Linasoft's AutoPlay Menu Builder offers a simple method for building digital menus. Perfect for DVDs and CD-ROMs, its usefulness easily overcomes some minor design hurdles.

We headed straight for the Help file and its topic-by-topic instructions upon opening this program. The layout was a cluttered collection of separate command windows surrounding the main screen and didn't make sense at first, but these issues were quickly sorted out, improving navigation overall. AutoPlay wisely offers about seven different templates for making menus, ranging from DVDs to tutorials and software installations. There's also an option to build a menu from scratch, but this proved fairly difficult to lay out in a professional manner. We liked AutoPlay's drag-and-drop simplicity and the ability to type the proper information in the templates and set each menu button's functionality and color with an easy onscreen wizard. All of the templates produced a professional-looking screen that would be right at home with any piece of software. We felt the program's finest feature was its option to run a virtual test of your new menu to make sure everything is linked up perfectly.

While its interface was a little too busy for our tastes at first, AutoPlay Menu Builder proved to be worth our time, and we recommend it. We appreciated this program's usefulness, once we got over the initial screen shock. The free trial version downloads as a compressed file and opens with a nag screen. The full version costs $49.95. It's fully compatible with Windows 7.