Mitch
I believe that every Windows computer should come prepared with the following awesome freebies. Instead of all the b*s* it already comes with. Here is a list of my favorite freewares I like to have handy.
Lets start with the tools everyone know about, rather should know about.
1) Mozilla Firefox
We all know that Firefox, FF, is known for its great stability and its rapid performance. We use it because we feel secure when using it. When I’m surfing with FF I feel as if my screen is a safe… an actual safe where nobody can get in… and when I’m using Internet Explorer, IE, I feel like its a cardboard box with holes. Ahh… maybe you get what I’m saying, maybe you don’t. There is sh$! out there that you have not seen with Firefox and missed with IE… so download there latest version of FF and browse the un-browsable.
Mozilla Firefox - Get!
2) Mozilla Thunderbird
Yeah, there is GMail, there is Yahoo!, there is Hotmail, Live mail, Spam mail, whatever mail. But there isn’t anything like the best standalone email client… Mozilla Thunderbird. You want this free program if you are wanting to have multiple email account in one window. I know you can do this with GMail. Like add multiple accounts to it and stuff, but the good thing about this is it can stand on its own. It doesn’t need Firefox or IE. “Reclaim your inbox!”
Mozilla Thunderbird - Get!
3) IE 7, with IE7Pro 2.0
Yes, Mozilla Firefox is the best browser, but there are times where it can give you trouble. It does to me. This is why I have IE 7 handy right next to Firefox. Use Firefox for everyday browsing, and for those odd days that you can’t see something in FF, you might just have some luck with IE 7. Can’t go wrong for just have it as backup. IE 7 - Get!
There is also a great add-on to IE 7, IE7Pro 2.0. This little freeware pimps out your IE 7 like no other. It’s the ultimate add-on to Internet Explorer. Just recently released, its great. Check it out.
Features it includes are:
- Enhance Internet Explorer’s Tabbed Browsing Capabilities:
1. Double click to close tab.
2. Open new tab from address bar.
3. Enable/disable tab browse history manager.
4. Enable/disable crash recovery
5. Move the IE menu bar above the address bar
6. Hide search bar.
7. Modify the maximum number of parallel connections to the web server.
8. Select the external program to view page source - Super Drag and Drop - you can open new links by simply dragging and dropping the link on the page. You can also Drag and Drop to search selected words with the default search engine or save the selected photo when Shift is held down.
- Mouse Gesture - allow the user to execute commonly performed tasks (open/close a tab, go back, go forward , print , scrolling page etc.) by drawing a simple symbol on the screen.
- Crash Recovery - automatically restores all opened pages after a crash happened.
- Save Page to Image - Flexible and easy-to-use tool that converts HTML page from any URL to image. It captures the whole web page’s content into JPG, BMP , GIF , PNG or TIFF on the fly.
- Quick Proxy Switcher - Different internet connections do often require completely different proxy server settings and it’s a real pain to change them manually.
- AD Blocker - Blocks all forms of advertising, including Flash ads, rich media, fly-ins, slide-ins, pop-ups, pop-unders, spyware and adware ads, and messenger ads.
- Greasy monkey alike User Script - IE7Pro Script is to Internet Explorer7 as Greasemonkey is to Firefox. It lets you remix the Web via scripts.
- Inline Search - Adds the inline search bar like firefox has, finds as you type, use the F3 and Enter Key to cycle between multiple results, highlight all results.
- Spell Check - IE7Pro Spell Check will check any text you enter and alert you to possible errors by adding a red underline to any potentially misspelled words.
IE7Pro - Get!
Moving on to what people might have known about but may have forgot about or just never heard of.
4) Frostwire
The ultimate free version of Limewire… works better than Limewire! This is an open source freeware under CC (Creative Commons).
You get Turbo-Charged Download Speeds at ALL times!
No spyware or adware
There is no PRO, this is PRO… only free!
Frostwire - Get!
5) uTorrent
The fastest, most lightweight and efficient bit-torrent client for Windows. I don’t know how this works so well but it does, you can get loads in very little time.
uTorrent - Get!
6) Paint.NET
This is an absolute must have if you do not want to pay for Adobe Photoshop. Yeah, there is GIMP (Get!) but this is the closest to PS piece of freeware you can get. The best part is not only that its completely free, rather so much fun to use. It’s easy and loaded with pictures.
Get wild with it. Paint.NET - Get!
7) CCleander
CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) is a freeware system optimization and privacy tool.
It removes unused files from your system - allowing Windows to run faster
and freeing up valuable hard disk space.
It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history.
But the best part is that it’s fast (normally taking less than a second to run) and contains
NO Spyware or Adware! :) CCleander - Get!
8) TVU Player
One of the best standalone internet TV out there. It’s in beta but its a killer and a must have if you don’t have a TV in your room. If you do, yayay for you. I don’t.. because all the shows are now online.
