No matter your purpose, Audio Record Wizard is a versatile sound recording program that lets you capture sound from your microphone, speakers, TV and other devices that you can plug into the sound card. The best part of this very capable tool is that it’s in fact very easy to use and even beginners will quickly get the hang of it.
Installation & Requirements
Only a few basic settings and the license agreement form the extremely fast and painless installation of Audio Record Wizard. The installed folder takes up a modest 11 MB of space on the hard drive, and Audio Record Wizard (ARW) runs on all versions of Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8.
The trial of the program can be used indefinitely with all features enabled, but each recording will be limited to a maximum length of 2 minutes.
Interface
ARW has a media player inspired layout that is familiar to most users. Even so, a quick step-by-step tutorial will show you how to get started. To begin with, you’ll have to choose a recording source. The program automatically detects all sources that are present on your computer: speakers, microphone, headset, TV…etc. However, the most interesting option is Computer Sounds & Voice. This function lets you record simultaneously from the computer microphone and speakers, thus can be successfully used to record chat sessions.
After selecting the source, you can create a new file to save the recording using the Open/Add button. If you don’t, ARW will create one automatically and save it in the NowSmart Recordings folder on the desktop. While recording you can adjust the level manually or use the Auto Gain Control function (available in the program’s Settings) which will do it automatically.
Besides Auto Gain Control, the tabbed Settings menu offers plenty of other options to customize your recording, such as noise suppression level, voice activation options, quality settings for various audio file formats, hotkeys and others. The File Length Limitation tab is worth taking a look at: here you can set time or size limitations for recording so that the program either starts recording a new file or stops the recording when the defined limit is reached.
Audio Record Wizard also has a Schedule function so you can record even if you’re not at the computer. A simple menu lets you choose start & end times, repeat (once or any day of the week) and the output file. The program also supports command line mode and can be scheduled via Windows Task Scheduler.
Pros
– Quick and painless setup.
– Friendly, intuitive interface resembling media players.
– Can record from any device that can be plugged into the sound card.
– A simple step-by-step tutorial guides new users into quickly learning how to use the program.
– Multiple customizations are available for recording such as auto gain control, noise suppression mode, voice activation and file length limitation.
– An online user guide offers tutorials for some of the most commonly used actions.
Cons
– None worth mentioning.
Conclusion
Audio Record Wizard is highly versatile, functional but at the same time not bloated with useless options that could confuse users instead of actually being useful. Even more, this lightweight sound recorder is also extremely easy to use, although power users won’t be disappointed by its features and command line support.
