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    Cool Cool Software You Can't Do Without

    Thought I'd start this thread for some fresh programs that you can't do with out, please add as many as you like.
    Give an indication of what OS your running it on & if it is free or give a link to the best price you found for it.


    Well, in search of software that works with Win8, I have come across a real good one.

    This a Partition Manager that will work with Windows XP up to W8 64bit.
    It is easy to use & clean, comes in free download (see links below), can get an ISO for bootable CD for Partition & HDD rercovery & you can make a bootable USB stick.

    Its free for home use & they have pro versions as well.

    I used it after initial setup of my W8 PC just to try it out & found it excellent.



    Bootable CD link

    Bootable USB link
    Cheers, Tiny
    "You can lead a person to knowledge, but you can't make them think? If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.
    The information is out there; you just have to let it in."

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    Here's another Gem I've been using for years on XP & Vista, have been testing on W8 64 Pro & it's all good.

    It's freeware.

    Its called Stickies & that's exactly what it is, the program runs in the startup & lives in system tray.

    Just double click & you get a sticky note that you can type in, past in & copy from, any info you like.
    You can have as many stickies as you like. Fully customised.
    You can drag it any where & that's where it stays, you can change color & opacity so it fades into the background then just click on it & its on top & readable.
    You can set your stickies to always be on top of other windows or not. A single click on the sys tray icon brings all open stickies to the top.
    You can simply click on the Sticky note Garbage bin in the right corner & it's gone, still stored in closed stickies or you can hide it by putting it to sleep for as long as you want by right clicking the bar at the top & selecting sleep & how long for. When it wakes up it's there on your desktop as a reminder if you like, you can even set recurring stickies as reminders to pay bills, go to meetings etc.
    You can print directly from your sticky.

    I just can't live without this program, I use it constantly for web browsing to save bits of important text or links, as bill reminders & monthly job reminders.

    Edit: Forgot to mention that right clicking on the Stickies sys tray icon produces a menu with lots of options for managing & recovering stickies if you accidentally close an important one. ;p

    If you want to try it out

    What is Stickies? Stickies is a PC utility I wrote to try to cut down on the number of yellow notes I was leaving stuck to my monitor. It is a computerised version of those notes.
    The design goal behind Stickies is that the program is small and simple. Stickies will not mess with your system files, or write to the registry. Stickies stores information in a single text-based ini file.
    Stickies will never support animated dancing figures, or play "Greensleeves". They are instead yellow rectangular windows onto which you can put some text notes. Once created, they will stay on screen until you take them away. Just like a real sticky piece of paper.
    Main features:

    • Once on screen, stickies will remain where placed until closed, even through reboots
    • Stickies appearance can be customised; fonts, colours and buttons may be changed, and styles saved. Stickies can be resized.
    • Stickies can store text or images
    • Stickies can snap to each other and to the sides of the screen to keep them neatly lined up
    • Stickies can be attached to a web site, document or folder so they only show when it's on screen
    • Stickies can be transferred from one machine to another either over a TCP/IP network connection, or by using an SMTP mail server or MAPI client:
      • Hierarchical friends list, which may be automatically transferred from other friends
      • Play a sound file on receive
      • Signature for transmitted or emailed stickies
      • Favourite friends, and custom lists can be made

    • Stickies can be hidden for a certain period, until a specified date and time, or to wake every day, week or month, to act as reminders.
    • Stickies can have alarms set to ensure you notice them at a point you choose
    • International language, Unicode and RTL text support
    • Stickies works with Windows Vista and Windows 7
    • Stickies is small and simple, it writes to a single text file, and does not alter the registry
    • AD network administrators can use Group Policy to control settings
    • API to allow integration with other applications
    • ...and Stickies is completely free!
    Last edited by Tiny; 04-05-13 at 02:19 PM.
    Cheers, Tiny
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    The information is out there; you just have to let it in."

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tiny View Post
    Here's another Gem I've been using for years on XP & Vista, have been testing on W8 64 Pro & it's all good.

    It's freeware.

