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

Batch image resizer on right click, called Image Resizer. A leftover from Windows XP's Powertoys, but now for 64-bit Vista/7.
 
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SyncToy which is a backup utility made by Microsoft which has me puzzled why it don't come with windows as default.

Now there is an easier way. SyncToy, a free PowerToy for Microsoft Windows, is an easy to use, highly customizable program that helps users to do the heavy lifting involved with the copying, moving, and synchronization of different directories. Most common operations can be performed with just a few clicks of the mouse, and additional customization is available without additional complexity. SyncToy can manage multiple sets of folders at the same time; it can combine files from two folders in one case, and mimic renames and deletes in another case. Unlike other applications, SyncToy actually keeps track of renames to files and will make sure those changes get carried over to the synchronized folder.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15155


Mindweaver said:
Hey what do you think about adding my new Directory Size Utility? Do you think it's worthy? It's free.. :p
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OOh forgot about this app ^^.. I would like to know why it trying to connect to Perfora.net and if blocked on the connection it just hangs :(.
 
Frick said:
Batch image resizer on right click, called Image Resizer. A leftover from Windows XP's Powertoys, but now for 64-bit Vista/7.
Click to expand...

Was going to write about this, I beat me to the punch. :(

AsRock said:
SyncToy which is a backup utility made by Microsoft which has me puzzled why it don't come with windows as default.

Now there is an easier way. SyncToy, a free PowerToy for Microsoft Windows, is an easy to use, highly customizable program that helps users to do the heavy lifting involved with the copying, moving, and synchronization of different directories. Most common operations can be performed with just a few clicks of the mouse, and additional customization is available without additional complexity. SyncToy can manage multiple sets of folders at the same time; it can combine files from two folders in one case, and mimic renames and deletes in another case. Unlike other applications, SyncToy actually keeps track of renames to files and will make sure those changes get carried over to the synchronized folder.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15155
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Yes, synctoy is quite excellent. Works over the network as well! Another nifty program from the MS Garage, Mouse without borders. It's like a software KVM, up to four computers with the same keyboard/mouse. You can even setup the mouse so it moves between computers like it would between monitors. Only Windows though, would be super awesome if there was something similar with multi platform support..
 
mouse without borders is awesome, i used to use it a lot. had it setup with a key combo that was a macro bound to my mouse to swap between screens.

now i dont have two PC's in the same room, kinda stopped using it.
 
AsRock said:
OOh forgot about this app ^^.. I would like to know why it trying to connect to Perfora.net and if blocked on the connection it just hangs :(.
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Sorry, I haven't seen this before now, but we talked about it in pm. But for anyone else wondering what that is.. It's just going out to get the current version number. Perfora.net is apart of 1and1.com which is where my version/file is hosted. I haven't updated this program in awhile, but I will soon and I'll update it so it doesn't default to check for updates. :toast:

EDIT: Also, if anyone has anymore questions about the Directory Size Utility please use that thread. :toast:
 
Here guys, I know a few that aren't that well known:

Sorry if any of these have been mentioned, I'm copy and pasting these from other sites I posted them on. I'll go back and look through the thread and try to remove the ones that are already known.

AS SSD benchmark
This is a must have for SSDs. Why? It lets you know if your SSDs are properly aligned. If they're not aligned, you get crappy performance. (if your drive isn't aligned you'll get "Bad").

MiniTool Partition Wizard Home Edition
Lots of good tools to play around with! It'll even re-align your hard drive like I mentioned above. Decent amount of format options, error scanning, general information.

HTTPS Everywhere
NSA scaremongering aside, this is a nice browser addon for both Chrome and Firefox. It's right up there with Adblock and Noscript.

"HTTPS Everywhere is produced as a collaboration between The Tor Project and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Many sites on the web offer some limited support for encryption over HTTPS, but make it difficult to use. For instance, they may default to unencrypted HTTP, or fill encrypted pages with links that go back to the unencrypted site. The HTTPS Everywhere extension fixes these problems by using a clever technology to rewrite requests to these sites to HTTPS."

Keepass
From their site: "KeePass is a free open source password manager, which helps you to manage your passwords in a secure way"

I use the Professional Edition. Lets you generate strong passwords and store your logons. This makes having strong passwords practical to use. No more using words with numbers or the same password for all your accounts just for the sake of being able to remember all of them, which puts you at risk for dictionary attacks. I prefer it over online password storing sites as one site such as LastPass was "hacked" recently.

OCCT
From their site: "OCCT is a stability checking tool that was created back in 2003, and was regularly updated since. It enables you to fully test your computer's stability, using 4 different tests : CPU:OCCT and CPU:Linpack aimed at testing the CPU, GPU:3D for the GPU stability, and Power Supply, a combination of CPU:Linpack and GPU:3D to fully load your Power Supply."

I use this along with Prime95 for testing cpu overclocks and heat/voltage at full load. I find this is faster than Prime95 and even detected things Prime95 had missed.

qBittorrent
"qBittorrent is an attempt to provide a μTorrent equivalent that is open-source and multi-platform adding a streaming-like function to let users download-and-play video files. qBittorrent is currently offering functionality comparable to more popular BitTorrent clients such as Vuze but without requiring the Java Virtual Machine. qBittorrent requires Python only for the search engine while other clients such as Deluge and BitTornado require it for the BitTorrent protocol itself." ~ Wiki

I first started out with Azureus and dumped it after it changed to Vuze. Then I used μTorrent for years but started getting sick of it. So it's the fact that it seems to do everything that I liked about the first two without everything I hated. Plus Open Source so it'll never spew ads like they did.

