What’s better than free software? How about free software that’s as good as most commercial applications and fills a void that free-based software doesn’t? That’s what it takes to make it onto any respectable list of must-have freeware. Read on to see if some of these battle-tested free applications can make your computing life easier.
System tools
What do you use when you need to find duplicate files on your computer, clean your internet tracks, optimise the start-up of your PC for maximum speed, shred or encrypt files, or remove spyware? You could turn to a lot of small add-on tools, or you could just use Glary Utilities (http://www.glaryutilities.com/). This free utility pack beats the massive all-in-one utility suites of yesteryear because it contains efficient tools that are useful to most computer users but consumes a mere 19 megabytes of disk space. Tools are organized neatly into the categories such as “clean up and repair,” “optimize and improve,” and “privacy.” If all you need to do from time to time is clean the junk files that inevitably clog a Windows computer, CCleaner (http://www.piriform.com) is the one essential free tool that many swear by.
Image viewers
A rudimentary thumbnail viewer is built in to Windows. But the moment you need to view images in the RAW format of your digital camera — or another less common format — you run into trouble. That’s where dedicated image viewers come in, and most computer users need one. Unfortunately, commercial image viewers have become unwieldy and slow, piling on features that most never use.
XnView (http://www.xnview.com) is a refreshing, free change. It’s fast, simple, and ties in nicely with your image editor of choice.
With a drive tree on the left and the image thumbnail viewer on the right, it’s compatible with most image formats today, and there’s even a version that ties in with Windows Explorer to replace Windows’ anaemic thumbnail viewer.
Windows key automation
Windows 7 uses the Windows key better than any previous version of the operating system. But there’s still much more that can be done with it. That’s where the free Hotkeyz (http://www.skynergy.com/hotkeyz.html) comes in. With it, you can supercharge your underused Windows key. How about Windows key+I to open Internet Explorer? Windows key+W for Word? Windows key+C to open the Control Panel? The Hotkeyz functionality should be built into Windows. Since it’s not, this tiny free application is the next best thing.
Media player
When you get tired of Windows Media Player crashing or failing to play some media file that you’ve downloaded from the internet, it might be time to turn to the free VLC Media Player (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/).
VLC plays both audio and video and does so more reliably and quickly than Windows Media Player. Best of all, it can be used side-by-side with Media Player or another of your favourite media tools.
Zip and archive tools
For a simple and reliable archival tool that both reads and creates compressed archives in the Zip format, it’s hard to beat 7-Zip (http://www.7-zip.org).
System tools
What do you use when you need to find duplicate files on your computer, clean your internet tracks, optimise the start-up of your PC for maximum speed, shred or encrypt files, or remove spyware? You could turn to a lot of small add-on tools, or you could just use Glary Utilities (http://www.glaryutilities.com/). This free utility pack beats the massive all-in-one utility suites of yesteryear because it contains efficient tools that are useful to most computer users but consumes a mere 19 megabytes of disk space. Tools are organized neatly into the categories such as “clean up and repair,” “optimize and improve,” and “privacy.” If all you need to do from time to time is clean the junk files that inevitably clog a Windows computer, CCleaner (http://www.piriform.com) is the one essential free tool that many swear by.
Image viewers
A rudimentary thumbnail viewer is built in to Windows. But the moment you need to view images in the RAW format of your digital camera — or another less common format — you run into trouble. That’s where dedicated image viewers come in, and most computer users need one. Unfortunately, commercial image viewers have become unwieldy and slow, piling on features that most never use.
XnView (http://www.xnview.com) is a refreshing, free change. It’s fast, simple, and ties in nicely with your image editor of choice.
With a drive tree on the left and the image thumbnail viewer on the right, it’s compatible with most image formats today, and there’s even a version that ties in with Windows Explorer to replace Windows’ anaemic thumbnail viewer.
Windows key automation
Windows 7 uses the Windows key better than any previous version of the operating system. But there’s still much more that can be done with it. That’s where the free Hotkeyz (http://www.skynergy.com/hotkeyz.html) comes in. With it, you can supercharge your underused Windows key. How about Windows key+I to open Internet Explorer? Windows key+W for Word? Windows key+C to open the Control Panel? The Hotkeyz functionality should be built into Windows. Since it’s not, this tiny free application is the next best thing.
Media player
When you get tired of Windows Media Player crashing or failing to play some media file that you’ve downloaded from the internet, it might be time to turn to the free VLC Media Player (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/).
VLC plays both audio and video and does so more reliably and quickly than Windows Media Player. Best of all, it can be used side-by-side with Media Player or another of your favourite media tools.
Zip and archive tools
For a simple and reliable archival tool that both reads and creates compressed archives in the Zip format, it’s hard to beat 7-Zip (http://www.7-zip.org).
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