions.. CDA 5.0 provides several
ways to produce the requisite tracks including the ability to change or
eliminate the gaps between tracks.
If you burn commercials or news actualities to CDs, you’re going to love the
time-stretch feature. With time-stretch, you just hold down your keyboard
control button and use your mouse to drag the end of an event to either
stretch or compress its timing while leaving the original pitch intact.
Nothing could be easier to use and it works great.
CDA 5.0 has added a trimmer window that allows you to do editing on
individual events before you place them in the CD track list. This let’s you
do the kind of editing that would have required opening a separate audio
editor in the past. It’s convenient, and it saves time.
You can also audition multiple takes in a single track position. Did you
record three cuts of a particular commercial but you’re not sure which one
you like best? You can stack them all in a single track position and then
compare them until you decide which one you like.
One of my favorite new features is the ability to individually normalize
each of the events in the track list. All you do is check the normalize box
for each event and the tracks are immediately normalized. Talk about a time
saver!
Perhaps the single most powerful feature of CDA 5.0 is the ability to apply
virtually any DirectXplug-in effect either individually to any track or
globally to all the tracks. Each event has its own event editor that allows
you to chain as many DirectX compatible plug-ins as you want. So you can add
individual reverb, compression, noise reduction -- whatever you want to each
of the tracks.
Then you can do the same to the entire CD by applying another set of DirectX
plug-in effects to all of the tracks. This makes CDA 5.0 one of the most
powerful CD burning programs that I know.
There is a price to pay for this kind of flexibility. Once you begin to ask
the software to perform a multitude of tasks, you are requiring the kind of
processor overhead that cannot be applied in a “straight” burn. To
compensate for this, CDA 5.0 has two features.
If you have set the software to perform number of complex processes, then
you almost certainly need to save the project as a CD Architect Image File.
This is essentially a WAV file in which all of the operations that you have
chosen are already performed.
If the number of processes to be performed on the WAV files are small to
moderate, than you can take the faster route of checking the Render To
Temporary Image Before Burning. In either case, expect the time necessary
for burning the first CD to be longer than you would normally expect at the
requisite burn speed. But that is a small price to pay for the ability to
perform almost endless operations on your CD files.
I have given you only the highlights of CDA 5.0. There are many other
features. So many, that I recommend that you print out the 100 plus page
manual and keep it by you as you work your way through the program.
Expect a fairly significant learning
curve to master all of the many new features. If you have used previous
versions of CDA, you should be able to perform your former tasks in a matter
of minutes.
CD Architect 5.0 is a worthy successor to the earlier versions and should be
a welcome software tool for anyone who needs to burn audio CDs. I have used
it for several months and can’t imagine my work life without it.
-- The End --
Minimum System Requirements:
400 MHz processor
Windows-compatible sound card
128 MB RAM
Microsoft Windows 98SE,Me,2000, or XP
Microsoft Direct X 8 or later
Internet Explorer 5.0 or later
http://www.sonicfoundry.com 800-577-6642 customerservice@sonicfoundry.com
Sonic Foundry, Inc. 1617 Sherman Avenue Madison, WI 53704
THUMBS UP:
Backwards compatible with previous version(s)
Stand-Alone-Application
Time-Stretch feature lets you expand or compress time without altering pitch
Trimmer Window permits editing of individual events
The ability to automatically normalize individual tracks
Multiple takes can be previewed in the same track position
DirectX-PlugIns can be applied to individual tracks and globally
THUMBS DOWN:
Processor overhead requirements for complex operations requires
pre-rendering of file before burning.
Significant learning curve to master all of the new features
Read Burgan is a free lance writer and a former public radio station manager
who can be reached at (906) 296-0652 or through e-mail at rgb@chartermi.net
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