What is the Best Free Software Programs?

M-I Youtube · Posted:Thu Nov 20 @ 10:13 am

We all know that free is good, well OK the Best darn thing ever! When it comes to programs for your PC you could spend 100's and 1000's of your hard earned money. But there are plenty of great free (legally) software programs out there. What are some of you favorites?

For me I used to use Samurize

Samurize is an advanced system monitoring and desktop enhancement engine for Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista. IT professionals, overclockers, gamers and desktop modders alike use Samurize for system information, weather reports, news headlines and much much more. And best of all, Samurize is 100% free!

Samurize's rich feature set includes:

• an unrivalled set of built-in meters (Disk utilization, CPU usage, network traffic, system temperatures...)
• ultimate customizing and skinning possibilities with no programming knowledge required
• monitoring your own computer or others over a network
• tiny memory footprint and CPU usage
• the first system monitoring tool with a true WYSIWYG editor
• full extensibility via scripts and plugins with a powerful plugin SDK/API
• minimal software requirements (no .NET or Service Packs necessary)
• multimonitor support
• many usage options (desktop, taskbar and clock clients, server outputting to XML or image formats, screensaver)

Samurize: The Only Limit Is Your Imagination.

Posted:Thu Nov 20 @ 12:20 pm

Interesting. I'll have to give that one a go.

Lets see I use Plaxo for my email because it keeps my contacts for me so if I have to reformat it just loads it all back up. Um, that's all I can really think of at this time. Have to wait till I get home and check my system out. I take stuff for granted once it's been on there a while.

Posted:Thu Nov 20 @ 1:29 pm

I use Pidgin for instant messaging, and stardock is a free dock similar to the one in mac osx. Until recently i used Windowblinds, but then I found out that you can change the look of your desktop by downloading a patch that lets you use what ever themes you want. I use OpenOffice as a replacement for Microsoft Office, and I use the Gimp for basic image editing. As far as utilities go, I use Abexo registry cleaner, Auslogics disk defrag, and ccleaner.

M-I Youtube · Posted:Sat Nov 22 @ 12:12 pm

OK here is another one

Filezilla the free FTP solution. Both a client and a server are available. FileZilla is open source software distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License

This a great program if you have to do a lot of FTP work.
Go to the Filezilla Home Page

Also do you have two monitors? Then you have to get this one....DisplayFusion

# Use a different desktop wallpaper image on each monitor
# Use a desktop wallpaper image that spans all monitors
# Randomly change your desktop wallpaper using local images or images from Flickr
# Drag maximized windows to other screens
# Auto-snap windows to the edge of your monitor
# Integrated Flickr image search & download
# Manage application windows with fully customizable hotkeys:

The free version lets you do all kinds of great stuff.

Check out the DisplayFusion Page Here

My YouTube Channel · Modding God Joined: Feb 23, 2007 Posts: 715 Location: U.K.

I like the look of Display Fusion Smile

Joined: Jul 27, 2009 Posts: 34 Location: Edmonton, Alberta

how about an office application, i find the openoffice works very well and has all the features as microsoft office and best of all, you can open a msoffice document with it or even port it to msoffice. and its free

http://www.openoffice.org/

M-I Staff Joined: Oct 23, 2008 Posts: 435

Avira!

Free antivirus software ... "Certification by independent, international research organisations such as ICSA confirm a detection rate of AntiVir of one hundred per cent for ITW viruses."

http://www.avira.com/en/company/awards.html

For someone like me (downloading almost 24/7) it's the best thing ever. Get it here FOR FREE:

http://download.cnet.com/Avira-AntiVir-Personal-Free-Antivirus/3000-2239_4-10322935.html?part=dl-10322935&subj=dl&tag=button&cdlPid=11012914

Joined: Jul 27, 2009 Posts: 34 Location: Edmonton, Alberta

i have been using this software since 2001. no problems and everybody i recommend it to has been very happy with it.

Posted:Tue Sep 01 @ 8:45 pm

Hold on a moment - I thought everything was free..... :p oops....