    Its called Stickies & that's exactly what it is, the program runs in the startup & lives in system tray.

    I want to second Stickies. It actually took me awhile to hunt for it, and it's one of the first things I reinstalled when I wiped my computer. I loved having the ability to just switch to the desktop and just write. No extra clicking, no save button, just write and it's there. It was the perfect to-do-list tool (and some notetaking for when I was feeling lazy). This is hands down one of the most useful freeware programs I have ever used.


    My own recommendation: If you do a lot of gaming, I recommend . It's free and let's you get your PC or laptop go into and out of performance-focused settings quickly.

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    Ultimate boot CD for Windows.

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    My every-day application favorites so far:


    CCleaner (freeware, Win8 ready)

    With "CCleaner" you can optimize your PC. The free software throws junk data from your hard drive, cleans and removes erroneous entries in the browser and from the registry database. "CCleaner" uninstalls programs faster than Windows.


    FireFox (freeware, Win8 ready)

    "Firefox" offers fast page layout, ease of use and safety. A central authorization manager you specify convenient store which websites cookies, open pop-ups or allowed to query your location. With the online synchronization "Sync" keep add-ons, bookmarks, passwords, settings, and history of several "Firefox" installations on the same stand.


    YouTube to MP3 Converter (freeware, Win8 ready)

    With the "Free YouTube to MP3 Converter" you save the audio of YouTube videos easily as MP3 file. Practical: Play them about on the MP3 player, you go enjoy the sound of music videos and live recordings.


    Adobe Flash Player (freeware, Win8 ready)

    Browsers utilize the "Adobe Flash Player" to display animations and interactive content from websites. To the Flash FLV (Flash Video) and SWF (Shockwave Flash) you meet in the multimedia Internet on every corner: YouTube video, animated image galleries and browser games usually have a set installed "Adobe Flash Player" ahead.


    SUPER 2012 (freeware, Win8 ready)

    "SUPER" is a free playback and conversion program that allows you to play all major audio and video formats. Also, you convert the files to other formats. Thanks to the preset conversion profiles, the films can be easily transferred to mobile devices such as iPhone, Blackberry and Android smartphone.


    7-Zip (freeware, Win8 ready, 32Bit and 64Bit version available)

    "7-Zip" Pack is a free program that allows you to compress and decompress files and folders. The tool generates and processes put in the archives 7z format, as a classic zip file or open procedures GZIP, BZIP2 and TAR.


    Windows Movie Maker 2012 (freeware, Win8 ready)

    The "Windows Movie Maker 2012" is a free video editing program from Microsoft. Use a wizard to add together step by step home movies and slideshows and create effective scene transitions. Shaky cell phone camera shots or smoothes the "Windows Movie Maker" by a sophisticated video filter.


    PDFCreator (freeware, Win8 ready, german only)

    Create PDF documents from any Windows application using the free "PDFCreator". You also save your documents as JPEG image in EPS format or as plain text.

    DL:


    GIMP (freeware, Win8 ready)

    Whether simple or complex image enhancement photo retouching - the free photo editing "GIMP" gives you in many situations the right tools at hand. Special features include some great filters and effects. Thus, "GIMP" for private and semi-professional use an interesting and free alternative to "Photoshop".


    VLC Media Player (freeware, Win8 ready, 32Bit and 64Bit version avilable)

    The free "VLC Media Player" supports all major codecs and gives virtually every movie and music file again. Videos from the Internet can be started as a stream and already watch while downloading. The universal player plays audio CDs, unprotected DVDs and Blu-rays.

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    media player classic, much better alternative to windows media player, free from sourceforge


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    I'd like to second VLC Media Player! That program can play anything you could throw at it. It also has an amazing amount of customization available to those who want to tweak specific settings.

    My own contribution is

    This is an open source version of something similar to Microsoft Office Suite. It includes almost everything you could ever need Microsoft Office for, but free! It has a few differences that take a moment to get used to, but I love it.

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    I prefer over GIMP, it is a little bit easier to use.

