Nexis 100AP Publishing System

 

Software:

 

The Nexis 100AP Publishing System comes with XLNT Idea’s DiscDirect and DiscStudio software. The software was installed as part of the initial setup, so we are ready to start using it right away.

Once we started the DiscDirect software, the Nexis 100AP Publishing System was recognized as the Active Unit, so we know we are ready to start using the unit.

DiscDirect

The next thing we did was navigate to the Properties menu. From here you can see we can adjust the Read and Write speed of the units CD/DVD Burner, Calibrate the Robotics, Check Ink Levels and Park it for Shipping.

Properties

The first Job Type we see is Print Only. Here we can have the Nexis 100AP Publishing System print one or more copies of the same disc.

Print Only

We can choose a preconfigured label by clicking Select Label or make our own using DiscStudio.

DiscStudio

We have a variety of options to choose from. Here we can add in any picture and it snaps into place. We can make the image smaller or larger using the zoom in and out buttons and even uses the drawing tools to make our own distinct design.

Another necessary feature is being able to quickly change the Inner and Outer Diameter; here we have the option right where we need it on the main page for quick access when printing Medias with different print diameters.

Now that we have our cover selected, we can save and exit the program and DiscStudio will add that cover automatically to the Print Label section as you can see from the Print Only screen above.

Our next option we have is Data Burn. We can choose to burn an ISO image or make a compilation of files and burn to disc with or without printing.

Data Burn

Here we will choose to make compilation of files. Simply drag and drop any files you’d like into the Drag and Drop Files Here window.

Data Job Details

From here you can save the job if you wish and click finish and you’re ready to burn your files. Once again we have the option to print a disc label at the same time if we wish.

The next feature we have is Audio Burn. Here we can select any number of MP3 files we would like to burn and drag and drop them into the window and again we are ready to burn and print.

Audio Burn

Audio Job

The next useful feature is Mixed Burn. Here we can create a mixed mode CD with separate Audio and Data tracks.

Mixed Burn

Selecting Audio files

Selecting Data files

Again we can save the job and open it again later or just click finish and burn our job with or without printing.

The next slick DiscDirect feature is called Disc to Image. Here we set the disc we want to make an image of in the hopper and select an output folder and click GO. Within minutes we have an image of our disc!

Disc to Image

DiscDirect’s next feature is equally as nice, it’s called Disc to Disc. With this feature we can make multiple copies of a disc. We then have the capability to save the copied disc to the hard drive at the same time as well; we can again chose if we would like to print the disc during this job.

Disc to Disc

The next smart option we have is Streaming. With Streaming you can copy a set of discs simply by placing the Master disc in the load bin followed but as many blanks as you’d wish, then you can place another Master disc followed by as many blanks as you wish and so on. This is very smart and useful job tool to have.

Streaming

Our final tool we have is Auto Insert. With Auto Insert we can rip audio from CD’s and DVD’s using many different programs. Here you can see we are using AudioCommander, but you can also use iTunes.

Auto Insert

Ripping tracks from CD

Our next feature is Queue Mode. In Queue Mode we can set up multiple jobs to run one after another. For our test we will set up a few jobs and see how the Nexis 100AP Publishing System runs through them. For this option though we need to select Enable Queue under the tools menu and we need to have the Nexis 100AP Publishing System turned off. As you will notice in the screen shot below, the unit is Offline.

Queue Mode

First we will select Disc to Disc, we are going to have the Nexis 100AP Publishing System make two copies of the disc and then print the our selected label on each of the discs. This is automatically added to the Queue. Editors note: You can use the drop down list and select any of the CD/DVD drives you have connected to your system to be the ripping drive, but for this example we are going to let the Nexis 100AP Publishing System do this.

Disc to Disc in Queue

The next job we are going to add is a Mixed Burn, here we have selected the Audio and Data we wanted to burn and saved the job. We will be making one copy of this job and not printing the disc label.

Mixed Burn in Queue

Our final jog that we will be adding to the Queue is an Audio Burn. Here we will select a group of MP3 files from our system and this time we will have the Nexis 100AP Publishing System make to copies for us.

Audio Burn in Queue

Now we are ready to run the jobs in our Queue but first we need to save our Queue. Next we can turn the Nexis 100AP Publishing System back on and we need to restart the software to take us out of Offline mode. Next we open the Queue project we just saved and then load the Disc Tray with the appropriate media for all our jobs.

Queue ready to run

As you can see in the screen shot below, we have started running our Queue.

Queue in progress

Queue Finished

Our Queue is now finished, let’s have a look though our discs and see if it was completed properly. First we made two Audio copies and had them print. As we can see the Audio disc burned with the tracks we selected and printed out perfectly (we will go into print quality in our next section)

Finished Audio Burn

Our next Queue job was a Mixed Burn. Using My Computer, we can see our data files were copied and by letting our disc Auto Start and play using Windows Media Player our Audio tracks are here as well.

Mixed Burn Data

Mixed Burn Audio

The final job in our Queue was Disc to Disc; here we had the Nexis 100AP Publishing System make two copies of our Audio disc. As we can see from our screen shot below, our disc was copied and played back perfectly in Windows Media player.

Disc to Disc Copy

On the next page we will take a closer look at Print quality…

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