This will be a running list of great computer programs that I have across in my time on the computer and working with computers, all of which are completely free of charge. Feel free to use any from this list, and feel free to add to this list.
(Click on the name to go to the download location.)
Last Edited: October 27, 2010
PC Protection
Ad-Aware - While I've actually grown to dislike this program as it progresses, it is still a very good tool for catching spyware, and removing spyware from your computer. The biggest gripe I have with it is that it USED to be simple to use, and now it's a little more intrusive, and a little less easy to use. Nonetheless, it is still a very good spyware protection program.
AVG - This is, in my opinion, the best free anti-virus protection on the Internet. I have never had a problem with AVG, and I have caught many many possible threats with it. I put it on every computer I work on.
HijackThis! - This is another spyware removal tool, but in a slightly different way. Running HijackThis creates a text file of all the stuff on your computer, and allows one to go through and see which stuff should not be there, and then go in and remove it manually. Unlike Ad-Aware or Spybot, it doesn't check against a list of known spywares, it just scans your computer to show what is there and what should be there. Unless you are very skilled, you would usually then take it to tech forum, and post your HijackThis and there will usually be tech experts to help you clean up what shouldn't be there.
Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware - I've only used this program twice, I believe, but each time it did something my anti-virus and spyware removal programs couldn't, and that's get rid of a couple nasty bugs. I've never used this as a primary removal tool, but it has never failed me as a secondary one. If you have something wrong with your computer, but you can't figure out what, try this program.
Microsoft Security Essentials - Some people may be surprised that Microsoft would bother to put out an anti-virus program. More people may be surprised that they provide it for free. But what people would be most surprised about is the fact that it works GREAT. This is a good program. I've been an avid AVG user for years, but more and more I'm turning away from AVG (due to its bulk and annoying ads) and turning to MSE. It's a good program, and for people concerned about Microsoft providing computer safety, do some research online. More and more security experts are praising Microsoft as being one of the leading companies dedicated to safety on the web. It's a good program, put out by a company concerned about safety.
PCTools Firewall Plus - A free firewall program. It can be a little annoying at first, but once you kind of guide it on what you will allow and not allow, then you hardly notice it's there, and it helps protect your computer.
Spybot Search and Destroy - The spyware removal tool I use most. It is as fast of a removal tool that I have found, and usually can get the job done. It also has a resident shield, which can prevent spyware from getting on your computer in the first place. I usually don't use the shield, so I can't vouch for its effectiveness.
Windows Steady State - This remarkable program is a free alternative to the popular "Deep Freeze". What this program does, for those who aren't familiar, is protect parts of your computer to prevent people doing things to your computer you do not want them to. You can set up Windows User profiles, and then restrict the things those profiles can do. A couple of examples is preventing a user from adding a file to the desktop, or prevent them from changing settings in Internet Explorer.
While that function is interesting and useful, there's a far better use for Steady State. With Steady State you can have the program take an "image" of your computer at any time, and then keep that image in it's memory. Then, every time you reboot the computer, you can have it restore the computer to the same condition it was in. You could intentionally download viruses on your machine, restart the computer, and the viruses would be found nowhere. Of course, neither would any documents you saved to your computer, so make sure you save those to a flash drive.
You can also set it to restore the computer to where you had it at any date you choose. This is SO very helpful when working with people who are not good with computers, and tend to attract viruses and spyware. Just make sure to save your personal documents to a storage drive, and you'll never have to worry about viruses infecting your computer again.
PC Tools
Adobe Reader - A free program every computer should have, and probably does. You will need this to read .pdf files.
Belarc Advisor - This AWESOME tool I just learned about a couple weeks ago. If you download and install the program, and then run the program, it will actually display to you everything about your computer. For example, it will tell you your computer model, your processor and speed, how much memory you have, how big your hard drive is and how much free space is left, and all the devices on your computer. It will also show you all the updates you've downloaded from Microsoft and what updates you need to download, as well as all the software you currently have on your computer. I love this program, and it comes in handy when you're trying to work on your system.
CloneZilla - This is an easy to use Linux based version of the Ghost software. What you can do is have the program take a snapshot of your entire computer, compress it into a file, called an image, and then store that image for as long as you want. If your computer ever freaks out on you, you can just reload that image back onto your computer, and your computer will be just like it was when you used CloneZilla. It's a combination of the System Restore and System Recovery mechanisms...it removes everything on your computer (including viruses, spyware, etc.) and lets you restore your computer like the System Recovery, but it lets you restore it to the point you took the image, like System Restore. It's very handy.
It's also very handy if you buy several of the same kind of machines, and only want to set up one of them. Just set up one machine, and then CloneZilla the others.
Crucial.com - I find this site works best in Internet Explorer. If you go to this site, and click on "Crucial System Scanner", it will tell you how much RAM memory you have in your computer, what kind of RAM you use (for example, mine is DDR PC2-6400 memory), how many slots your computer holds to have memory, how many slots you have free, and the maximum amount of memory each slot will hold. If you want to speed up your computer to keep it from lagging, buy more memory. If you want to know what memory to buy, use Crucial.com.
Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) - If you have ever been scared to throw away or sell your computer, fear no longer. DBAN is a program that will "zero fill" (a.k.a. completely wipe) your hard drive so there is no way your data can be recovered. It takes you hard drive and literally puts a 0 on every possible spot on the hard drive, overwriting every piece of data on it. Additionally, it can overwrite all the data MULTIPLE times, even going passed what is considered military grade deletion. DBAN is great when your hard drive is giving you trouble, or when you want to make sure no one can ever steal your data.
Be aware: DBAN is NOT to be used lightly. Only use it if you are SURE you want to delete everything on your hard drive. Because once DBAN works its magic, there is nothing left. It's like setting off a nuclear bomb inside a telephone booth.
EasyCleaner - This is a very small, but very powerful and very helpful program. Easy Cleaner has several different options where it can run through various parts of your computer and clean out the unneccessary stuff, free up space and helping your computer run faster. It has a good registry checker, as well as a good startup checker. It deletes cookies and temp internet files, as well as unnecessary hard drive files. The best part about it is that whenever it makes system changes, it also backs up your computer, so if something goes bad, you can always retrieve it. Very handy program.
Knoppix - This is a program that EVERY computer user should have in his or her arsenal. No matter how careful we are with our computers, something will go wrong eventually. And then how can we ever get all of our personal files off the machine? Well, that's where Knoppix comes in. Knoppix, a Linux based software, boots as a Live CD (meaning the entire operating system is contained on the CD, and the computer runs from the CD), but what is really nice about Knoppix is that it recognizes your hard drive and displays it very easily. So, if your computer messes up and you can't get it to load, pop in the Knoppix CD or DVD, boot it, and then retrieve all of the files you wish to backup and place them on a flash drive. It is really that simple.
Please note: The first time I used this program, it kept locking up on me. However, Knoppix has what are called "cheat codes" which you can use to alter the way the software boots. If you load your machine, and it freezes right when you get the display, you may try doing the following: At the "boot:" screen, type "knoppix no3d". This tells Knoppix to load, but without the Compiz 3D software. This has fixed my problem on three different computers. Be quick though, the boot screen flashes by quickly.
Microsoft Office 2007 Add-In - .pdf - A .pdf file is a very useful file extension, in that it is easy to create by scanning images, or if you have a text document you don't want altered. This add-in from Microsoft allows those with Office 2007 to create a .pdf file from Office. It is a very small download, but very handy to have if you want to create .pdf documents.
Ubit - Do you have Microsoft Office 2007? Do you hate the new ribbon system Office 2007 uses, where it seems that everything is much harder to find? Then install this handy little tool. It is a small plugin, but when it is installed, it will create another item on your toolbar called "Menu". If you hover over the Menu item, beneath will be the old Microsoft layout, where everything is categorized just like it was in previous versions of Office. Now you can find everything the way you always did before. This comes highly recommended for anyone who uses Microsoft Office 2007, but hates the new layout.
Virtual PC 2007 - Have you ever wanted to test a different operating system, but didn't want to get rid of the one you had? Have you ever wanted to try working with Linux, but are afraid to lose Windows? Then Virtual PC 2007 to the rescue. Virtual PC literally does just that; it creates a virtual computer inside your current one, so you can run a new operating system. And what's really nice about it, it that not only is it free, it is also fairly simple to use and has compatibility with most "guest" operating systems (a guest operating system is the one you install the virtual machine). Virtual PC 2007 and the more publicized VirtualBox (which I will discuss in the future) both do basically the same thing, but Virtual PC 2007 is probably easier to get set up for new users.
Internet and Development
Apache - Have you ever wanted to try hosting your own web site? Ever wanted to run different programs, maybe even your own message board, just to play around? To do that, you will need to set up a web server on your machine. In my opinion, Apache is a very easy web server to set up and configure. When it comes to tech stuff, I'm certainly not dumb, but I didn't know anything about web servers. But, I installed Apache, worked through it, and I can now host my own web site, as well as my own vBulletin forum. While it's not anything important, it can be fun to play with.
Arachnophilia - I'm sure there are plenty of HTML editors out there, but this is the one I have used for nearly 10 years now. Arachnophilia is a program that provides you the ability to have proper HTML code, just by hitting certain functions in the program, leaving you nothing to do but to actually create the content of the web page. Arachnophilia does all the work for you, you just have to decide what you want on it.
FileZilla - A very popular, and useful, FTP client. What an FTP client does is it allows your to connect to a web server to upload files to be put on the Internet. For example, if I were to have rights to work on the Wrestlezone.com web site, I could create a web page on my machine, and then connect to the Wrestlezone web server, and upload my web page to the web server using FileZilla. It's very easy to use...assuming you have rights to upload to a web server.
Firefox w/ Adblock - In my opinion, one of the best ways to protect one's computer is to use Firefox w/ Adblock as one's exclusive Internet Browser. Firefox is a far superior browser to Internet Explorer (and Opera and Safari, in my opinion), in that it is much more secure, with less bugs in it. Plus, since Firefox is "open source" (which means anyone can work on the code to Firefox), Firefox vulnerabilities are usually fixed MUCH sooner than similar holes in Internet Explorer. Firefox also supports add-ons, which can customize your web browser. Firefox is a much superior browser, in my opinion.
Ad-block Plus is an add-on to Firefox, that you can use to prevent ads from displaying on web pages, or from popping up on your computer. In this post, I have demonstrated the difference from opening Wrestlezone's main page with Internet Explorer, and with Firefox using Ad-block Plus. You'll notice NONE of the ads from Internet Explorer show up in Firefox. Very handy.
Kompozer - Kompozer is a "What You See Is What You Get" or "WYSIWYG" HTML editor. What this means is that, using this program, you can create a web page simply by typing and adding colors and pictures whereever you want, without ever having to worry about creating HTML code. Kompozer does everything for you. Many people have heard of Frontpage, well, this program is just like Frontpage...except it's free. Very easy to use, and if you've ever been interested in creating web pages, but you just didn't know how, download this program, and you'll be creating web pages in no time.
MySQL - I'm going to cheat on this one, and quote Wikipedia, since it explains it better than I can...
phpBB forums - A phpBB forum is free forum software which anyone can download and install themselves. In order to install it, you'll need to have a web server set up, with MySQL and PHP installed, all free components. Apache and MySQL are both mentioned in the list of programs. But anyways, you can set it up and learn how to work forum software on your own time and learn the ways you can work a forum, including how to modify it.
It's not vBulletin, like we use here, but it's not bad for free software.
Enjoyable Programs
DOSBox - Computers these days run at the speed of lightening. We have quad core processors with multi-threading possibilities, RAM that an be expaned into the double digits, Blu-Ray burners built into our computer...computers are so amazing. But what's really amazing is that no matter how great our computers get, we still long for those games released back when a good hard drive had 64 megabytes of hard drive space. We miss those 4 and 8 bit graphics games, games released 20 years ago for MS-Dos.
Well, this is where DOSBox comes in. DOSBox acts as a virtual MS-DOS machine. With this, you can play games from 20 years ago that you loved as a child, but thought you would never have the opportunity to play again. It can be a little tricky to learn how to use at first, but with just a few minutes of learning, you can have those old school games up and running in no time. I use this all the time to play the old Gold Box Dungeon and Dragons games from my childhood. And I still kick ass at them.
DVD Decryptor or ImgBurn - ImgBurn is the updated version of DVD Decryptor. What this program does is rip information from a DVD disc and puts it on your computer. For example, if I rented the movie "Shawshank Redemption", and wanted to burn a copy for myself, I would use this program to rip the movie from the DVD to have on my computer. This is, of course, technically illegal, but you know how that goes. This program will only burn decrypt the movie to put it on your computer, to burn it to a DVD you'll need a program like DVD Shrink.
DVD Shrink - This will take files and create a DVD. So, using the Shawshank Redemption example from before, after I ripped the movie to my computer, I can now use DVD Shrink to take those ripped files and put them on a blank DVD. Usually, you will want to use DVD-R is you wish to burn movies to play on DVD players.
Extreme Warfare Revenge - As wrestling fans, I'm sure most of us have heard of this game, but if not, shame on you. This is what the GM Mode in the Smackdown vs. Raw games tried to (pitifully, I might add) aspire to. The game is entirely text based (meaning you won't see wrestlers fight), but don't let that dissuade you. When you start, you get to take over ANY wrestling company in North America, and become the GM of the company. You book matches, book shows, hire and fire wrestlers, hire and fire staff like writers, referees, announcers, etc., create tag teams, make deals with sponsors, create TV deals, etc. Every facet of a wrestling company is yours to do with as you will. However, if you do a bad job, you can get fired.
Additionally, people are ALWAYS creating "scenarios" to be used with EWR. A scenario will take you to a certain time and place and give you that times feel. So, for example, if you had an "80s Scenario" then you could select wrestling companies like Mid-Atlantic wrestling, WWF, AWA, etc. You could work with wrestlers like Andre the Giant, Hulk Hogan, Magnum TA, Arn Anderson, Greg Gagne, Rick Martel, etc. Or, there might be a scenario for this month, which will give you rosters as they are currently (the original rosters are now several years old). Scenarios are done by independent people, so the quality of them will vary, but you can usually figure out which ones are good, and which ones aren't. This is a very impressive game, and if you are a wrestling fan, you should at least give it a shot.
GIMP/GIMPShop - This is a very powerful Adobe Photoshop alternative. For those people who have never had an imaging program, GIMP/GIMPShop provides a chance (for free, of course) to let everyone have a chance to manipulate images and do what they want with them. Everyone on the site could be a sig maker if you wanted. GIMPShop is the same thing as GIMP, except it's layed out in a format similar to Photoshop, and not GIMP. This comes highly recommended to people with no money who like to mess with graphics.
MSN Messenger - I doubt I need to describe this one, but basically it's an instant messaging tool. Yeah, everyone knows this one.
Open Office - This is the free alternative to Microsoft Office. There are a couple programs in MS Office that don't show up in Open Office, but for basic spreadsheet and word processing, this set of programs is very good...because it's very free. Instead of paying hundreds of dollars for MS Office, you can use Open Office for free and get all the same perks. Like Firefox, Open Office is "open source" so there are always customizations out there for it.
Pidgin - This program is an all-in-one Instant Messaging system. It will allow you to sign on to all of your messenger accounts, including Yahoo, MSN, AIM, ICQ, etc. all in the same program. No more having to open 5 different messengers to talk to all of your friends, you can do it all in one program. Additionally, this program is available for both Linux and Windows operating systems (and probably Macs too, but Mac users don't count), and is fairly lightweight and easy to use. You won't get all the bells and whistles, but for those of us who, *gasp*, use Instant Messaging to Instant Message, it's a very good program.
