Our Verdict
You ’ve got iTunes to organize your music and iPhoto to mastermind your delineation . But what about your videos ? Do you just allow them straggle , willy - nilly , all over your hard drive ? ManyTricks’sUsherattempts to fetch your movie , TV shows , family television , and more under one roof , undivided , with browsing and metadata for all .
Like Apple ’s own medium - catalog apps , Usher features a split - dose interface that render a root inclination on the left-hand hand and a listing of filing cabinet on the right . Built - in desegregation with iTunes , iPhoto , and your Movies brochure means that you ’ll line up Usher automatically populated with TV from those sources . you may view your pictures as thumbnails ( with mouseover previews ) , in a lean , or in a Cover Flow - style carrousel , but some interface are better than others for certain tasks ( for example , in thumbnail mode you ca n’t drag and drop multiple files ; you ’ll have to trade to lean modality for that ) .
The law of similarity with iTunes and iPhoto does n’t finish with the user interface , either . Usher also provides capability for generate television superstar military rating , organise them into playlist and Smart Playlists , and even converting them into other format . ( Though , copulate with the excellentPerian , Usher can play back just about any data file format you throw away its manner . ) And , of track , Usher lets you play back telecasting in a window or in fullscreen mode , although I rule its fullscreen playback of a MP4 TV choppier than the same video when see in QuickTime Player , though that may be due in part to using it on a foresightful - in - the - tooth Mac mini . While Usher also has a remote control - base port that permit you see to it it from your couch — enceinte for use with an HDTV - touch base miniskirt — it ’s no substitution for the media essence interfaces of Plex or Boxee . I also establish the formatting spiritual rebirth slow , though again , that might in part be due to the ironware I prove on
But in organization , Usher ca n’t be beat . As you might expect from the folk music behind Name Mangler , it ’s easy to batch rename the statute title of movies into something more readable , just in slip you ’ve pay off a bunch of every which way - titled files ; note that that wo n’t alter the factual file names , just the way they ’re expose in Usher . For movie , Usher can even draw down metadata from the Web , although disappointingly , it does n’t really handle idiot box serial publication at all .
The power to create Smart Playlists base on various criteria is another of Usher ’s strong suits . look to group all your unwatched programs from the last seven day ? No problem . Want a list of your favorite sequence by star evaluation ? Sure affair . The available filtering criteria are panoptic , including pretty much any metadata that can be affiliate with a piece , from last playback to substance abuser - defined tags .
If all Usher did was handle your live video , that might be enough . But we inhabit in an Internet - connect age , and Usher reverberate that by integrate built - in support for look video on both YouTube and Vimeo . Not only can you speedily graze through matching issue , but double - clicking on any television will quickly download it to your estimator , just in case you desire to watch it while you ’re not on-line . Once a video ’s download , it can be tagged and organized just like any other movies in your collection .
For those looking to bring a semblance of order to their unwieldy collection of videos , Usher is excellent at organizing the topsy-turvyness . There are a few rough edges that need to be polished , include some strange UI behavior , and the gain of automatic retrieval for TV metadata would aid frequent TV spectator like myself , but even without those feature it stay a powerful pecker .
