1. SPS Accounts:
    Do you find yourself coming back time after time? Do you appreciate the ongoing hard work to keep this community focused and successful in its mission? Please consider supporting us by upgrading to an SPS Account. Besides the warm and fuzzy feeling that comes from supporting a good cause, you'll also get a significant number of ever-expanding perks and benefits on the site and the forums. Click here to find out more.
    Dismiss Notice
Dismiss Notice
You are currently viewing Boards o' Magick as a guest, but you can register an account here. Registration is fast, easy and free. Once registered you will have access to search the forums, create and respond to threads, PM other members, upload screenshots and access many other features unavailable to guests.

BoM cultivates a friendly and welcoming atmosphere. We have been aiming for quality over quantity with our forums from their inception, and believe that this distinction is truly tangible and valued by our members. We'd love to have you join us today!

(If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us. If you've forgotten your username or password, click here.)

Useful tools/freeware

Discussion in 'Techno-Magic' started by Barmy Army, Jul 12, 2009.

  1. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

    Joined:
    May 26, 2003
    Messages:
    6,586
    Media:
    2
    Likes Received:
    162
    What tools/freeware do you have on your PC?

    I use CCleaner, Daemon Tools, Zattoo, Adaware, VLC, Spotify.
    What do you people use? Any gems out there?
     
  2. Kitrax

    Kitrax Pantaloons are supposed to go where!?!?

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2002
    Messages:
    7,899
    Media:
    74
    Likes Received:
    96
    Gender:
    Male
    HFS - HTTP File Server...'nuff said

    Zone Alarm - One of the best firewalls out there

    AVG - A very good (for the price) virus scanner

    CCleaner - Essential for every computer!

    WinDirStat - Scans all your drives and produces blocks, representing individual files, proportional to their size. Great for finding out what's hogging up all the space on your HDD.

    DVD43 - DVD decrypter...

    Daemon Tools - Virtual drive software

    True Crypt - Creates encrypted virtual drives that the NSA, CIA, and FBI would be hard pressed to crack. Perfect for making drives to dump sensitive data into.

    VLC - best video player out there

    WinAMP - My favorite Mp3 player

    Trillian - I use it for IRC chat...but it handles MSN, AIM, ICQ, and others....
     
  3. Morgoth

    Morgoth La lune ne garde aucune rancune Veteran

    Joined:
    Jul 21, 2002
    Messages:
    3,652
    Media:
    8
    Likes Received:
    86
    Gender:
    Male
    Everything running on my PC is freeware, it's an Ubuntu box :)

    Most notable:
    emacs The ultimate editor. Is easily extendable for people who know Lisp and also handles images, IRC, LaTeX, etc with the correct mode installed. The version that is coming this month will have built-in support for anti-aliased fonts.
    wine For playing Starcraft and IE games.
    Amarok For listening to music.
    grip For ripping my (legal!) CD collection.
    gnomad For putting said music collection onto my zen music player.
     
  4. Ziad

    Ziad I speak in rebuses Veteran

    Joined:
    Aug 3, 2004
    Messages:
    4,088
    Media:
    57
    Likes Received:
    47
    Long lis there...

    7-Zip - Create and extract archives

    aMSN - Freeware MSN client without all the bloat of the official one.

    Avira - Anti-virus. It's supposed to be adware rather than freeware but considering you can inactivate the ads in two clicks of the mouse and without using any third-party cracks or whatnot, I count it as freeware.

    Daemon Tools - Very handy for speeding up loading times of old games that constantly access the CD and don't have a "full install" option (I've got way too many of these)

    Foxit Reader - PDF reader that is about 80x lighter than Adobe's and does everything.

    GIMP - GNU Image Manipulation Program (exactly what it says on the tin :p ). It doesn't do everything that Photoshop does (colour management is the big missing one here) but we have a Photoshop licence at work and I can do all the regular manipulation at home using this.

    ImageJ - More specialised image editing. For things like adding scale bars to my micrographs. Runs in Java so a bit slow but excellent software otherwise.

    ImgBurn - CD image creation and burning. Very lightweight, fast and reliable.

    jv16 Power Tools - Registry cleaner and other cleaning functions. I don't use this one often but run it every once in a while and clean all the files left by programs after uninstallation.

    K-Lite Mega Codec Pack and VLC - I can't decide which one I like more. There are formats that one but not the other will play, so I keep both installed.