ROMs/Emulators - Many gamers think back to the old days of when they were little playing their old systems and games. And Emulator will give you, once again, a chance to play those old games. An Emulator is a computer program which acts like a gaming system. For example, a Nintendo Emulator will give you the ability to play Nintendo game files. However, to play these old games, you will need to download the game ROM. So, if I wanted to play Super Mario Bros. Nintendo version, I would download a Nintendo Emulator, and a Super Mario Bros. ROM. If you visit the link, and just try working with it, it's very easy to understand...and very fun to relive the classics.
uTorrent - This free program allows you to download torrent files from the web. A torrent is a type of download that can allow you to download large files easily. For example, if you use Napster to download AC/DC's song Rock N' Roll Train, you could use a torrent to download the entire Black Ice album. There are plenty of torrent sites around the net (like isohunt.com, for example), where you can download programs, games, movies, albums, etc. to put on your computer. And all of it is peer to peer downloading, so when you download, you are actually downloading from someone's computer, not from a server. This provides more privacy. However, after you download a torrent, always run a virus scan, just to be safe. uTorrent is a program that lets you download torrents and manage them.
YouTube Downloader - Ever see a video on YouTube you just had to have? Download this program. All you have to do is enter the URL of the Youtube video into the software, and it will download the video to your computer. From there, you can convert the video to different formats, or just rip the audio from the video if that's all you want. Very handy, very useful, very small file size...and very free.
Linux Distro
CactiEZ - This one is more for the tech geeks out there. CactiEZ is a Linux distro that comes with the famously infamous Cacti program already set up and ready to go. It is a CentOS based distro with Cacti already prepared and running for you. And if you are not aware of what Cacti is, in brief, it is a network monitoring program. CactiEZ can also be used as a server itself, if I'm not mistaken. I've only just started working with it.
FreeNAS - FreeNAS is a BSD Unix operating system, which serves as a file server on a network. Do you have an old computer machine just lying around, with no one ever using it because it is too old? Put that baby back to use. Install FreeNAS on it, and set it next to your router. Once it is set up, everyone on your home network can store their files on it, and access those files on any other machine in the house. Additionally, by storing all of your files (Word documents, music, videos, etc.) on the FreeNAS file server, you save room on your personal computer's hard drive, which will not only leave you more room for programs and games, but also make your computer run a little bit quicker. The best thing about this operating system is that, like many Unix systems, the hardware requirements to make it work are FAR less than what it takes to run a new operating system like Windows 7. For example, I have my FreeNAS set up on a machine that was considered "middle of the line"...seven years ago.
Awesome program, and one that everyone with an unused machine should use.
OpenSUSE 11.x - While I'm not exactly a Linux expert by any means, I've been working a lot with the OpenSUSE Linux product lately, in particular Novell Linux Desktop 9, and OpenSUSE 11.1. And I have to say I've been VERY impressed with it. I haven't tried a Windows emulator yet, but I am extremely happy with how easy it has been to learn the basics of the operating system. OpenSUSE 11 is incredibly gorgeous to look at, and best of all, it's free. It's very easy to install, and you can use it to shrink your Windows partition and and install the Linux system on the hard drive, making it so you can use either Windows or the Linux, which is very nice when you're installing for the first time. Highly recommended operating system, especially for people with older computers who don't want to buy new machines.
Remote Administration
iTALC - This free program is actually quite wonderful, but only if you have multiple computers on your network. If there is only one computer attached to your network (home or business), then don't waste your time on this program. What iTALC will do is allow the administrator of a network to remotely view, access and control every workstation on his network by installing the software on the client. For example, let's say my computer was the "boss" computer, and I have 4 other computers I leave on, or are family member computers. I install the Administrator software on my machine, and the client software on everyone else's machine. I can then open my program and watch, in real time, what the other people are doing on their computers. Perhaps I'm upstairs, and someone downstairs wants me to fix a problem. "No problem", I say. Instead of getting out of my comfortable bed, I just remotely access the problem computer and work on it, like it was my own machine.
This is a very cool program, and a VERY great tool for business networks, or if you just like spying on people.
Ultra VNC (Virtual Network Computing) - This program is a DREAM when you're like me...you have several computers, and they're not all close together. Or, better yet, when you have to help people with their computers, and you need to check your computer to figure out what's wrong with theirs.
What VNC will allow you to do is to remotely sign into your computer at home (or any computer that you know the IP and password for), and allow you to browse that computer from the one you are on. It's like you're hacking your own computer and controlling it from whatever computer you want to control it from. Say your home is in LA, and you're vacationing in New York, and you left a list at home...you can just VNC into your computer and bring up that list. You literally can control your computer from anywhere you are. Not only is it useful, it's extremely cool.
Video Players
VLC - Several other people have mentioned this, and I'm upset that I forgot it. Generally people will use either Windows Media Player, Quicktime or RealPlayer to run the videos they wish to view. However, sometimes those players can't display those videos, for a variety of reasons. For example, Windows Media Player, by default, doesn't play .flv files. So, whenever you find a file you can't play, use VLC. There has yet to be a file that I have not been able to watch with VLC. It's a very small file to install, and very easy on system memory..but very very awesome.
That is all for now. I will update this list as I think of, or come across, more. If you have any questions, or wish to add programs to the list, feel free to post in this thread.
