My first review will be devoted to a program that I use daily to record streaming music. Streaming Audio Recorder is a lite version of famous i-Sound Recorder from Abyssmedia. As practice has shown, the cut-down possibilities are more cosmetic and do not affect the functionality. What is the program intended for is clear from its name, so we will not waste time studying the basics of sound recording and immediately proceed to the main features.
Main features
The main feature is the recording of sound in excellent quality without using a virtual sound card. This is really important, because a virtual sound card can create many problems for you. Other features of the program are common for their class – real-time compression, recording level adjustment, automatic separation of tracks by pauses, automatic file naming, recording scheduler. The scheduler allows not only to start and stop recording, but also to run external programs. For example, it can open your favorite radio station in the browser. Many settings are set automatically, so you just select the folder for audio recordings and the compression format. In the list of formats there are already familiar MP3 and lossless FLAC encoder.
Interface
The main interface of the program is compact and clear. There is nothing superfluous, all controls are located as on an ordinary tape recorder, so working with it will not cause difficulties. The only possible problem is the use of the program with the HiDPI monitor – the interface is not scaled.
Additional features
As a bonus, you get a free audio editor, which is installed on demand. It has only basic capabilities, but it allows you to trim tracks, remove silence, normalize the volume. In addition, the recording browser allows you to copy tracks, edit tags and send them to iTunes.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that the program is worth its money. Missing features are compensated by an affordable price. During the testing, the program never hung or caused any errors. In the next version I would like to see M4A/AAC encoder.