    OpenOffice 3.1 - Who needs M$ Office? I find both Writer and Impress to be much, much, MUCH better than Word and Powerpoint. I've had less compatibility problems giving M$ Office users files created with OO than they had transfering files between themselves created with the same version of M$ Office! The Excel equivalent isn't so compatible yet, but I've not needed any of Excel's advanced features in a while and wouldn't use it for them anyway; if say I need to do statistics then I'd use SPSS, if I needed databases I'd use a database program (not Access).

    Firefox - Not perfect, but the best browser I've used.

    I think that covers imy Windows installation. I think the only commerical software I've got on there are my ganes :lol:
     
  5. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

    Joined:
    May 26, 2003
    Messages:
    6,586
    Media:
    2
    Likes Received:
    162
    So far I've nicked jv16 Power Tools and WinDirStat - both look nifty as fook. Cheers lads
     
  6. Topken

    Topken Elven-dragon wizard

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2008
    Messages:
    442
    Likes Received:
    13
    Gender:
    Male
    hmm lets see ive got an older version of damemon tools before they went the pay route aand have had no issues with it at all running any of my isos ive made of my games. lets see ill make a list as well.

    7-zip

    ccleaner

    firefox

    dosbox for playing daggerfall and arena

    open office

    vitrual box for running versions of linux and testing out the new windows features so i can tell when it will be a good time to change my main os to linux

    gimp 2

    defraggler free defragmentation program a lot better then the one windows gives you as it can defrag the free space as well as you can tell it to put larger files at the end of the drive and specify which types and how large which is a good thing

    vlc and cccp with media player classic for movies and shows as for music i use winamp which is a good thing

    comodo internet sercuity suite which is firewall and antivirus together which is much better for me then zone alarm sence the anti virus cataches a whole lot more with this one

    flashget v2 for downloading the large files and for those websites that take forever to download.

    utorrent for torrenting linux distros to try

    spybot search and destroy for spyware

    alftp for ftp sites

    byond for good games that remind you of the 16bit era

    super for converting music and video files

    that it for me for now if i can think of anything else ill add it
     
  7. Merlanni

    Merlanni Veteran New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

    Joined:
    Nov 12, 2005
    Messages:
    2,445
    Media:
    23
    Likes Received:
    53
    Gender:
    Male
    kaspersky internet security, firefox, openoffice, picasa, nero, coretemp
     
  8. Ziad

    Ziad I speak in rebuses Veteran

    Joined:
    Aug 3, 2004
    Messages:
    4,088
    Media:
    57
    Likes Received:
    47
    Nero's not freeware is it? It used to be pay software (and rather expensive if I remember)

    :doh: how could I forget DOSBox?
     
  9. Topken

    Topken Elven-dragon wizard

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2008
    Messages:
    442
    Likes Received:
    13
    Gender:
    Male
    lol neros still pay software. as for forgetting dosbox? shame on you for forgetting such a useful program
     
  10. Harbourboy

    Harbourboy Take thy form from off my door! Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

    Joined:
    May 29, 2003
    Messages:
    13,346
    Likes Received:
    97
    ZoneAlarms

    Firefox

    What is cool about this Cleaner thing you all seem to have?
     
  11. Kitrax

    Kitrax Pantaloons are supposed to go where!?!?

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2002
    Messages:
    7,899
    Media:
    74
    Likes Received:
    96
    Gender:
    Male
    Read my guide here on SP: Kitrax's guide to cleaning up your hard drive. (I talk about CCleaner in the 6th paragraph down) CCleaner is so awesome, it should come pre-loaded on every PC! :love:

    Also...CCleaner has a registry cleaner...so I'm not sure if jv16 Power Tools if worth the time.
     
  12. Erod Gems: 14/31
    Latest gem: Chrysoberyl


    Veteran

    Joined:
    May 21, 2005
    Messages:
    652
    Likes Received:
    3
    Here are a few that I use and have not been mentioned yet:

    DisplayFusion - Multi-Monitor Taskbar and Desktop Wallpaper. Previously I used the desktop manager that came with the NVIDIA drivers, but it is not available for Windows Vista.

    EasyBCD - A simple and useful tool to tweak the Windows Vista bootloader.

    Password Safe - Store all your passwords behind a single encrypted master password list. Has lots of other features too.

    Pidgin - Universal chat client. I use it as a multi-IM client. IRC needs a proper client.

