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The Big Useful List Of Free Useful Programs To Use Usually For Free

(Prevent the installation of spyware and other potentially unwanted software! Simple, effective, trusted.)
I would use this to prevent ransomware. I couldn't update my antivirus with this so be warned.
www.brightfort.com

SpywareBlaster

Prevent the installation of spyware, adware, malware, and more. Free download.
www.brightfort.com


Geek Uninstaller - the best FREE uninstaller

Efficient and Fast, Small and Portable. 100% Free
geekuninstaller.com geekuninstaller.com
 
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Holy crap spyware blaster is still around?

They havent updated their website in like 10 years, downloads page shows its recently updated tho :O
 
cucker tarlson said:
DaVinci Resolve,it's unbelievable such software can come free.
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Agreed.

A number that I use or have used:
Advanced Renamer - batch file/folder renaming, very powerful
Autoruns - Microsoft Sysinternals; most probably know of this but I don't remember seeing it mentioned, maybe I missed it
DisplayCAL - one of the best monitor calibration software (if you have the appropriate device for calibrating of course)
FanControl - easy-to-use customizable fan control software, highly recommend this one (forum link)
HCFR - calibration software that is more suited for calibrating TVs (again need the appropriate calibration device)
Hugin - panorama photo stitcher
Logitech Setpoint - if you have certain Logitech keyboards, this will allow you to remap, for example on mine, the home, mail, shutdown, and calculator buttons at the top of the keyboard. It is older software but still works. For example I remapped my calculator key to put my PC into sleep and my home button to run F.lux (with a -noshow modifier)
MPC-HC - many know of this media player, it is without a doubt my favorite. Development is active again.
MadVR - a renderer that allows MPC-HC to use your monitor calibration profile when playing video, among many other things you can do with it
MusicBee - music player that is highly customizable
Speccy - shows basic computer specs in a nice interface; made by Piriform, I don't think its been updated in a few years but it still works fine
XnViewMP - image viewer program; the big advantage of this one is that it's fully color aware. Not many are, I believe FastStone is only partially. I used to use FastStone but switched to this for that reason. With a little tinkering I got the interface to look almost identical to how FastStone looks. I love in particular the ability to customize labels with EXIF/metadata info.
WifiInfoView - made by Nirsoft, shows WiFi signal strength and more
 
Logan7 said:
MPC-HC - many know of this media player, it is without a doubt my favorite. Development is active again.
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It's not being maintained anymore. MPC-BE is a fork that is being maintained.
sourceforge.net

MPC-BE

Download MPC-BE for free. Media Player Classic - BE. Media Player Classic - BE is a free and open source audio and video player for Windows. Media Player Classic - BE is based on the original "Media Player Classic" project (Gabest) and "Media Player Classic Home Cinema" project (Casimir666)...
sourceforge.net sourceforge.net
Logan7 said:
XnViewMP - image viewer program; the big advantage of this one is that it's fully color aware. Not many are, I believe FastStone is only partially. I used to use FastStone but switched to this for that reason. With a little tinkering I got the interface to look almost identical to how FastStone looks. I love in particular the ability to customize labels with EXIF/metadata info.
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I personally prefer the standard XnView. "MP" is a big departure from the intuitive UI that made XnView a joy to use.
 
Steve Gibson's site has a lot of freebies but one of my favorites is his DNS Benchmark software.
 
One more I forgot about:
PhotoRec (part of TestDisk)
For recovering photos from a corrupted SD card (and other forms of storage).
Somehow last month my camera's SD card got corrupted and I was missing over 100 of the last pictures I took. Some but not all of them would show in the camera, but none of them were showing when the card was plugged into a PC. With PhotoRec I recovered every picture.

Something you won't need very often, but its fantastic when you do need it.
 
Can anyone recommend a free ftp client. There use to be a Chrome extention called codeanywhere that you had most ftb abilities as well as ability to edit webpages in real time, but its no longer available. Something similar would be great formy use as I maintain occasional updates on 2 sites as well as moving files around. I like the idea of a browser extension allowing flexibility to have access from multiple locations. But a stand alone client would also work. Currently I'm using a Chrome app sFTP on trial and it works ok but trial time is almost up.
 
mrpickem said:
Can anyone recommend a free ftp client. There use to be a Chrome extention called codeanywhere that you had most ftb abilities as well as ability to edit webpages in real time, but its no longer available. Something similar would be great formy use as I maintain occasional updates on 2 sites as well as moving files around. I like the idea of a browser extension allowing flexibility to have access from multiple locations. But a stand alone client would also work. Currently I'm using a Chrome app sFTP on trial and it works ok but trial time is almost up.
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I use Filezilla to do FTP transfers
 
mrpickem said:
Can anyone recommend a free ftp client. There use to be a Chrome extention called codeanywhere that you had most ftb abilities as well as ability to edit webpages in real time, but its no longer available. Something similar would be great formy use as I maintain occasional updates on 2 sites as well as moving files around. I like the idea of a browser extension allowing flexibility to have access from multiple locations. But a stand alone client would also work. Currently I'm using a Chrome app sFTP on trial and it works ok but trial time is almost up.
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I have used ncftp as my default FTP client for the past two decades. There are various clients including macOS, various Linux distros, Windows, UNIXes, etc.
 
mrpickem said:
Can anyone recommend a free ftp client. There use to be a Chrome extention called codeanywhere that you had most ftb abilities as well as ability to edit webpages in real time, but its no longer available. Something similar would be great formy use as I maintain occasional updates on 2 sites as well as moving files around. I like the idea of a browser extension allowing flexibility to have access from multiple locations. But a stand alone client would also work. Currently I'm using a Chrome app sFTP on trial and it works ok but trial time is almost up.
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Free FTP Client for Windows :: WinSCP

WinSCP is a free file manager for Windows supporting FTP, SFTP, S3 and WebDAV.
winscp.net winscp.net

I've used it for years.
 
