Useful Apps thread

[Dan]

Post all the applications which you find useful here. Ideally they should be freeware.

Adobe Reader SpeedUp

Adobe Reader SpeedUp is a simple application that was created to help make the loading time of Adobe's Acrobat/Reader software bearable for everyday use. AR SpeedUp only needs to be used once (a process taking only a few seconds) and then your 'Reader will be transformed forever. There are also some tweaking options available. "w00t!", as the young kids say.

Microsoft PowerToys for Windows XP

The following tools are available from the link above.

Open Command Window Here
This PowerToy adds an "Open Command Window Here" context menu option on file system folders, giving you a quick way to open a command window (cmd.exe) pointing at the selected folder.

Alt-Tab Replacement
With this PowerToy, in addition to seeing the icon of the application window you are switching to, you will also see a preview of the page. This helps particularly when multiple sessions of an application are open.

Tweak UI
This PowerToy gives you access to system settings that are not exposed in the Windows XP default user interface, including mouse settings, Explorer settings, taskbar settings, and more.

Version 2.10 requires Windows XP Service Pack 1 or Windows Server 2003.

Power Calculator
With this PowerToy you can graph and evaluate functions as well as perform many different types of conversions.

Image Resizer
This PowerToy enables you to resize one or many image files with a right-click.

CD Slide Show Generator
With this PowerToy you can view images burned to a CD as a slide show. The Generator works downlevel on Windows 9x machines as well.

Virtual Desktop Manager
Manage up to four desktops from the Windows taskbar with this PowerToy.

Taskbar Magnifier
Use this PowerToy to magnify part of the screen from the taskbar.

Webcam Timershot
This PowerToy lets you take pictures at specified time intervals from a Webcam connected to your computer and save them to a location that you designate.

Coolmon

CoolMon is a program for monitoring vital system stats and almost anything else you wish to display on the desktop. It can also display stats from remote pc's and publish real-time stats on a webpage. The application can display CPU, RAM and page file usage, hard drive usage, MotherBoard Monitor temperatures and fan speeds, various network stats and much, much more.

Motherboard Monitor

Motherboard Monitor is a tool that monitors fan speeds, temperatures, voltages and more. In addition, it provides detailed system information about your chip and memory. It also includes an alarm features that can send e-mail alerts, initiate an FTP transfer or even send a pager message if conditions exceed the user defined condition.

SmartFTP - free ftp program

XP Administrator password reset tool - can reset the admin password of a PC running NT, 2000 and XP.

[vulture]

Winrar (zip utility)

TightVNC (remote access to PC)

Filezilla (ftp client)

Firefox (web browser)

Thunderbird (email client)

[Guest 3533]

Crimsion Editor General text editor/ide, can support any syntax!
Cooktop XML etc editor.
Visual Studio 2005 Express Free versions of C#, VB.NET, SQL Server Express...in beta right now.
GrabIT Free and the best binary usenet reader.
ID3-TagIt Free and the best MP3 Tag editor.
SysInternals Lots of free nerdy type diagnostic and information tools.
CDeX Free cd Ripper
REMOVED - Can't post that here!
ACDSee Classic Not free, but one of the best picture organizations.

That'll do for now
oh and my homepage has some free utilities on it too...(most) feedback appreciated

[jarbalan]

foobar2000

Foobar2000 is an advanced audio player for the Windows platform. Some of the basic features include ReplayGain support, low memory footprint and native support for several popular audio formats.

Proxomitron

For those who have not yet been introduced, meet the Proxomitron: a free, highly flexible, user-configurable, small but very powerful, local HTTP web-filtering proxy.

PDFCreator

PDFCreator easily creates PDFs from any Windows program. Use it like a printer in Word, StarCalc or any other Windows application.

7-Zip

7-Zip is a file archiver with highest compression ratio.

HTTrack Website Copier

HTTrack is a free (GPL, libre/free software) and easy-to-use offline browser utility.

Nvu

Finally! A complete Web Authoring System for Linux Desktop users as well as Microsoft Windows users to rival programs like FrontPage and Dreamweaver.

Media Player Classic - Audio/Video Player
OpenOffice - Office Suite

[Guest 44186]

VLC Media Player

Plays just about anything you throw at it. A handy feature is being able to view media files before they're fully downloaded.

[compa]

This site as a set of apps to cover recovery of deleted files from camera memory cards to hard discs it saved me grief after losing jpegs on a XD memory card.

PC Inspector

[Guest 10877]

Treesize
Hard disk usage viewer jobby.
Winimage
Windows 2000 Support Tools
Ultimate Boot CD
Loads of handy utilities on a bootable CD
SmartPar
Google Toolbar

[KeyserSoze]

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

VLC Media Player

Plays just about anything you throw at it. A handy feature is being able to view media files before they're fully downloaded.

does it decode DD5.1 and DTS properly ?

[Guest 44186]

Originally Posted by KeyserSoze

does it decode DD5.1 and DTS properly ?

I honestly don't know. I only know that it plays back files as they're downloading. Files like .bin and .rar
There's an FAQ on their website but I haven't read it properly to find your answer.