    Secunia PSI - Software vulnerability scanner.

    SharpReader - The best RSS aggregator that I have come across.
     
  13. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

    Joined:
    May 26, 2003
    Messages:
    6,586
    Media:
    2
    Likes Received:
    162
    I use RocketDock as well. I really like it.
     
  14. ChickenIsGood Gems: 23/31
    Latest gem: Black Opal


    Veteran

    Joined:
    Sep 3, 2006
    Messages:
    1,601
    Likes Received:
    24
    CCleaner, Magic Disc (kinda like Deamon Tools), Firefox, AVG anti-virus, Unlocker (for when you get the irritating cannot delete, program in use messages), and VLC Media Player are my main ones.
     
  15. Ziad

    Ziad I speak in rebuses Veteran

    Joined:
    Aug 3, 2004
    Messages:
    4,088
    Media:
    57
    Likes Received:
    47
    Oh yes, forgot one more (Chicken reminded me of it with Unlocker). I use ProceXP to get rid of the annoying Program In Use errors. I've used Unlocker as well and it's quite good but I like some of the extra features that ProceXP has.
     
  16. ChickenIsGood Gems: 23/31
    Latest gem: Black Opal


    Veteran

    Joined:
    Sep 3, 2006
    Messages:
    1,601
    Likes Received:
    24
    Haha, I have process explorer as well, forgot about it.
     
  17. Taza

    Taza Weird Modmaker Veteran

    Joined:
    Oct 23, 2002
    Messages:
    1,447
    Likes Received:
    25
    For Linux... I mostly use dd and gzip. See Eraser for windows for one tool that must go with them if you plan on making disk images.

    But, on my actual linux boxes, evince, firefox, irssi, totem

    CCleaner
    Eraser portable (I used original Eraser, but Eraser portable stops Eraser's very annoying habit of adding useless context menu entries)
    Firefox
    GIMP - image editing
    IrfanView - image viewing
    Areca - backups
    TrueCrypt - making said backups encrypted
    DosBox
    Audacity - audio editing
    VLC - video playing
    foobar2000 - music playing
     
  18. Kitrax

    Kitrax Pantaloons are supposed to go where!?!?

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2002
    Messages:
    7,899
    Media:
    74
    Likes Received:
    96
    Gender:
    Male
    Duh...backups! I knew I was forgetting something...

    I use SyncBack for my backups. Very nice little program that one. :thumb:
     
  19. Stu Gems: 20/31
    Latest gem: Garnet


    Joined:
    Apr 13, 2003
    Messages:
    1,206
    Likes Received:
    5
    Auto Hotkey
    lets you create small scripts and hotkeys - for example I have all my numpad keys assigned to various folders/shortcuts, and I have a few key sequences set to insert my address or email.

    Folder Size
    shell extension for explorer which allows you to view the size of folders and not just files. Can't really work without this one

    Keynote
    Notepad with a tree-file structure - very useful for jotting down quick notes or organising stuff for in the messy research phase of an assignment.

    Word Web
    light dictionary tool - just highlight or click on a word to get the definition, synonym, or (if you're online) the wikipaedia article.

    MS power toys calculator and TweakUI
    the calculator is just an improvement on the original. Tweak UI can be good for changing the appearance of a few things in windows xp.

    Also everything on Taza's list is awesome
     
  20. Ragusa

    Ragusa Eternal Halfling Paladin Veteran

    Joined:
    Nov 26, 2000
    Messages:
    10,140
    Media:
    63
    Likes Received:
    250
    Gender:
    Male
    Komodo Edit (because it uses standard UNIX type regular expressions)
    File Edit (because it has a built in case sensitive duplicate deletion function, and can sort lines in a .txt file alphabetically)
    Python 3.1 (because I'm a newbie to programming)

    FreeMind
    OpenOffice
    Scribus

    Shiretoko 64bit Firefox 'Minefield' version. Sadly, Adobe so far has chosen not to provide a 64bit Flash Player
     
Sorcerer's Place is a project run entirely by fans and for fans. Maintaining Sorcerer's Place and a stable environment for all our hosted sites requires a substantial amount of our time and funds on a regular basis, so please consider supporting us to keep the site up & running smoothly. Thank you!

Sorcerers.net is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to products on amazon.com, amazon.ca and amazon.co.uk. Amazon and the Amazon logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates.