Great programs that most people might not think to get or have heard of?

I always like adding new cool programs, so can anyone suggest any? They don't have to be free.. just something you use that maybe most people haven't heard of. Obviously not Microsoft Word etc..

I'll start it off with

WebcamMax.. you can really play around on your webcam with this thing

WinDirStat... great way to see where all your space is going

 

BatteryBar is really neat: http://osirisdevelopment.com/BatteryBar/index.html

 

I somehow think that apart from the paid software this would be a very similar thread compared to the "free software" thread.

Your webcam software for example - the Vaios come with something called ArcSoft to let you play around...

I suppose if you maintain this as the "paid software guide" it may make sense as a thread - as just a list of recommended programmes - not really as nobody will read several pages worth of posts...

Also - random software people won't have heard of...
Maple - for maths
SAS - for statistics...

 

Actually, I think this is a GREAT thread because it focuses on the missing link of the “free software” threads, because the "free software" threads primarily just list the software, but don’t offer many opinions or discussion about which software apps are really great, and why. Just a few minutes ago, I posted about one of my favorite apps, the Microsoft Office Picture Manager, in the “Show Off Your Vista or XP Desktop – Second Edition!” thread (Link #54, March 1, 2009 posted at 7:06 AM) – This is a great app that comes standard with Vista, but most people are totally unaware of, because it’s not programmed to be the default. And, it’s not even mentioned on the free software thread. I would love to have a thread like this, where I could get some good advice (and warnings) about which software, free or not, is good, and which isn’t, and the reasons why!

 

Switcher ( http://insentient.net/) for Windows users that want Expose like features.

 

+1 for BatteryBar especially on machines that don't natively support a "time to empty" function, like the Sony Vaio FZ series.

Gary

 

Trillian : fully featured, stand-alone, skinnable chat client that supports AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo Messenger, and IRC.

 

Stardock Fences. The most awesome of em all!! - http://www.stardock.com/products/fences/

Awesome way to clean up ur icon littered desktop in just a double click!!

+ awesome organization of icons! really a dream come true kinda software for me!

DO check it out!

 

Sandboxie is great http://www.sandboxie.com/index.php?VersionChanges_2_64

 

I like this thread

Trying out WinDirStat and battery bar right now

 

Well I was hoping for a lot of paid software suggestions. I know "paid" software is a bit of a taboo nowadays but I'd like to hear good suggestions. It can be free too don't put restrictions on it

 

Oh, I need to check this one out!

Not a bad thread, either!


Cin

 

Wow, this thread is so useful. Keep 'em coming!

 

I like battery bar

 

I like a free floating toolbar application called Rocketdock. you can drag and drop icons to it, lots of animations for it. it not bad and its a free application. it makes keeping things organized a little easier too. if you have alot of icons you can seperate and put the important ones on this bar to find easier.

 

Pretty much everyone knows about that now.

 

Hott Notes - Much like Vista's notes gadget or Windows 7's notes app, but much more customizable.

Jing - Free screen capture software.

John's Background Switcher - Does basically what Windows 7's new background switching feature does, except this is WAY more customizable. You can make it display collages of random images from RSS feeds and such. Very cool.

 

Don't know if any one else mentioned it but VLC Media Player, by VideoLan, plays basically anything you can throw at it.. even half finished downloads..

 

To all you audiophiles out there check out srs audio:
http://www.srslabs.com/store/audioproducts.asp

360desktop:
http://www.360desktop.com/

For all of you firefox users this is cooliris:
http://www.cooliris.com/

 

I believe this is on the freeware thread It's supposed to be pretty good!




Cin

 

I didn't!

So...as good as this thread may become, I can't help but feeling it will become unwieldy and either siphon off posts from, or cause double posting in, the "freeware" thread. Perhaps if it were to become a "payware" thread to run parallel with the freeware thread?

Anyway, I'll toss in EasyBCD

Freeware, it allows the choice of OS boot order in a multiple boot systems when using Vista via a GUI. I use it to set Vista as my default OS while multiple booting with W7 beta and Ubuntu Linux. This way, if anything gets hosed on W7 or Linux I have Vista as my default OS timeout on reboot. I also don't have to deal with Grub or LILO possibly messing up Vista's BCD (formerly known as the MBR in XP).

