Must Have Programs

[Static]

Hey all, I'm just wondering what free software you have on your computer at all times. Especially in regards to things like popup blockers, anti adware programs, and anti-virals. Specifically in mind for browsing the internet and safeguarding your computer from the forces of evil.

I get McAfee free thru cox cable internet and I use it and it's firewall protection. Coupled with Windows defender and firefox, I've been clean for years.

But I was wondering if anyone would recommend or discuss the best/their favorite pop up blockers and adware type programs.

Please add why you use them specifically as well. and keep in mind I'm discussing free programs. Only give shout outs to paid ones if they're light years better and worth the price.

 

[DocBrown]

MajorGeeks has lots of Free & ShareWare stuff


" Doc "

 

[K3VL4R]

Firefox 3.5 with Addons- Addblockplus / Flashblock / NoScript.

 

[Static]

MajorGeeks has lots of Free & ShareWare stuff


" Doc "

Thanks good to know. But the focus of this thread for me was to discuss and determine what runs best specifically on windows 7 and what runs best combo'd togther with what other programs!

 

[Uber Philf]

Avira free, for anti-virus, Itunes, to sync music to my Ipod, FireFox, Chrome, SRware Iron, Opera, for Browsers, Nokia PC Suite, to sync to my mobile, CCleaner to get rid of junk files and such, Windows Live Suite, for Windows Live Messenger, Steam, to organise all my games, and that basically what gets installed on my computer every format, not including Paid software.

 

[Static]

Firefox 3.5 with Addons- Addblockplus / Flashblock / NoScript.

Thanks. I'm trying those addons now

 

[Static]

, FireFox, Chrome, SRware Iron, Opera, for Browsers,

Why so many?

Avira free, for anti-virus, CCleaner to get rid of junk files and such,

I liked Avira from what I hear. I think on my next reformat I'm going to run Avira and test it out. Lotta people told me it's nice.

What about this CCleaner program? do explain. I'm googling it right now tho

 

[K3VL4R]

Why so many?



I liked Avira from what I hear. I think on my next reformat I'm going to run Avira and test it out. Lotta people told me it's nice.

What about this CCleaner program? do explain. I'm googling it right now tho

Avira is definitely one of the best. However with the free version you get adds during the update procedure. To remove these adds you can:

Just make sure if you're using the free version to disable the ads that pop up when it updates.

To remove the adds during AV update:

go to the avira folder and find the program called avnotify.exe
-right click it
-properties
-security
-remove its security rights to "read and execute"

or right click avnotify.exe / properties / select read only

 

[Uber Philf]

haha glad to explain. CCleaner has many features, but its generally used to clean out junk files from browsers, and program caches. Also has a reg cleaner, which on some builds will screw your computer over. Has a custom Un-installer, Start-up Manager, and System restore Feature. To round it up, its a generally very handy program to have on hand.

 

[Static]

Ya, just installed it. And it cleaned out just over 300mb of crap. And I did a fresh win7 install barely a month ago. Kind of nice. A definite addition to my must have program list as well. Thanks.

 

[Uber Philf]

No problem Static, glad to of helped.

 

[Charles Kane]

Irresistable thread!
Popup blocker: All the browsers have them built in. Rarely see an unwanted popup. Google Toolbar also has one - I leave it turned on but don't know whether its that or Firefox doing the blocking.
Anti Adware: nothing specific - usually Malwarebytes (dumped Ad-Aware awhile back)
Anti-Virus: Avast till now. Microsoft Security Essentials is now it.
Firewall: most annoying software programs out there. and the most useless when it really matters. So I go for quiet/non-intrusive - Ashampoo. but on Win7 I use built in.

(Just a note: I put reasonable protection up - I don't buy into the huge scare campaign. No protection is 100%. I have a clone of my OS partition. something goes astray, so what! I'm 30 minutes from a re-install completion).

*Firefox: I live there
*uTorrent

Work: Adobe Suite. Essential (esp *PS, Fireworks, DW, Acrobat, InD). V Expensive. Nexus Font.

Other Image Stuff: *Faststone Image Viewer. Free, Absolutely best viewer, quick editor, resizer etc. Inpaint: image object remover, invaluable, the best, not free. ColorSchemer Studio (I use the same one I got free years ago).

Text: EditPad Lite. MS Office (but OpenOffice is good too). DamnNFO Viewer. *Evernote.

Search: *Everything (little miracle)

Launcher: Launchy, but Windows Start Search is nearly there!

Media: AIMP2 for sounds GOM for video

Burn: *ImgBurn (free - the best), Ashampoo is very good too - good free version.

