Great Freeware Programs That Should be on Every PC

[T_G]

I have been using the gizmo website for a long time to find free programs for my PC. All the programs there are tried and tested, so no nasty surprises. When it says free, it is actually free, unlike other places where it stops working after a 7 day test period.
The attached PDF has a list of 9 programs with screenshots and download links.

One that I find quite useful is the pure text converter, it is a neat little tool that works well - especially useful when posting on this website


The program featured are:

Program 1: Microsoft Security Essentials (Security) ................................................... 4
Program 2: CCleaner (Maintenance) .............................................................................. 9
Program 3: Auslogics Disk Defrag (Maintenance) ..................................................... 14
Program 4: 7-Zip (Productivity) ..................................................................................... 19
Program 5: EditPad Lite (Productivity) ........................................................................ 23
Program 6: PicPick (Productivity) ................................................................................ 26
Program 7: BullZip PDF Printer (Productivity) ............................................................ 32
Program 8: PhraseExpress Boilerplate Text Manager (Productivity)) ..................... 36
Program 9: PureText Format Stripper (Productivity) ................................................. 40



Well worth a read - and bookmark the website!

 

[Lazarus]

For 3., try Advanced System Care instead.

I use CCleaner frequently, but ASC is useful for a mega-tidy every now and then. Includes Smart Defrag 2 which is comprehensive, fast and excellent.


For 7., try Foxit. Replace Acrobat in every way and has decent Print functions.


Good list, TG.

 

[Channel Hopper]

I would add VLC media player and a couple of video conversion programmes that are on the other PC.

Mediacoder 2011 (version 0.8.1) and DVD Styler (version 1.8.4.2)


Why no torrent stuff ?

 

[sonnetpete]

For 3., try Advanced System Care instead....

Nice one Tivù. I downloaded Advanced System Care after reading your post and it 'does what it says on the tin'.

 

[paxrax]

calibre - converts ebooks between formats and catalogues all of your books neatly and its FREEWARE

 

[Analoguesat]

Pixresizer

-http://bluefive.pair.com/pixresizer.htm

For simple resizing of one or many picture files.

Anyone who posts pictures on a forum should have a copy - 1024*768 is plenty big enough for almost picture on a forum

One important thing to remember with PR - make copies of the pictures you want to resize and work on the COPIES!!

 

[Llew]

Audacity for anything and everything to do with audio. Graph analysis, audio level meters, effects (speed changing, audio track reversal etc).

 

[Analoguesat]

Audiograbber for ripping your cd albums

-http://www.audiograbber.org/

Make sure you d/l the LAME plugin as well if you are going to make mp3's

 

[Analoguesat]

Open Office for a fully feature Office suite thats the equal of MS Office - and is free

This is what I give to my pupils when they ask for a copy of Office to do their homework with - in fact theres a link to it on our Intranet home page

 

[Lazarus]

Well for various reasons, Open Office has actually become less "open" and a breakaway faction have produced Libre Office instead.

I have the former on a Lappie and the latter on my Netbook. Hard to distinguish, in truth.

But both remove any temptation to buy or otherwise "acquire" any Microsh*t Office nonsense.

 

[T_G]

I am using open office at home but I hate it. Especially with spreadsheets I prefer the original...But I guess that's not PC as MS is the devil

 

[davemurgtroyd]

Add Irfanview for anything to do with images - cropping, resizing, colour manipulation, slideshows etc.

 

[Channel Hopper]

Whilst not a programmes as such, this link takes you to Gibson research, where they can sniff your ports for any backdoor intrusion (oooer missus !).

_https://www.grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2

 

[Llew]

If you're techie minded and need to draw out circuits or just string together a few components (of which there is a large selection both active and passive in the database), I recommend the free ExpressPCB CAD software. As good as many of the professional (and costly) wares available.