HitmanPro

"First it detects viruses and other files that have a suspicious behaviour (behaviour analysis) and sends them then to the scan cloud via the Internet. The malicious files are detected in the scan cloud and are removed by HitmanPro. The newest version of HitmanPro, version 3, uses Dr Web, Emsisoft Anti-Malware, G Data AntiVirus, BitDefender and now IKARUS (replaced Prevx as the fifth engine) to detect malicious software. As the various virus scanners are not installed on the local computer, but in the scan cloud on Internet, there is a very low system load."

Qualys BrowserCheck
I love this thing. The only sane way to keep track of all the web browser plugins that are frequently exploited, such as Java and Adobe stuff. Now you can keep your plugins updated.
 
Some nice free utilities by Moo0

Transparent context menu

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System monitor

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And many other tiny utilities (HDD cleaner, file shredder and so on)
 
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Greenshot, for taking screenshots. You can customize pretty much everything. Licensed under GPL. I've never tried it, but it's supposed to work directly with imgur, dropbox, flickr, photobucket and picasa too.
 
herdProtect
http://www.herdprotect.com/downloads.aspx

herdProtect Anti-Malware Scanner is a fast and free Windows desktop program which detects malicious threats, spyware and adware by utilizing 68 industry anti-malware scanners. It has no impact on your system resources and uses the herdProtect cloud-based scanning engine. Best of all, like all herdProtect products, the scanner is a second line of defense and is designed to work perfectly with your existing antivirus software.
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I guess it's in beta or early stages. It's free for now.
 
Evernote. Sync notes and stuff between devices! Works like a charm with Windows and Android. I have not tried to get on on Linux yet, but I will. There's no evernote program, but there are programs that synch with Evernote servers. There's always wine, and a web based system, if all else fails.
 
PCI-Z is a freeware lightweight system utility designed to provide information about (unknown) PCI (PCI-E, PCI-X...) devices and helps you find appropriate device drivers.
 
Privacy Badger

EFF is launching a new extension for Firefox and Chrome called Privacy Badger. Privacy Badger automatically detects and blocks spying ads around the Web, and the invisible trackers that feed information to them. You can try it out today.

Privacy Badger is EFF's answer to intrusive and objectionable practices in the online advertising industry, and many advertisers' outright refusal to meaningfully honor Do Not Track requests. This week, Mozilla published research showing that privacy is the single most important thing that users want from their web browsers. Privacy Badger is part of EFF’s growing campaign to deliver that privacy by giving you the technical means to disallow trackers within the pages you read on the Web.

This is an alpha release; we've been using it internally and don't think it's too buggy. But we're looking for intrepid users to try it out and let us know before we encourage millions of people to install it. If you find bugs, you can file them on github against either the Firefox or Chrome repos as appropriate.

How does Privacy Badger work?

Privacy Badger is a browser-add on tool that analyzes sites to detect and disallow content that tracks you in an objectionable, non-consensual manner. When you visit websites, your copy of Privacy Badger keeps note of the "third-party" domains that embed images, scripts and advertising in the pages you visit.

If a third-party server appears to be tracking you without permission, by using uniquely identifying cookies to collect a record of the pages you visit across multiple sites, Privacy Badger will automatically disallow content from that third-party tracker. In some cases a third-party domain provides some important aspect of a page's functionality, such as embedded maps, images, or fonts. In those cases, Privacy Badger will allow connections to the third party but will screen out its tracking cookies.

Advertisers and other third-party domains can unblock themselves in Privacy Badger by making a strong commitment to respect Do Not Track requests. By including this mechanism, Privacy Badger not only protects users who install it, but actually provides incentives for better privacy practices across the entire Web.

So users who install Privacy Badger not only get more privacy and a better browsing experience for themselves, but actually contribute to making the Web as a whole better for everyone.

...

How is Privacy Badger different to Disconnect, Adblock Plus, Ghostery, and other blocking extensions?

Privacy Badger was born out of our desire to be able to recommend a single extension that would automatically analyze and block any tracker or ad that violated the principle of user consent; which could function well without any settings, knowledge or configuration by the user; which is produced by an organization that is unambiguously working for its users rather than for advertisers; and which uses algorithmic methods to decide what is and isn't tracking.

Although we like Disconnect, Adblock Plus, Ghostery and similar products (in fact Privacy Badger is based on the ABP code!), none of them are exactly what we were looking for. In our testing, all of them required some custom configuration to block non-consensual trackers. Several of these extensions have business models that we weren't entirely comfortable with. And EFF hopes that by developing rigorous algorithmic and policy methods for detecting and preventing non-consensual tracking, we'll produce a codebase that could in fact be adopted by those other extensions, or by mainstream browsers, to give users maximal control over who does and doesn't get to know what they do online."EFF is launching a new extension for Firefox and Chrome called Privacy Badger. Privacy Badger automatically detects and blocks spying ads around the Web, and the invisible trackers that feed information to them. You can try it out today.
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https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/privacy-badger

Download: https://www.eff.org/privacybadger
 
I generally use Glary and CCleaner to clean and defrag my Registry, and Glary does a security scan. Anyways, came across this link, don't remember now how... I think it was something to do with ExpressCache.exe. I was perusing my Task Manager and was wondering what this Diskeeper program was doing.

Anyways, anybody know this? http://www.systweak.com/registrycleaner/2005/?x-at=file.net_EN-RegPro
 
http://www.getpaint.net/index.html

Paint.NET 4.0

This release improves performance and memory usage with a new rendering engine optimized for multicore CPUs and hardware acceleration (GPU). Most tools now support "fine grained history" and live adjustment of their properties, including the Magic Wand and Paint Bucket. Selections are now antialiased, which greatly improves their quality.
 
I forgot all about this useful thread:toast:
 
I don't know if anyone posted this already but here is a useful online photoshop editor (it's not like the real deal but similar):
https://pixlr.com/editor/
 
This fantastic thread needed a bump. Thanks.
 
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