PEGASYS Set to Release TMPGEnc Authoring Works 4

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://tmpgenc.pegasys-inc.com/en/product/taw4.html' target='_blank'>http://tmpgenc.pegasys-inc.com/en/p...oduct/taw4.html</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Pegasys, Inc., the company that makes digital video easy, announces the upcoming availability of its TMPGEnc Authoring Works 4 software. It's the perfect, all-in-one media authoring solution for any video enthusiast. It is easy enough for a beginner to understand, and sophisticated enough to meet the demands of an experienced videographer. The U.S. release date is scheduled for November 13th, 2008...With the capability to author the high-capacity Blu-ray format, users can enjoy high definition videos with menus without worrying about disc capacity. This allows the saving of high-definition videos taken with an AVCHD or HDV camcorder and keeping it in high definition. Add in support for high quality 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound or linear PCM audio (up to 192kHz/20bit) and the result is a superb audio/video presentation."</em></p><p><em></em><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/dht/auto/1226012305.usr1.jpg" /><br />Aha - so this is the mystery product that they were teasing us all about a few weeks back. I have to admit that I'm confused by this product - it seems like it has a lot in common with TMPGEnc Xpress 4.0, and I'm not sure if you'd want to buy this if you have Xpress 4.0, because most of us have DVD burning applications already. I'm not alone in my confusion - our very own <em>onlydarksets </em>from the forums has <a href="http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pFYPptDt6VtRoV6b6oMmTTg" target="_blank">posted a spreadsheet</a> trying to make sense of how TMPGEnc products differ from each other.</p>

[onlydarksets]

And I'm still not sure I understand! I appreciate what they are trying to do - offer top-end full-spectrum packages for a particular function (e.g., conversion OR burning) and lower-end reduced depth of functionality for the full process products (e.g., one-stop for authoring DivX DVDs). However, their offerings just aren't intuitive.

If I were them, I would break it down into "Professional" and "Consumer" products. Professional products would take a particular function, and work the daylights out of it. For example, Xpress would be TMPGEnc Conversion Professional, and the featureset would stay largely unchanged. Have an Authoring application that takes any input ready for burning and burn it to any type of media. While each could operate by itself, all of the Professional products would be seemlessly integrated (i.e., if I wanted professional Capture, Conversion, and Authoring, those three products would operate as a single product, even though I would pay three licensing fees).

Consumer products would take a particular end goal, and provide soup-to-nuts functionality for getting there easily. For example, Portable Media Players (and "integrate" to iTunes, etc.), DVD Video, DivX Authoring, Digital Video Camera Archival, etc.

Really, I think they are almost there, but the naming conventions are overlapping and use the same words. Still, I think that would go a long way in giving direction to their suite of offerings.