I use this Program Updater "Patch My Pc" which keeps me informed every week.
patchmypc.com

Home Updater

Did you know your home device/computer needs regular updates to stay secure? Automate your patching for over 500+ applications free of charge.
patchmypc.com patchmypc.com
 
DoH! said:
I use this Program Updater "Patch My Pc" which keeps me informed every week.
patchmypc.com

Home Updater

Did you know your home device/computer needs regular updates to stay secure? Automate your patching for over 500+ applications free of charge.
patchmypc.com patchmypc.com
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Love this little program. I use it on multiple PC's at home and work.
 
xrobwx71 said:
Love this little program. I use it on multiple PC's at home and work.
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Is it free? I couldn't really tell from the website.
 
Splinterdog said:
Is it free? I couldn't really tell from the website.
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Home updater is free, their other programs are not.

If the two users above were 0 post noobs i'd have hit the spam button, my mod-senses tingled so hard
Hell i found reports of it being a trojan on malwarebytes forums, and it was deemed clean and whitelisted.

I have daily backups so i'm giving it a shot here, but it might be that one rare updater thats not malware ridden trash
 
DoH! said:
I use this Program Updater "Patch My Pc" which keeps me informed every week.
patchmypc.com

Home Updater

Did you know your home device/computer needs regular updates to stay secure? Automate your patching for over 500+ applications free of charge.
patchmypc.com patchmypc.com
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Seems legit and neither Kaspersky Internet Security or some of the other Security tools freaked out.
It found Notepad++ and GreenShot to be outdated - which where correct - and updated the apps without any hiccup's - nice tool
 
Yeah i had no issues or problems with it
 
Splinterdog said:
Is it free? I couldn't really tell from the website.
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Yes.

Mussels said:
Home updater is free, their other programs are not.

If the two users above were 0 post noobs i'd have hit the spam button, my mod-senses tingled so hard
Hell i found reports of it being a trojan on malwarebytes forums, and it was deemed clean and whitelisted.

I have daily backups so i'm giving it a shot here, but it might be that one rare updater thats not malware ridden trash
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I've been using it for years without issue.

I spend hours at my job maintaining the Server environment for our Point Of Sale system and would never use or recommend anything that would be detrimental to its functioning. However, I keep an eye on its changelogs.
 
For those with cameras like GoPros, Gyroflow is a new open-source alternative to the $99 USD ReelSteady.

https://gyroflow.xyz/
https://github.com/gyroflow/gyroflow

Supported formats:​

  • Sony (a1, a7c, a7r IV, a7 IV, a7s III, a9 II, FX3, FX6, RX0 II, RX100 VII, ZV1, ZV-E10)
  • GoPro (All models with gyro metadata, starting with HERO 5)
  • Insta360 (OneR, SMO 4k, GO2)
  • Betaflight blackbox (CSV and binary)
  • Runcam CSV (Runcam 5 Orange, iFlight GOCam GR)
  • WitMotion (WT901SDCL binary and *.txt)
  • Mobile apps: Sensor Logger, G-Field Recorder, Gyro
  • Gyroflow .gcsv log
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WifiDiagnosticsView a Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista​

www.nirsoft.net

Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista

Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista that monitors the wireless network service of Windows operating system and displays any event that occurs while WifiDiagnosticsView is running.
www.nirsoft.net
 
P4-630 said:

WifiDiagnosticsView a Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista​

www.nirsoft.net

Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista

Wifi diagnostics tool for Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista that monitors the wireless network service of Windows operating system and displays any event that occurs while WifiDiagnosticsView is running.
www.nirsoft.net
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Just about anything from Nirsoft is useful.

I'm sure this has been posted before but its worth a reminder. WSCC It puts all of Nir Sofer's tools and Microsoft's Sysinternals Suite (and a few others)in one place. It's frequently updated. The packages are downloaded and updated direct from the Authors site. It's the first thing I add to my Portable Tech Drive.
 
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Nirsoft do indeed make great stuff, somehow i never knew of this one

Edit: that's right, they have 30,000 various little tools for and the relevant ones get buried
 
Not a program, but a site I've found to be quite excellent, if it fits the thread:

Virtual Graph Paper

Virtual Graph Paper is a web application for creating drawings and illustrations on a virtual grid. You can use it right here in your browser. When you are done, your drawing can be downloaded as an SVG file.
virtual-graph-paper.com virtual-graph-paper.com

It's just what it says. Virtual graph paper. It's pretty rudimentary, but it's developing and there's even a forum for suggetions.
 
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