(Click on the name to go to the download location.)
Last Edited: October 27, 2010
PC Protection
Ad-Aware - While I've actually grown to dislike this program as it progresses, it is still a very good tool for catching spyware, and removing spyware from your computer. The biggest gripe I have with it is that it USED to be simple to use, and now it's a little more intrusive, and a little less easy to use. Nonetheless, it is still a very good spyware protection program.
AVG - This is, in my opinion, the best free anti-virus protection on the Internet. I have never had a problem with AVG, and I have caught many many possible threats with it. I put it on every computer I work on.
HijackThis! - This is another spyware removal tool, but in a slightly different way. Running HijackThis creates a text file of all the stuff on your computer, and allows one to go through and see which stuff should not be there, and then go in and remove it manually. Unlike Ad-Aware or Spybot, it doesn't check against a list of known spywares, it just scans your computer to show what is there and what should be there. Unless you are very skilled, you would usually then take it to tech forum, and post your HijackThis and there will usually be tech experts to help you clean up what shouldn't be there.
Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware - I've only used this program twice, I believe, but each time it did something my anti-virus and spyware removal programs couldn't, and that's get rid of a couple nasty bugs. I've never used this as a primary removal tool, but it has never failed me as a secondary one. If you have something wrong with your computer, but you can't figure out what, try this program.
Microsoft Security Essentials - Some people may be surprised that Microsoft would bother to put out an anti-virus program. More people may be surprised that they provide it for free. But what people would be most surprised about is the fact that it works GREAT. This is a good program. I've been an avid AVG user for years, but more and more I'm turning away from AVG (due to its bulk and annoying ads) and turning to MSE. It's a good program, and for people concerned about Microsoft providing computer safety, do some research online. More and more security experts are praising Microsoft as being one of the leading companies dedicated to safety on the web. It's a good program, put out by a company concerned about safety.
PCTools Firewall Plus - A free firewall program. It can be a little annoying at first, but once you kind of guide it on what you will allow and not allow, then you hardly notice it's there, and it helps protect your computer.
Spybot Search and Destroy - The spyware removal tool I use most. It is as fast of a removal tool that I have found, and usually can get the job done. It also has a resident shield, which can prevent spyware from getting on your computer in the first place. I usually don't use the shield, so I can't vouch for its effectiveness.
Windows Steady State - This remarkable program is a free alternative to the popular "Deep Freeze". What this program does, for those who aren't familiar, is protect parts of your computer to prevent people doing things to your computer you do not want them to. You can set up Windows User profiles, and then restrict the things those profiles can do. A couple of examples is preventing a user from adding a file to the desktop, or prevent them from changing settings in Internet Explorer.
While that function is interesting and useful, there's a far better use for Steady State. With Steady State you can have the program take an "image" of your computer at any time, and then keep that image in it's memory. Then, every time you reboot the computer, you can have it restore the computer to the same condition it was in. You could intentionally download viruses on your machine, restart the computer, and the viruses would be found nowhere. Of course, neither would any documents you saved to your computer, so make sure you save those to a flash drive.
You can also set it to restore the computer to where you had it at any date you choose. This is SO very helpful when working with people who are not good with computers, and tend to attract viruses and spyware. Just make sure to save your personal documents to a storage drive, and you'll never have to worry about viruses infecting your computer again.
PC Tools
Adobe Reader - A free program every computer should have, and probably does. You will need this to read .pdf files.
Belarc Advisor - This AWESOME tool I just learned about a couple weeks ago. If you download and install the program, and then run the program, it will actually display to you everything about your computer. For example, it will tell you your computer model, your processor and speed, how much memory you have, how big your hard drive is and how much free space is left, and all the devices on your computer. It will also show you all the updates you've downloaded from Microsoft and what updates you need to download, as well as all the software you currently have on your computer. I love this program, and it comes in handy when you're trying to work on your system.
CloneZilla - This is an easy to use Linux based version of the Ghost software. What you can do is have the program take a snapshot of your entire computer, compress it into a file, called an image, and then store that image for as long as you want. If your computer ever freaks out on you, you can just reload that image back onto your computer, and your computer will be just like it was when you used CloneZilla. It's a combination of the System Restore and System Recovery mechanisms...it removes everything on your computer (including viruses, spyware, etc.) and lets you restore your computer like the System Recovery, but it lets you restore it to the point you took the image, like System Restore. It's very handy.
It's also very handy if you buy several of the same kind of machines, and only want to set up one of them. Just set up one machine, and then CloneZilla the others.
Crucial.com - I find this site works best in Internet Explorer. If you go to this site, and click on "Crucial System Scanner", it will tell you how much RAM memory you have in your computer, what kind of RAM you use (for example, mine is DDR PC2-6400 memory), how many slots your computer holds to have memory, how many slots you have free, and the maximum amount of memory each slot will hold. If you want to speed up your computer to keep it from lagging, buy more memory. If you want to know what memory to buy, use Crucial.com.
Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) - If you have ever been scared to throw away or sell your computer, fear no longer. DBAN is a program that will "zero fill" (a.k.a. completely wipe) your hard drive so there is no way your data can be recovered. It takes you hard drive and literally puts a 0 on every possible spot on the hard drive, overwriting every piece of data on it. Additionally, it can overwrite all the data MULTIPLE times, even going passed what is considered military grade deletion. DBAN is great when your hard drive is giving you trouble, or when you want to make sure no one can ever steal your data.
