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Audio tool WireTap Anywhere hits v2.0
Ambrosia Software has released WireTap Anywhere 2.0, an upgrade to the company's professional audio routing and mixing software. Following up on the 2008 release of version 1.0, this upgrade claims that "hardwired is out; softwired is in" and allows users to capture, map, and independently adjust audio channels from any combo of applications or input devices and route it to the audio processor application of your choice. Interested in recording your Skype conversations or sending some real-time QuickTime audio to a friend in iChat? WireTap Anywhere 2.0 can do that, allowing users the ability to mix and match any combinations into a single recording application. I have been a user of Audio Hijack Pro from Rogue Amoeba for years, and this looks like a solid competitor in the audio capture niche. While you can try it out free for 30 days, WireTap Anywhere 2.0 for Mac OS X 10.5 or later is available to new users for US $129 or as a $69 upgrade for registered users of WireTap Anywhere 1.x.
First look: Ambrosia's Mondo Solitaire and Aki Mahjong for iPad
Ambrosia Software CEO Andrew Welch kindly sent over these sneak peaks at two of their upcoming iPad titles, namely Mondo Solitaire and Aki Mahjong. As you can see, both titles have been written exclusively for the iPad to take advantage of the larger screen size. I haven't personally played either game on the iPhone but after watching these videos, I'm definitely looking forward to trying them out -- especially the solitaire app. I think the table-based pick-the-game interaction is a little inelegant but the actual card play looks appealing. As for the Mahjong game, which follow in the Read More section, it addresses my biggest issue with iPhone-based tile games, namely size. Game play is going to be so much better than on the cramped iPhone screen. Although there are several excellent Mahjong offerings currently on App Store, I never felt comfortable using those games with so few pixels. Both card games and tile games will really benefit from the iPad's better geometry and it's ability to approximate real-world sizes of these tangible objects. How will these to play in real life? These videos give a taste of what's to come.
Ambrosia ships WireTap Studio
We've been eagerly awaiting WireTap Studio, and it has arrived -- available for download and purchase today from the fine folk at Ambrosia. Like Rogue Amoeba's venerable Audio Hijack Pro (friend to podcasters everywhere & used in the production of the TUAW talkcast) and the older Ambrosia versions of WireTap and WireTap Pro, WTS will allow you to record the audio output of any application, line-in or microphone source on your Mac. The new app goes beyond AHP, however, in providing a full 'lossless master' editing environment to allow your audio to shine. You can roll back to your original source at any time, and even hear 'live previews' of your compression settings before putting the squeeze to your files.A full WTS license is $69 for Tiger or Leopard (universal binary), and WireTap Pro or Audio Hijack Pro users can up/cross-grade for $30. I'm definitely going to check it out, and if you do the same, please let us know what you think.
Sneak Peek: WireTap Studio
After our recent interview, Ambrosia Software's Andrew Welch was kind enough to give us a sneak peek at his company's forthcoming audio recording and editing application WireTap Studio. They've also prepared a series of videos that show off the application's unique features. What's remarkable about WireTap Studio is that it was designed from the ground up to work in lossless mode. This means that WTS creates a high-quality master of all of the recordings it makes. You can then compress and save at any bitrate you like (including live previewing of various compression settings), but the master is always there for you to go back to if you want to export a higher quality version. This also carries over to the editor, which is non-destructive (analogous to the way Aperture works with photos or iMovie '08 with video clips), so all of your edits can be undone and the original audio recovered at some future time. WireTap Studio should ship next week, but in the meantime these videos are apt to whet your appetite if you're into podcasting or anything else that requires audio recording and editing.
