Thread: K3b 2.0 Alpha 1

I chose K3b Alpha to see what additional features it offers over the KDE3 version. It is advisable not to use the testing release for the production environment. The development for K3b I2.0 should be out soon and available before the KDE 4.3 release.
K3b 2.0 will finally bring native KDE 4 support and will eventually fill the gap that has been a deterrent to KDE4 acceptance. Besides, K3b offers Blu-Ray support to the open source industry.
K3b offers a complete solution out-of-the-box, irrespective of which format or media you throw at it. Here are the features it offers:
•Data CDs/DVDs/.Blu-Ray discs
•Support for multiple El-Torito boot
images
•Multi-session support
•Audio CDs
•Video CDs
•Mix mode e;Ds
•eMovixCDs
•CDcopy
•DVD burning
•CD ripping
•DVD ripping and DivX/XviD
encoding
•Save/load projects
•BlankingofCDR-W
•Retrieving table of contents and CDR information
•Writing existing ISO images to a CD or DVD with optional verification of the written data
•Writing cue/bin files created for CDRWIN
•DVD copy (no video transcoding yet)
•Enhanced CD device handling:
•Automatic detection of maximum writing and reading speeds
•Detection of Burnfree and Justlink support
•Good media detection and optional automatic CD-RW and DVD-RW blanking
•Kparts plug-in ready.
K3b has the upper hand over Nero as it supports easy ripping of video discs, while the latter doesn't. K3b offers more than decent quality rips and burning capabilities with an easy to use interface. But creating a data disc might be a pain for a new user. The space provided for dropping in files is less and might become congested in windowed mode.
K3b offers high speed scanning of audio files and you can drop files in bulk, which is not the case with Brasero. The latter offers slow scanning of media files and thus becomes vexatious at times.
K3b is yet in the Alpha stage but still provides a quality experience. I have yet to experience any sort of crash or bug. Though the DVD burning sometimes gets stuck at 99 per cent, resulting in wasted space. So if you want to test K3b, get yourself a rewritable disc, which will substantially minimise the disc squander.
The UDF support in K3b (Linux in general) isn't as reliable as Nero Linux. Burning files in UDF mode resulted in non-working discs in Windows/MacOS, which is not the case with Nero Linux. I even used K3b 1.0.5 [kde3/qt3 version] to check them 'Jut, but all in vain.
Burning media in K3b is swift and effortless, though burning files larger than 4GB with UDF standards left a negative impression. It's not actually a problem with K3b-the Linux UDF standards didn't get recognised in Wmdows and the Mac OSX

Note: A UDF DVD burnt using K3b shows up as an empty media in Windows Explorer, while it lists all the files if you view the disc in a burning software even in Windows. So, it's more of an integration problem from the burning software's end. Discs burned using Nero Linux have no problem whatsoever.
Except for issues with UDF and large files, K3b is a rock solid disc burning software. It has been undoubtedly the most popular burning software in Linux, but major problems like non-working discs are certainly a let down. Hopefully, these will be fixed or a notification will be added informing users about the issues they could face.