Be aware: DBAN is NOT to be used lightly. Only use it if you are SURE you want to delete everything on your hard drive. Because once DBAN works its magic, there is nothing left. It's like setting off a nuclear bomb inside a telephone booth.
EasyCleaner - This is a very small, but very powerful and very helpful program. Easy Cleaner has several different options where it can run through various parts of your computer and clean out the unneccessary stuff, free up space and helping your computer run faster. It has a good registry checker, as well as a good startup checker. It deletes cookies and temp internet files, as well as unnecessary hard drive files. The best part about it is that whenever it makes system changes, it also backs up your computer, so if something goes bad, you can always retrieve it. Very handy program.
Knoppix - This is a program that EVERY computer user should have in his or her arsenal. No matter how careful we are with our computers, something will go wrong eventually. And then how can we ever get all of our personal files off the machine? Well, that's where Knoppix comes in. Knoppix, a Linux based software, boots as a Live CD (meaning the entire operating system is contained on the CD, and the computer runs from the CD), but what is really nice about Knoppix is that it recognizes your hard drive and displays it very easily. So, if your computer messes up and you can't get it to load, pop in the Knoppix CD or DVD, boot it, and then retrieve all of the files you wish to backup and place them on a flash drive. It is really that simple.
Please note: The first time I used this program, it kept locking up on me. However, Knoppix has what are called "cheat codes" which you can use to alter the way the software boots. If you load your machine, and it freezes right when you get the display, you may try doing the following: At the "boot:" screen, type "knoppix no3d". This tells Knoppix to load, but without the Compiz 3D software. This has fixed my problem on three different computers. Be quick though, the boot screen flashes by quickly.
Microsoft Office 2007 Add-In - .pdf - A .pdf file is a very useful file extension, in that it is easy to create by scanning images, or if you have a text document you don't want altered. This add-in from Microsoft allows those with Office 2007 to create a .pdf file from Office. It is a very small download, but very handy to have if you want to create .pdf documents.
Ubit - Do you have Microsoft Office 2007? Do you hate the new ribbon system Office 2007 uses, where it seems that everything is much harder to find? Then install this handy little tool. It is a small plugin, but when it is installed, it will create another item on your toolbar called "Menu". If you hover over the Menu item, beneath will be the old Microsoft layout, where everything is categorized just like it was in previous versions of Office. Now you can find everything the way you always did before. This comes highly recommended for anyone who uses Microsoft Office 2007, but hates the new layout.
Virtual PC 2007 - Have you ever wanted to test a different operating system, but didn't want to get rid of the one you had? Have you ever wanted to try working with Linux, but are afraid to lose Windows? Then Virtual PC 2007 to the rescue. Virtual PC literally does just that; it creates a virtual computer inside your current one, so you can run a new operating system. And what's really nice about it, it that not only is it free, it is also fairly simple to use and has compatibility with most "guest" operating systems (a guest operating system is the one you install the virtual machine). Virtual PC 2007 and the more publicized VirtualBox (which I will discuss in the future) both do basically the same thing, but Virtual PC 2007 is probably easier to get set up for new users.
Internet and Development
Apache - Have you ever wanted to try hosting your own web site? Ever wanted to run different programs, maybe even your own message board, just to play around? To do that, you will need to set up a web server on your machine. In my opinion, Apache is a very easy web server to set up and configure. When it comes to tech stuff, I'm certainly not dumb, but I didn't know anything about web servers. But, I installed Apache, worked through it, and I can now host my own web site, as well as my own vBulletin forum. While it's not anything important, it can be fun to play with.
Arachnophilia - I'm sure there are plenty of HTML editors out there, but this is the one I have used for nearly 10 years now. Arachnophilia is a program that provides you the ability to have proper HTML code, just by hitting certain functions in the program, leaving you nothing to do but to actually create the content of the web page. Arachnophilia does all the work for you, you just have to decide what you want on it.
FileZilla - A very popular, and useful, FTP client. What an FTP client does is it allows your to connect to a web server to upload files to be put on the Internet. For example, if I were to have rights to work on the Wrestlezone.com web site, I could create a web page on my machine, and then connect to the Wrestlezone web server, and upload my web page to the web server using FileZilla. It's very easy to use...assuming you have rights to upload to a web server.
Firefox w/ Adblock - In my opinion, one of the best ways to protect one's computer is to use Firefox w/ Adblock as one's exclusive Internet Browser. Firefox is a far superior browser to Internet Explorer (and Opera and Safari, in my opinion), in that it is much more secure, with less bugs in it. Plus, since Firefox is "open source" (which means anyone can work on the code to Firefox), Firefox vulnerabilities are usually fixed MUCH sooner than similar holes in Internet Explorer. Firefox also supports add-ons, which can customize your web browser. Firefox is a much superior browser, in my opinion.
Ad-block Plus is an add-on to Firefox, that you can use to prevent ads from displaying on web pages, or from popping up on your computer. In this post, I have demonstrated the difference from opening Wrestlezone's main page with Internet Explorer, and with Firefox using Ad-block Plus. You'll notice NONE of the ads from Internet Explorer show up in Firefox. Very handy.