TVU Player - Get!
9) Launchy
Very addictive keystroke launcher for Windows. It’s designed to help you forget about your start menu, your desktop icons, and even your file manager. ALT+Space bar to bring it up, search it up, ENTER… you are done.
Launchy - Get!
10) RamBooster 2.0
RAMBooster monitors the amount of RAM your system is using and allows
you to free it up. This will let your PC run smoother and faster, and
you won’t have to reboot as often. It will monitor the memory at all
times, and if the amount of free RAM gets too low, it will
automatically boost it for you, finding unused RAM and returning it to
the free pool. RAMBooster will also monitor your CPU usage.
RamBooster 2.0 - Get!
11) AusLogics Disk Defrag
The best disk defraging tool out there. This is even better then the ones you pay for. Its designed to speed up your computer and make it a lot more smoother.
AusLogics Disk Defrag - Get!
12) FileMenu Tools
This is a great freebie if you want to customize your right click menu. Useful tools include a file time changer, advanced renamer (I always have problems with the extentions, not after this tool), split and join files and much more.
FileMenu Tools - Get!
13) Glary Utilities
It allows you to clean common system junk files, as well as invalid
registry entries and Internet traces. You can manage and delete browser
add-ons, analyze disk space usage and find duplicate files. You can
also view and manage installed shell extensions, encrypt your files
from unauthorized access and use, split large files into smaller
manageable files and then rejoin them. Furthermore, Glary Utilities
includes the options to optimize memory, find, fix, or remove broken
Windows shortcuts, manage the programs that start at Windows startup
and uninstall software. Other features include secure file deletion, an
Empty Folder finder and more.
Glary Utilities - Get!
14) Glarysoft Registry Repair
I think this is the BEST free registry cleaner out there. It optimized your registry and removes unnecessary junk like no other.
Glarysoft Registry Repair - Get!
January 27, 2008
hey, thanks. there are tons of apps i didn’t knew about. nice list and site, keep up the good work.
January 27, 2008
nice list, thanks a lot!! :)
March 27, 2008
Very nice. That photo.net can do so much more than Googles free picture editor, Picasa. A lot of good stuff you posted.
August 4, 2008
RamBooster isn’t needed. Programs like that can actually make your computer run slower.
August 5, 2008
Fail…. IE is not free by any means…….. and yes, rambooster is bad :/
August 5, 2008
nice list… what the fuck shud i care
August 5, 2008
Typo:
Number 7 should be CCLEANER - No ‘D’. It’s there twice. Great app. Nice list, BTW. Lose IE7. I’ve never had a problem with firefox that I’ve been willing to give up on. May I recommend a firefox extension called ‘IE Tab’ to persuade you to lose IE7 from the list perhaps?
August 5, 2008
I though I had all the freeware in the world, but I discovered a couple of new ones here…I am going to check them out now!
August 5, 2008
Vishal - nice list, very useful. I do think that I should point out, however, that IE is actually quite pointless, beyond having it installed. You can use IE Tabs, a plug-in for Firefox, to view IE pages as they would look in IE. Works wonderfully, and keeps all the strong points of Firefox.
August 5, 2008
Don’t you need IE7 on board to use IE Tab in Firefox? - that’s why it doesn’t work in Linux. IE Tab just uses IE7, but displays inside a Firefox window. It is still IE7.
August 5, 2008
The list was great up to Launchy, then it got really lame.
JKDefrag is a way better defrag program.
Eusing Reg Cleaner is a way better reg cleaner.
Cleanup! is a way better cleanup utility.
RamBooster is a joke. Cleaning up your RAM like that actually makes your computer slower for a short period of time for common tasks.
Other than that, good article.
Also, do a grammar check this article. It sounds like it was written by a 15-year-old.
August 5, 2008
This list is clearly photoshopped.
August 6, 2008
What good is a list if the yahoo ads ar on top of it and can’t be removed to see the list.
August 7, 2008
U have missed VLC media player which plays alomost every type of audio and video file where WMP, DIVx, PoerDVD fails…
August 8, 2008
[...] is a list of my favorite freewares I like to have [...]
August 9, 2008
I was under the impression that all the new Windows computers did come with IE7.
August 10, 2008
very useful programs! i like frostwire! :D
August 10, 2008
Antivira detected a virus in your Frostwire donwload :(
August 15, 2008
YES!!! must have VLC media Player, it’s one of the first things I install after the OS re-install I do about every 6-months (only on my Windows machine of course)
Also, there is a program out there called Printkey 2000 that I find invaluable, it’s a screen print utility that lets you select objects from your desktop to print instead of just printing the whole screen (saves you the time of cropping them first in paint or whatever)
Toby
August 21, 2008
I just wanted to say thanks alot for this!
August 24, 2008
Well, you should have included Sopcast.