EDIT:
It has AC3 and DTS codecs built in so it seems

[Guest 30887]

My essentials not mentioned yet:

IrfanView - incredibly quick image viewer and batch processor (freeware)

qTag - best batch MP3 tagger/renamer I've found, especially if there's no names at all as it can grab info from freedb ($17 shareware)

EAC - best CD ripping software (freeware)

LAME windows binaries - for MP3 encoding (GPL I think)

dBpowerAMP Music Converter - for converting between compressed music formats keeping the tags intact. Rips CDs too. (free)

DigiGuide - UK TV listings (subscription required)

FeedReader - for RSS feeds (GPL)

Crazy Browser - best tabbed, popup blocking browser - uses the IE engine so no problems on poorly-supported sites (free)

BSPlayer - fantastic video player (free for non-commercial use)

Sequoia View - does similar job to TreeSpace, but presents it differently with treemaps (free)

Renamer Fairy for quickly and easily renaming lots of files (free)

[Guest 17778]

IE Spell - Spell check program for the forum boxes. Now there is no excuse to get spelling wrong in the forums

[MetalGearAl]

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

VLC Media Player

Plays just about anything you throw at it. A handy feature is being able to view media files before they're fully downloaded.

Bet it ain't a patch on BS Player

Originally Posted by raymondlin

IE Spell - Spell check program for the forum boxes. Now there is no excuse to get spelling wrong in the forums

If you're an IE-monkey that is..

[Guest 19825]

Here's a few more .....

DU Meter - DU Meter is an award winning utility from Hagel Technologies that provides an accurate account of the data which is flowing through your computer's network connection at any given moment. This readout is presented in both numerical and graphical format, in real time. DU Meter includes extensive logging facility, flexible events system, and more. DU Meter works with virtually all types of network connections: phone modems, DSL, cable modem, LAN, satellite, and more.

PopTray - PopTray is a full-featured, easy-to-use, customizable, e-mail notifier.

DVD Genie - DVD Genie is a DVD Tweaking and Enhancement tool. It allows you to enable many undocumented or hard to find options through a simple and easy to use user interface. It also lets you switch regions on RPC-1 drives.

TextPad - TextPad® 4.7.3 is a powerful, general purpose editor for plain text files. Easy to use, with all the features a power user requires.

ABI-Coder - ABI- CODER is a personal file encryption software that is powerful, yet extremely easy to use. It allows you to encrypt multiple files in multiple folders by using one of its 3 encryption algorithms. This software also has a self-decrypting file tool, which can create encrypted files, which do not require any decryption software. ABI- CODER currently features the following encryption algorithms:
448 bit Blowfish encryption algorithm, 168 bit 3DES encryption algorithm, 256 bit AES encryption algorithm.

Goldwave - GoldWave is a top rated, professional digital audio editor. It contains so many great features, you will be amazed by all the things it can do.

Intel Application Accelerator - The Intel® Application Accelerator is a software package that replaces the ATA drivers that come with Windows with drivers optimized for desktop PCs using select Intel® chipsets.

UK Phone Codes - A handy utility which sits in your system tray and can lookup the location from a telephone number and vice versa.

[kiran_mk2]

http://www.stardock.com/ - add an apple style docking bar to your desktop

http://www.samurize.com - More system stats/news/weather/tv listings on your desktop

Speedfan - Monitor system temperatures and slow fans down to quieten your system

AMPsoft - Home of Winoff - a sleep timer for Windows (can turn off, hibernate, log off, hang up modem etc at a time you set)

CPU-Z - tells you everything about your motherboard and CPU you could need

TMPGEnc - Freeware videoencoder - turn AVIs to MPEGs

PowerTab - Brilliant guitar Tab program that will play your tabs

[DM]

Quadsuck Great for downloading pages of porn images. Hands free!

[Refrenz]

Desktop Sidebar
GT Ripple
XP Anti-Spy
NetLimiter
Zoom Player
Quicktime Alternative

[Guest 33684]

Originally Posted by MetalGearAl

Bet it ain't a patch on BS Player

I should ask you to put some money up first. But you would only lose it VideoLan is superior to BSPlayer. Though BSPlayer is a good player in itself. As far as VideoLan is concerned, if the file you point it at contains a media file - it plays it.

[Guest 23274]

Gimp 2

Free image manipulation software - loads of features

[Guest 23274]

Originally Posted by raymondlin

IE Spell - Spell check program for the forum boxes. Now there is no excuse to get spelling wrong in the forums

cool, I've been looking for that

DVD Profiler

Keep track of your entire DVD collection

DVD Profiler can manage any size collection. Extensive data collection, filtering and reporting features specific to DVD, and unique to DVD Profiler.

Put simply, DVD Profiler is the best way to track your DVD addiction!

Belarc Advisor

The Belarc Advisor builds a detailed profile of your installed software and hardware, including Microsoft Hotfixes, and displays the results in your Web browser. All of your PC profile information is kept private on your PC and is not sent to any web server.

Avast

Free antivirus software - free virus protection for home PC

Zone Alarm

ZoneAlarm Security Suite protects against hackers, viruses, worms, identity theft, security breaches via instant messaging "holes," access to offensive Web content, and more—all in one easy-to-use, yet powerful package

Add a button

Why download and run an extra launch bar when you can use AddaButton to add "launch" buttons directly to Internet Explorer's own toolbar? Enjoy convenient access to any program or document directly from I.E.'s toolbar while browsing the web via custom buttons that you design. These buttons use absolutely no additional system resources or desktop space.

Legacy Family Tree

The full-featured professional genealogy program that helps you track, organize, print, and share your family history. Includes sourcing, reports, merging, To Do list, slide shows, multimedia, Web pages, spell checking, import and export and much more. And, it's free!