Kompozer - Kompozer is a "What You See Is What You Get" or "WYSIWYG" HTML editor. What this means is that, using this program, you can create a web page simply by typing and adding colors and pictures whereever you want, without ever having to worry about creating HTML code. Kompozer does everything for you. Many people have heard of Frontpage, well, this program is just like Frontpage...except it's free. Very easy to use, and if you've ever been interested in creating web pages, but you just didn't know how, download this program, and you'll be creating web pages in no time.
MySQL - I'm going to cheat on this one, and quote Wikipedia, since it explains it better than I can...
Wikipedia said:
phpBB forums - A phpBB forum is free forum software which anyone can download and install themselves. In order to install it, you'll need to have a web server set up, with MySQL and PHP installed, all free components. Apache and MySQL are both mentioned in the list of programs. But anyways, you can set it up and learn how to work forum software on your own time and learn the ways you can work a forum, including how to modify it.
It's not vBulletin, like we use here, but it's not bad for free software.
Enjoyable Programs
DOSBox - Computers these days run at the speed of lightening. We have quad core processors with multi-threading possibilities, RAM that an be expaned into the double digits, Blu-Ray burners built into our computer...computers are so amazing. But what's really amazing is that no matter how great our computers get, we still long for those games released back when a good hard drive had 64 megabytes of hard drive space. We miss those 4 and 8 bit graphics games, games released 20 years ago for MS-Dos.
Well, this is where DOSBox comes in. DOSBox acts as a virtual MS-DOS machine. With this, you can play games from 20 years ago that you loved as a child, but thought you would never have the opportunity to play again. It can be a little tricky to learn how to use at first, but with just a few minutes of learning, you can have those old school games up and running in no time. I use this all the time to play the old Gold Box Dungeon and Dragons games from my childhood. And I still kick ass at them.
DVD Decryptor or ImgBurn - ImgBurn is the updated version of DVD Decryptor. What this program does is rip information from a DVD disc and puts it on your computer. For example, if I rented the movie "Shawshank Redemption", and wanted to burn a copy for myself, I would use this program to rip the movie from the DVD to have on my computer. This is, of course, technically illegal, but you know how that goes. This program will only burn decrypt the movie to put it on your computer, to burn it to a DVD you'll need a program like DVD Shrink.
DVD Shrink - This will take files and create a DVD. So, using the Shawshank Redemption example from before, after I ripped the movie to my computer, I can now use DVD Shrink to take those ripped files and put them on a blank DVD. Usually, you will want to use DVD-R is you wish to burn movies to play on DVD players.
Extreme Warfare Revenge - As wrestling fans, I'm sure most of us have heard of this game, but if not, shame on you. This is what the GM Mode in the Smackdown vs. Raw games tried to (pitifully, I might add) aspire to. The game is entirely text based (meaning you won't see wrestlers fight), but don't let that dissuade you. When you start, you get to take over ANY wrestling company in North America, and become the GM of the company. You book matches, book shows, hire and fire wrestlers, hire and fire staff like writers, referees, announcers, etc., create tag teams, make deals with sponsors, create TV deals, etc. Every facet of a wrestling company is yours to do with as you will. However, if you do a bad job, you can get fired.
Additionally, people are ALWAYS creating "scenarios" to be used with EWR. A scenario will take you to a certain time and place and give you that times feel. So, for example, if you had an "80s Scenario" then you could select wrestling companies like Mid-Atlantic wrestling, WWF, AWA, etc. You could work with wrestlers like Andre the Giant, Hulk Hogan, Magnum TA, Arn Anderson, Greg Gagne, Rick Martel, etc. Or, there might be a scenario for this month, which will give you rosters as they are currently (the original rosters are now several years old). Scenarios are done by independent people, so the quality of them will vary, but you can usually figure out which ones are good, and which ones aren't. This is a very impressive game, and if you are a wrestling fan, you should at least give it a shot.
GIMP/GIMPShop - This is a very powerful Adobe Photoshop alternative. For those people who have never had an imaging program, GIMP/GIMPShop provides a chance (for free, of course) to let everyone have a chance to manipulate images and do what they want with them. Everyone on the site could be a sig maker if you wanted. GIMPShop is the same thing as GIMP, except it's layed out in a format similar to Photoshop, and not GIMP. This comes highly recommended to people with no money who like to mess with graphics.
MSN Messenger - I doubt I need to describe this one, but basically it's an instant messaging tool. Yeah, everyone knows this one.
Open Office - This is the free alternative to Microsoft Office. There are a couple programs in MS Office that don't show up in Open Office, but for basic spreadsheet and word processing, this set of programs is very good...because it's very free. Instead of paying hundreds of dollars for MS Office, you can use Open Office for free and get all the same perks. Like Firefox, Open Office is "open source" so there are always customizations out there for it.
Pidgin - This program is an all-in-one Instant Messaging system. It will allow you to sign on to all of your messenger accounts, including Yahoo, MSN, AIM, ICQ, etc. all in the same program. No more having to open 5 different messengers to talk to all of your friends, you can do it all in one program. Additionally, this program is available for both Linux and Windows operating systems (and probably Macs too, but Mac users don't count), and is fairly lightweight and easy to use. You won't get all the bells and whistles, but for those of us who, *gasp*, use Instant Messaging to Instant Message, it's a very good program.