    About
    Paint.NET is free image and photo editing software for computers that run Windows. It features an intuitive and innovative user interface with support for layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools. An active and growing online community provides friendly help, tutorials, and plugins.
    It started development as an undergraduate college senior design project mentored by Microsoft, and is currently being maintained by some of the alumni that originally worked on it. Originally intended as a free replacement for the Microsoft Paint software that comes with Windows, it has grown into a powerful yet simple image and photo editor tool. It has been compared to other digital photo editing software packages such as Adobe® Photoshop®, Corel® Paint Shop Pro®, Microsoft Photo Editor, and The GIMP.

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    I personally CANNOT do without After Effects (windows) on Adobe Studio. I love to express myself by making videos and I am personally sick of seeing generic Movie-Maker, iMovie, etc. type videos. I feel as if they lack convention and are reductive toward what a movie should convey. A video should reflect the content and vice-versa. I love turning personal thoughts, feelings, and life events into videos - they seem so much more real and it's just a great way to express myself.

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    Not to forget a Comic Reader: . It's freeware.
    Besides comic format .cbr it also supports other similar comic format files, such as *.cbz, *.cb7, *.cbt and *.cba files.

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    I could't live without a text editor and I believe is the best editor ever. It is available for Mac, Windows and Linux (Ubuntu) but I have only used it on Windows systems. It is free to use, although you can also purchase a license.

    For registered users there's a new version available, , but it's still on a beta stage.

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    A program which I had never heard of before but which came to my attention on Windows 8 is filmon. It basically lets you watch TV from your laptop without any hassle associated with online web streams etc. It also lets you record and view it later. Unfortunately you can't download these recordings to your PC, they are all on the cloud.

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    I couldn't live without my media player. I love listening to music, and watching videos, and also making my own of my children.

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    I also love Open Office and I have almost every program jwoegerbauer mentioned.

    An app that I use constantly is Free Alarm Clock. It is a Win App that lets you set multiple alarms, either once, or re-occurring, and also allows you to customize the alarm sound. I use it to keep me on track (I'm easily distracted when surfing the 'net!).

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    With regards to essential software, whenever I'm setting up a new computer for myself or any of my friends, I always use to download all of the essentials in an easy package. It truly has a great collection of some of the best programs, and the ability to download it in bulk packages easily makes it an invaluable tool that reduces the amount of individual installers that you need to download at once.

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    Another vote for VLC Media Player here! It's much easier not having to worry about codecs and format problems.

    I really like Evernote, it's a great organizational app for the Apple, Windows and smartphone environments. I encourage my kids to use it to help stay organized with schoolwork with Evernote and Evernote Peek, and I can also use it to organize projects, tasks and ideas. The fact that it is cloud based means it can be accessed anywhere which is a nice feature. And it's free!
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    Ccleaner, avast!, Photoshop, Lightroom, Firefox, Chrome, Skype, uTorrent, Thunderbird, AIMP3, FastStone Max View, K-Lite Codec Pack, Foxit Reader, NetWorx, Photoscape, WinRar, TeraCopy and YouTube Video Downloader.

    These are the programs I always have installed in my laptop.

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    I am currently running Windows 7 operating system. The software I can't do without are the most simple software out there. These are

    Adobe Reader( freeware from the Adobe site, just search on google)
    7zip( this is a archive reader and writer, its better than winrar and is free, search on google)
    Microsoft Office( As with all Microsoft Software,it is quite expensive but it does the job and really helpful for me)

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    File Hippo's updater is definitely one piece of software that I value incredibly highly, it helps me keep on top if what needs updating without me having to go into every single program. I used to use a program called Catch-Up by CNet, but they shut it down years ago because it was costing too much money to maintain. Oh, and FireFox and a FireFox plugin called Adblock Plus.

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    On my list for any new system is always:
    cCleaner
    AVG
    Google Sketchup
    VLC
    7Zip
    uTorrent
    imgBurn
    Firefox and various extensions
    and open Office if I am setting up for someone else (unfortunately M$Office is still a necessity on my machines)

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