/me is now wondering if this post should've been in the freeware thread

 

MiniMIZE

http://aquaria.za.net/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/

Makes thumbnails of minimized apps on your desktop.

 

How much resources does this use?

 

Very little from what I can tell. I'm not sure how to check how much resources it uses since it installs as a toolbar on the taskbar, so there is no separate process for it. The installer is 410 KB.

 

I guess i should contribute to this list of softwares too.

If you guys like VLC player you guys will defeintely love GOM Player, in my opinion GOM Player is better than VLC Player. It can play as much files or more files as VLC and the skin is a lot better.

http://www.gomlab.com/eng/

Also thanks for the battery bar, i'm trying it out and its pretty neat.

 

Hm, I'll check it out. Thank you.

If you like VLC and GOM you will like KM Player.

 

Now that's cool, thanks a lot!! I know a lot of friends who'll love this

 

Spotify

www.spotify.com

Let's you listen to music streams off the internet, legally and free. Has a huge database of music.

 

I second this. Kmplayer is the best of the lot.


Great interface and better codec support

 

Yes, how DO you tell how much resources it uses??? I dug around in task manager and the process explorer and could not find it anywhere.

Gary

 

It's just a toolbar on the taskbar, so it doesn't have it's own process. In fact, the entire program only consists of DLL files - no EXE files.

I'm guessing the memory usage is negligible. Likely under 1MB.

 

Yes, I realized it was only a DLL, but I am still curious how (or if) one can determine how much of the CPU and mememory is being used by a DLL as opposed to a process or application.

Gary

 

I suppose you could try the following:

1) Close all Explorer windows
2) Record the RAM usage of explorer.exe without BatteryBar enabled
3) Record the RAM usage of explorer.exe with BatteryBar enabled
4) Find the difference

Honestly, I don't care enough to try.

 

For this app, I don't really care so much either. I was thinking about this in reference to some other circumstances where dll's are leaking memory and or hogging the CPU. I will drop the Sysinternals guys a note and ask.

Gary

 

Tell him the guy who bought the Pro version and emailed him saying thanks says hi.

 

Since its on the toolbar itself, does it get added into the process "windows explorer?" That would be my guess. Nifty application. I like.

 

Right. That's why you would look at the RAM usage of the Explorer process.

 

Anyone know an app for windows that when you press printscreen some auto save options appear? like on ubuntu.

 

I'd love to try Spotify, however it has this message on its download page:

"Spotify free is currently in an invitation-only beta, which means you need to have received an invitation token to access the service."

Does anyone have an invitation token they would be willing to provide?

Thanks very much.

 

Hmmmmmm....

Gary

 

Has anyone found a window switcher program like the one in the attachment, I tried window switcher 2.0. Thanks.

 

I've tried a few vista expose apps and switcher is by far the best looking and uses the least amount of ram. Handy on my laptop but not on my desktop.

 

I'm also going to recommend TVersity. For anyone who has a PS3, XBOX 360, Wii, or anything that can play media, TVesristy is a media server. Trust me when I say this, that TVersity is one of the apps that are impossible to live without. I only have experience with it on my PS3, since that is what i have and it works flawlessly. Any media I have on my pc, such as movies in .avi, .mkv, .mov, etc, music (.mp3), pictures (.gif, .jpg) if I store it on tversity on my pc, the PS3 will recognize it and will allow me to play it on my PS3. I use it almost every night to watch family guy, or a movie. There is no lag at all when you playback.

http://tversity.com/

EDIT: oh yeah its also free.

 

Another one not many people know about is WinPatrol

it is sort of like a watchdog for your computer
it shows a pop-up each time something is added to your start up list, wants to change preferences such as default web browser etc.
It also tells you about IE addons, processes etc

It has both a free version and a PLUS (paid) edition

http://www.winpatrol.com/

 

Battery Bar is great, the developer actually incorporated a change I wanted into the program!

 

I agree! Battery Bar is wickedly awesome and it works with Windows 7, even though I don't think Windows 7 is very accurate in reading the battery life yet.

 

Yaa VLC is awesome

 

What change was that?

(Just curious - not being skeptical. )

 

Before BB would count down 99.9, 99.8, 99.7, 99.6, 99.5 and that was annoying, so I asked for an option for it to count down by whole numbers (99, 98, 97, 96) and now it does!

 

Oh, nice! I use that. Thanks!