On a more serious note, Superantispyware is free for the basic version and it gets rid of a lot of stuff that AVG, Norton, Bitdefender and Housecall couldn't touch - definitely something for your arsenal even if only as an extra line of defence...

There's always AVG as an alternative to avira - no idea how they compare side-by-side. Skype has its uses, Xvid is essential. Media Player Classic is another good one... erm... it's 2.47am and you're making me think!!! 7-zip can replace those pesky nagware programs winzip and winrar, someone already mentioned ccleaner I think and I prefer foxit for pdf's over adobe reader - quicker, lighter, nothing in the system tray etc.... WSFTP-LE used to be my default for FTP altho to be honest I do very little of it now outside of dreamweaver, I just use my network places for the convenience...

I'm sure there's more I use but my brain is starting to sieze....

M-I Youtube · Posted:Sun Sep 06 @ 3:35 pm

VirtualBox is a powerful x86 virtualization product for enterprise as well as home use. Not only is VirtualBox an extremely feature rich, high performance product for enterprise customers, it is also the only professional solution that is freely available as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). See "About VirtualBox" for an introduction.

You can find VirtualBox here

Posted:Sun Sep 06 @ 4:12 pm

I heard about this program called OpenDNS that is good for if you have kids or a small business network and you want to keep people from going to bad places on the net. I installed it at work and at home and it's pretty cool. If you have a need for web filtering it's free and works.

M-I Youtube · Posted:Sun Sep 06 @ 4:36 pm

Yep... http://www.opendns.com/ I have used it when my cable company was giving me issues on the DNS side. It works rather well.

M-I Youtube · Posted:Sun Sep 06 @ 4:42 pm

DynDNS is another great program to have if you are running a home server.

DynDNS dynamic DNS service, which allows users to have a subdomain that points to a computer with regularly-changing IP addresses, such as those served by many consumer-level Internet service providers.

I have it setup for an FTP site and a test site. Once you get your router setup you are good to go Wink

Posted:Sun Sep 06 @ 5:49 pm

Site Advisor
and
Web of Trust

i am NOT advertising.. One has a free version and the other is totally free.
Simply put.. install both into your web browser of choice and you get a double hit to knowing which websites [even in search engines] have a bad reputation of viruses before you even click the link.

For the artists out there...
GIMP
not as good as photoshop.. but far better then MS paint and can use most of photoshops plugins made by 3rd party developers

Blender 3D
free 3D rendering program thats nowhere near as great as the pay programs.. its main fault is its lighting and final rendering.. but in comparison to the other programs out there.. it dont cost 4000$

For the statics out there.
SpeedTest.net
Not enough people out there know about this site.. nothing to download but the program on it tests your internet connection speed and is great for finding out just how your bandwidth is behaving for that day.

FRAPS
Frame rate monitoring program.. theres a free version.. alot more reliable then most gamed "debug mode" frame rate tests.. but is often seen as a 3rd party intrusion program by online games that have some sort of hack shield to it.

For the gamers out there...
Warzone ressurection project
Lil game called Warzone 2100.
basically the second true 3d rts on the market next to Total Ahnnilation.. and 500 times better as it has an actual tech "tree" that spans 500 researches.
once the item is reasearched.. body, propultion, and weapons.. you can literally create the vehicles of your choice to do battle with.
Gone free through the GNU due to eidos going under ages back and they released the rights of the game to the public.
the WRP are people dedicated to keeping the game running and updated through thier continued dedication and effort.

Joined: Sep 02, 2009 Posts: 38

Freeware:Audacity-CCleaner-Paint.NET-7Zip-FretsOnFire-TSConverter-Lifextender-Super Finder-GOM Player-GIMP-blender-Safari-ObjectDock-?-CamStudio>>>>Game demos:Empire Earth II-Company of Heroes-Stronghold 2 >>>>>>Upcoming game PS3:modnation>><<Search@ http://download.cnet.com/windows/?tag=hdr;snav