Summary: Condensed From DVDplusRW.org July 29, 2003
A stand-alone CD/DVD duplicator comes in very handy. However, CD/DVD duplicators have traditionally been very pricey, and hence remained the domain of large businesses or professional studios (and even then they were only to be found at dedicated duplication departments). Thankfully, the technology has now become much more affordable, so that also smaller businesses, non-profit organizations and even consumers may consider obtaining one of these devices.
In the past, DVD duplicators were usually based on DVD-R technology due to its traditional market position in professional DVD duplication and publishing. This means that people already owning DVD+R/+RW equipment and at the same time wanting to use such a machine had to make sure that the source drive was capable of reading the DVD+R/+RW media they want to duplicate, and that they had to buy different media (DVD-R instead of DVD+R/+RW) instead of the ones they are used to and which they probably already bought in larger quantities for their normal recorders. Especially when noticing the current trend towards lower and lower prices for "plus" media, especially for DVD+RW compared to DVD-RW, and the generally wider availability of DVD+R and DVD+RW media in retail stores in the US and Europe, such a "DVD-R limited" duplicator might not be a smart choice to make nowadays.
Alera promptly reacted to this situation by offering a series of CD/DVD duplicator devices which are among the first to include full DVD+R and DVD+RW recording support. They still allow for DVD-R and DVD-RW media to be used for recording as well. The Alera DVD Copy Cruiser Dual machines are able to make duplicates of DVD media on either DVD+R or DVD-R media at 4x speed (resulting in a copy of a fully recorded DVD to be completed in around 15 minutes!), or by using rewritable DVD+RW or DVD-RW media at 2.4x or 2x speed respectively. What's more, the devices are also capable of recording all kinds of CD-types (including CD-Audio, Video-CD, Picture-CD and CD-ROM) on CD-R or CD-RW media.
A rather unique piece of equipment is the Alera 1:1 duplicator. It has the most impressive looks of them all, finished in a stylish black case, with the display and operational buttons conveniently placed on top of the device.
On top of the device, we find a bright, backlighted LCD display, and 4 operational buttons. All copying, track selection, erasing and audio playback operations can be performed from this display, no computer is required. The main function of course is copying. Just put the source disc in the top drive (either a CD, CD-R, CD-RW, DVD, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-R or DVD-RW disc), and place an accompanying destination disc in the bottom recorder drive. Select the copy function, confirm writing speed (if, for any reason, you want to write the disc at a lower than its maximum allowed speed), and the copying process will start.
Copying DVDs works as straight-forward as copying CDs: just put the source DVD (of any format) in the source drive, and the recordable DVD (of any format) in the recorder, and start copying.
Then there is the Edit Track option. This can be used to make a compilation of various Audio-CDs. You can select the tracks you want to copy, and then these will be written to the destination CD. You can even determine the order of the tracks from a single CD that you want to copy. This operation can be repeated with several discs.
Now, there's one function of the DVD Copy Cruiser we haven't discussed yet. Besides using it as a stand-alone CD or DVD duplicating unit, it can also be used as a full featured DVD recorder drive when connected to a PC! On the back of the device, there's a USB 2.0 connector, and a switch to toggle between stand-alone use and PC use. Alera even provides a USB 2.0 cable in the box, to directly get you started. Once connected to a PC, it will automatically be recognized by the operating system. You may use the drive to burn CD-R, CD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-R and DVD-RW media, and use it as a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive as well. This is why Alera refers to it as an 8-in-1 device.
Alera not only offers this PC functionality of the duplicator as a bonus, it even provides a remarkable set of software with the unit to get you up and running.
The Alera DVD Copy Cruiser's set of features really surprised us. We never expected a CD/DVD duplicator unit priced at consumer level to offer this much functionality. Next to simple 1-on-1 copying of both CD and DVD media, the backlighted LCD display opens up a lot of extra functions, all of which can be used without connecting the device to a PC. Think of the Edit Track feature, to allow you to create your own music CD compilations, or the extensive CD playback features that are available, to use the device as a stand-alone music player when it is not copying a CD or DVD. And of course, we fancy the fact that Alera has brought the DVD+R and DVD+RW formats into the duplicator field as one of the firsts in the industry, by offering a device that's capable of writing all popular DVD formats. And if all of this is not enough, the unit can also be used as a state-of-the art 4x DVD recorder drive when connected to a PC. It will get you up and going immediately, as it comes bundled with an enormous amount of software to let you do anything from burning data backups to creating full featured DVD-Video titles.
We wonder how this offer can be beaten by any other manufacturer, and for sure we think this will not happen anytime soon. This product not only flawlessly does what you expect from it, but also adds a lot of functionality on top. We proudly present it with a DVDplusRW.org Editor's Choice Award.
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