ROMs/Emulators - Many gamers think back to the old days of when they were little playing their old systems and games. And Emulator will give you, once again, a chance to play those old games. An Emulator is a computer program which acts like a gaming system. For example, a Nintendo Emulator will give you the ability to play Nintendo game files. However, to play these old games, you will need to download the game ROM. So, if I wanted to play Super Mario Bros. Nintendo version, I would download a Nintendo Emulator, and a Super Mario Bros. ROM. If you visit the link, and just try working with it, it's very easy to understand...and very fun to relive the classics.
uTorrent - This free program allows you to download torrent files from the web. A torrent is a type of download that can allow you to download large files easily. For example, if you use Napster to download AC/DC's song Rock N' Roll Train, you could use a torrent to download the entire Black Ice album. There are plenty of torrent sites around the net (like isohunt.com, for example), where you can download programs, games, movies, albums, etc. to put on your computer. And all of it is peer to peer downloading, so when you download, you are actually downloading from someone's computer, not from a server. This provides more privacy. However, after you download a torrent, always run a virus scan, just to be safe. uTorrent is a program that lets you download torrents and manage them.
YouTube Downloader - Ever see a video on YouTube you just had to have? Download this program. All you have to do is enter the URL of the Youtube video into the software, and it will download the video to your computer. From there, you can convert the video to different formats, or just rip the audio from the video if that's all you want. Very handy, very useful, very small file size...and very free.
Linux Distro
CactiEZ - This one is more for the tech geeks out there. CactiEZ is a Linux distro that comes with the famously infamous Cacti program already set up and ready to go. It is a CentOS based distro with Cacti already prepared and running for you. And if you are not aware of what Cacti is, in brief, it is a network monitoring program. CactiEZ can also be used as a server itself, if I'm not mistaken. I've only just started working with it.
FreeNAS - FreeNAS is a BSD Unix operating system, which serves as a file server on a network. Do you have an old computer machine just lying around, with no one ever using it because it is too old? Put that baby back to use. Install FreeNAS on it, and set it next to your router. Once it is set up, everyone on your home network can store their files on it, and access those files on any other machine in the house. Additionally, by storing all of your files (Word documents, music, videos, etc.) on the FreeNAS file server, you save room on your personal computer's hard drive, which will not only leave you more room for programs and games, but also make your computer run a little bit quicker. The best thing about this operating system is that, like many Unix systems, the hardware requirements to make it work are FAR less than what it takes to run a new operating system like Windows 7. For example, I have my FreeNAS set up on a machine that was considered "middle of the line"...seven years ago.
Awesome program, and one that everyone with an unused machine should use.
OpenSUSE 11.x - While I'm not exactly a Linux expert by any means, I've been working a lot with the OpenSUSE Linux product lately, in particular Novell Linux Desktop 9, and OpenSUSE 11.1. And I have to say I've been VERY impressed with it. I haven't tried a Windows emulator yet, but I am extremely happy with how easy it has been to learn the basics of the operating system. OpenSUSE 11 is incredibly gorgeous to look at, and best of all, it's free. It's very easy to install, and you can use it to shrink your Windows partition and and install the Linux system on the hard drive, making it so you can use either Windows or the Linux, which is very nice when you're installing for the first time. Highly recommended operating system, especially for people with older computers who don't want to buy new machines.
Remote Administration
iTALC - This free program is actually quite wonderful, but only if you have multiple computers on your network. If there is only one computer attached to your network (home or business), then don't waste your time on this program. What iTALC will do is allow the administrator of a network to remotely view, access and control every workstation on his network by installing the software on the client. For example, let's say my computer was the "boss" computer, and I have 4 other computers I leave on, or are family member computers. I install the Administrator software on my machine, and the client software on everyone else's machine. I can then open my program and watch, in real time, what the other people are doing on their computers. Perhaps I'm upstairs, and someone downstairs wants me to fix a problem. "No problem", I say. Instead of getting out of my comfortable bed, I just remotely access the problem computer and work on it, like it was my own machine.
This is a very cool program, and a VERY great tool for business networks, or if you just like spying on people.
Ultra VNC (Virtual Network Computing) - This program is a DREAM when you're like me...you have several computers, and they're not all close together. Or, better yet, when you have to help people with their computers, and you need to check your computer to figure out what's wrong with theirs.
What VNC will allow you to do is to remotely sign into your computer at home (or any computer that you know the IP and password for), and allow you to browse that computer from the one you are on. It's like you're hacking your own computer and controlling it from whatever computer you want to control it from. Say your home is in LA, and you're vacationing in New York, and you left a list at home...you can just VNC into your computer and bring up that list. You literally can control your computer from anywhere you are. Not only is it useful, it's extremely cool.
Video Players
VLC - Several other people have mentioned this, and I'm upset that I forgot it. Generally people will use either Windows Media Player, Quicktime or RealPlayer to run the videos they wish to view. However, sometimes those players can't display those videos, for a variety of reasons. For example, Windows Media Player, by default, doesn't play .flv files. So, whenever you find a file you can't play, use VLC. There has yet to be a file that I have not been able to watch with VLC. It's a very small file to install, and very easy on system memory..but very very awesome.
That is all for now. I will update this list as I think of, or come across, more. If you have any questions, or wish to add programs to the list, feel free to post in this thread.
) you'll definately want to download some audio/video codecs, possibly DivX as well.
