Periodically, you may have a friend that’s getting a new PC or that ever popular reloading your OS to get ’some’ speed back to the system. When this happens I always have a baseline of applications that must be loaded. All of the applications I recommend are listed as freeware and are/or can be portable, which makes them ever more life attractive.

And having stated that, I offer you this list:

Web Browser – Firefox
Firefox is the best web browser out there. You’re going to fight to convince me otherwise. There are other browsers on the web, out in the wild, but Firefox is all round master of the web. I’m not going to risk a single website with IE; I learned my lesson long ago. Firefox has security issues the same as any other browser out there, but unlike IE, Firefox is not integrated in to the Operating System it’s self; it’s separate and therefore less likely to completely blow up my system, if I stray to a rogue website. The only place I’m going to visit with IE is ‘getfirefox.com’. There’s also a portable version [usb drive].

Anti-virus – Avast!
Previously I was a AVG guy, until AVG got on the band wagon of ‘bloat-ware is fun’ and damn near stagnated my system. I know, I know AVG is awesome; yeah I hear that a lot, but after testing AVG and Avast! head to head- Avast! is my preferred method of anti-virus. Yes, I know it’s a life long battle anyone on choice of anti-virus, but if you have some anti-virus; it’s better than none.

ZIP program – 7Zip
The built in ZIP interface is lame; everyone knows it. One of the first things I do is load 7Zip. It’s a complete package to cover so many different archive formats; it’s awesome. Simple/fast interface and performs as advertised. I haven’t found anything yet 7ZIp can’t handle. There’s also a portable version [usb drive].

Copy/Move Replacement – TeraCopy [Shell Extension for Explorer]
As entertaining as windows copy status is, I can’t stand it. It’s been forever inaccurate ‘1 or 25 files; est 60 days to complete’; I mean seriously- it’s just stupid logic. TeraCopy is a complete replacement for copying and moving files and has a option to sync folder to folder [xcopy function]. Where Windows base functions lack Teracopy excels. Highly recommended [free for person use].

Video Media Player – VLC
Having the right video player makes all the difference. There’s nothing I’ve thrown at VLC it can’t play. Again, Simple/fast interface and performs as advertised. One of the main reasons I can’t stand Windows Mediaplayer is the stupid missing codec crap; it’s great idea, but horrible execution. So far, for me, it’s never downloaded any codecs, nor found the correct one to play, but it’s really good at enforcing that almost exinct DRM crap. VLC is small light weight and portable [usb drive].

Music Player – Media Monkey
As most of you, I’ve a modest MP3 collection of music. All of which is DRM free [I knew that effort was going to fail]. But honestly I need something to play me my tunes and media monkey has been a really good work in progress. It has lots of great features and the program is free [limited of course], but it does what I need it to. The directory of MM can be copied to a USB drive for a portable version.

Spyware Scanner – Spybot Search and Destroy
If you have people [friends/family] that periodically come over and sit at your computer during visits/holidays you never know what they’re going to catch going to all those questionable websites. Not saying everyone is going to porn sites, but all those malicious websites; you never know what’s out there. The program does a great job and regularly updated. This program is also portable [usb drive].

PDF Viewer – XChange PDF Viewer
I found this program about 6 months ago and just love it to death. One reason I was disgusted with Adobe reader; the installation of Adobe is like 30+ mb now; to view a PDF. I think that’s a bit excessive. The version Adobe gives you, you can’t edit the PDF, add test, form filler, add arrows and etc and then save it; this program does. At a whopping 6mb it’s small fast and portable [usb drive]. It integrates right in to the browser as does anything else. At the time of this article the program doesn’t allow for right-click option to print.

Image Viewer – IrfanViewer/XNView
I don’t ever user nor recommend the built in image viewer from Windows. It’s lacking so many things it’s not worth listing. Depending on your taste, IrfanViewer or XnView do great lobs for handling a wide range of image formats; everything from TXT to PSD. Both programs are freeware and are updated regularly. There’s also a portable version [usb drive].

Text Editor – SuperEdi
There’s nothing like having a really good text editor from the word go. The text editor from Windows is so inadequate that I am surprised they keep including it in the OS package for Windows; pretty much any text files over 2mb is too much for it. SuperEdi makes easy work of navigating text files and loads larger text files easily. The files can be copied to a folder to make a portable version [usb drive].

PIM – OpenOffice
I haven’t used MS office in my home for quite some time now. For me, or the average user, OpenOffice is a perfect partner to any PC. The package is updated regularly and supports Open Document Format [ODF]. If your concerned about the future and being ahead of the curve ODF is where you need to be. Going with ODF means that your documents and information is accessible from OO or MS Office and other word processing programs. There’s also a portable version [usb drive].

Email Client – Thunderbird
While others may criticize the choice to use an ‘email client’ as opposed to using a web based email client, I like having my stuff local. In the case I don’t have a network connection; I will have my emails and attachments. I find the customization ‘plugins’ of TB to be it’s strong point. I never install TB without Lightning and Provider for Google to linkup to Google Calendar online. The program can handle calendar events, tasks, address book, emails and reminders. There’s also a portable version [usb drive].

I hope you find this list useful as I do.

Feel free to offer suggestions for this list…

Regards,
NapoleonAG

Similar Posts:

• Anti-virus for Ubuntu
• Windows Live Writer: Creating a Custom Template
• Norton 360 won’t let users ‘just go’ – their uninstall isn’t working properly
• Handling and Removing Spyware
• An Alternative to Adobe Reader