A few of the tools i like that haven't been mentioned yet

• ALZIP
  Compression utility which handles over 36 different compression formats
• Jdiskreport
  Provides a graphical and "drill-down" view of your disk usage. It also supports multiple ways to view your usage (e.g. by folder, by file type, ascending or descending order, top 50 file sizes, etc)
  
• FreeCommander
  Tired of trying to work back and forth between two different Explorer windows? Try a dual-pane view of your file/folders all within a single Window
  
• HDTune
  Very handy tool to help assess the health/performance of your drives
  
• VLC_Player
  Gotta have a copy of this portable multimedia player (which doesn't require you go searching for codecs) for playing
  • Various audio and video formats (MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, mp3, ogg, ...)
  • DVDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols
  • Unicast or multicast media streams received as IPv4 or IPv6 over a high speed network

And I'll add a few "of the more Geek-ish" tools

• RegShot
  Ever wish you could just see a “diff” between two different snapshots of your Windows registry?
• System Information Viewer
  We all like Everest, but System Information Viewer allows you to “drill-down” into your system to find lots of details and easily understand the relationships via a hierarchical drill-down view (The buttons in your SIV provide a "drill-down" or different view into your machine)
  
• Adapter Watch
  Keep an eye on your network adapters and their performance data
• BIOS Explorer
  If you ever feel like "crawling around" inside of your BIOS....
  

As the title suggests... a proper uninstaller !!...here is an amazing freebie, much better than m/s add/remove.. and actually clears the junk out of the registry afterwards, revo uninstaller

revo uninstaller YES! Good suggestion. Completely forgot about that one.

And welcome to TechSpot mushley!

Hope these have not been mentioned before..

Winrar and vlc media player.

Revo's got 3 fans then! (also forgot)

It has great options as to how picky it's supposed to be when searching for leftovers and it is clear where the files are situated, minimizing the risk of deleting something by mistake. Actually, I still haven't been offered to delete anything necessary for other programs. Spot on!

did anyone mention unlocker? this is a great program if u want to kill or unlock a program and also known where the program is from..

sorry for bringing this up..

i cannot post link because of the restriction...

Hi,

I can really recommend PSPad editor as a top notch text editor. It's been my favorite for a while now.

Also please take a look at faststone image viewer. Super fast image veiwer with sweet editing and batch processing features. This is like the best tool ever!

http://www.pspad.com/en/
http://www.faststone.org/FSViewerDownload.htm

Keep up the good work.

Bne

Putty. Best telnet/ssh client.

OK...first...great thread concept.........second everything I'll list is totally free.

I SECOND this motion:

GIMP - A FULL picture editor/creator. Get it, Learn it, Love it.
VLC Player - great supplemental (if not primary) media player
Foxit Reader - loads way quicker than Adobe for PDF's. Not annoying either.
Google Earth - great for finding places and mapping trips as well as just plain cool

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OK, now a couple personal favorites:

Auslogics Duplicate File Finder - Finds duplicate files easily. VERY cool for thinning out the herd...errm, I mean hard drive.

Defraggler - WAY better than XP native defrag utility...you can defrag individule files...and even consolidate just the free space if you want.

7zip - quicker than Winrar...unpacks many file types....zip, ISO's and even .rar files...MUST HAVE for me. Andto keep it short, last b' not least:

TreeSizeFree.exe - Ever wonder what's taking up all that disc space? This FINDS the LARGEST files on your disc....VERY user friendly...Easy to read BAR-chart...lets you delete. DON'T hesitate...just get it.

OK, two final thoughts:

1) To keep current with my favorite 'restore' goodies...I just keep a fat thumb drive plugged in. ( I know it is not TOTALLY safe as far as data loss..but have never had a single issue with it)...very easy instead of having to make a disc or something. Makes new installs simple.

...and...

2) As we all know...software companies like to 'upgrade' our favorite freebies into nightmarish advertising platforms on a regular basis. MOST of you will already know about this,,,,but for any who don't...you can find a LOT of old version utilities/prgs etc...at, guess where.... oldversion.com A TREASURE of goodies.
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I would put in my vote for Microsoft Security Essentials for Anti malware and anti-virus. It has gotten very good reviews and i have been very pleased with its low profile & low annoyance factor. Plus it gets extra points for being free without having to register anywhere (note that i think it does validate your windows license on install, so make sure you have a valid copy).

Am a relative newbie at all this tech stuff, but think IMHO 'Format Factory' is excellent for simple multimedia needs eg ripping/copying music and videos and converting to/from various formats without hassles. It is even capable of batch conversions and file joining.
And its free.

BumpTop is a great program that gives your desktop walls. You can download themes or use your own pictures. You can put programs into piles. You can put sticky notes on it too. BumpTop: http://bumptop.com Widgets: http://widgets.indakind.com Free version and Full version* available.
Great. BumpTop is no longer available. Bought by Google. This stinks.








* Full version has