Author: ConvertX2DVD

IM/SocialNetworks: *Digsby

Uninstaller: *RevoUninstaller.

Mouse Cursor Tweak: CursorFX (can't resist)

File Mgt: TeraCopy, WinRAR or 7zip

Drive Mgt: Paragon Hard Disk Manager 2009, If I hadn't been given it I would have paid for it. (Macrium is good too). Clone, Partition etc

Widgets: Yahoo widgets.

SysInternals: Autoruns, Process Explorer

*= can't live without

 

[Uber Philf]

Great list there Charles, Got a few programs from this list too great work

 

[Lee]

Here are a few more to add to your collection:

Faststone Imagine Viewer (excellent for viewing thumbnails and minor fixes of photos and pictures - allows you to setup to whatever major photo editor you are using).

Mp3tag - probably (not sure) just about the best MP3 tag editor available (great when working with large collections or just updating your collection).

DisplayFusion (Free Version) for those looking for an excellent way to control the wallpaper and more on two monitors (really nice to have with two monitors).

Microsoft Reader - If you are a heavy reader as am I then this is a nice little reader. It works with the .lit files you find on open and free eBook sites (like Project Gutenberg).

Win7codecs - allows you to watch must movies and video formats with in WMP12.

FoxitReader - allows you access to just about any PDF file (nice if you don't want to use the resource heavy Acrobat reader.

dopdf - If you don't have Acrobat and need a PDF printer then this is a nice addition to your needed applications.

These are just a few I use at present and they all work under Win 7 64. Enjoy

 

[Static]

lol Nice compilation for sure charles. I'm definitely going to look into a few of them. especially that faststone image one. If it does what you say and what I need, it'll be awesome since I don't have photoshop.

Good work so far. If anyone else has something to add or argue. Chime in!

btw, what do most of you use for .rar files and/or other compression stuff? i used to use winrar. but Im sure there are better.

 

[garbanzo]

xnview is another great image viewer, lots of features and very quick.

photofiltre is a fantastic image editor. tiny and portable.

universal extractor can unpack everything from standard archives to many installers. it's essential!

billy is a tiny, tiny music player. i use foobar for my main player, but if i want to just preview a song or something, i don't want it to open in foobar and mess up my library. billy is the perfect solution.

clipx is a great clipboard extender, if you use that kind of thing.

as for firefox, get quick drag. it's hands down the most useful addon i've ever used. i hate browsing the internet without it!

some more good resources:
Gizmo's Freeware Reviews
NirSoft - freeware utilities: password recovery, system utilities, desktop utilities

oh, and 7zip is the best alternative to winrar. it can't create rar files (proprietary format), but it can extract them.

 

[Charles Kane]

faststone image i used to use winrar. but Im sure there are better.

Glad you liked them.
WinRAR really is the best, 7Zip is probably comparable if you just want to un-zip un-rar. 7Zip zips and 7s really well too - how often do you really compress?

FastStone is not a fully fledged editor. Picasa has similar tools (plus has a clone stamp) but I like the ease of FastStone, its short cuts/key strokes, the fact it doesn't interfere with the OS, it's fast and will link directly to any other editor and for freebies you can't go past PhotoFiltre and as a viewer I love it.

 

[betawind]

Glad you liked them.
WinRAR really is the best, 7Zip is probably comparable if you just want to un-zip un-rar. 7Zip zips and 7s really well too - how often do you really compress?

I have to agree that WinRAR is the best. I've had some multipart rars that will appear to be extracting w/ 7zip and then at the very end fail with a non-descriptive error. 7zip will consistantly fail on these archives whereas WinRAR will not.

 

[Stabgotham]

This is the list of apps on my Applications USB Drive...meaning these are always automatically installed on my Windows PC's...and all play great with Windows 7.

1. Firefox 3.5
2. Google Chrome
3. iTunes x64
4. PulpTunes - for streaming my iTunes library to anywhere in the world
5. ESET NOD32 x64
6. ImgBurn
7. Foxit PDF - a free alternative to Adobe Reader
8. CCleaner
9. CDisplay - a digital comic viewer
10. 7-Zip x64
11. uTorrent
12. VLC Media Player 1.0 - alternative to Windows Media Player and considerably better
13. Revo Uninstaller

That's pretty much it outside of my other programs (Office 2007, Steam for games, etc.).

 

[Static]

I don't compress files, I just need to Unzip and Unrar them. and I hate the Trial box that pops up for winrar after 30days. so 7zip it is.

Im trying out quickdrag too atm. It's nice, I don't think I've discovered its true potential yet because Im not 100% sure what it does. But Im learning so far.

Im gonna try Faststone here in a minute as well. I don't need much image editing so it might work fine. We'll see.