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Some of these are a copy/paste from an old list in this sub-form. I remember there was an awesome thread with a lot of these in it long ago. Not sure if they all work with Windows 8 but should at least work with Windows 7. The urls might be dated but most work, I believe. Alt-drag Let's you drag windows with alt/left mouse click and resize with alt right click. You can change it and it has some other options as well. f.lux I assume everyone knows about this by now. Changes the color temperature of your monitor during the day to match the natural light of the sun and adjusts at sunset. Rightload inserts itself into windows context menus so you can right click a file and upload it to your website/server. Made by a fellow goon. Even makes thumbs for pics, lets you copy [img] code, its saved me so much time. Apparently works with imgur as well. Lockhunter Ever try to move, delete, or otherwise change a file or folder to find out that it's in use but shouldn't be? This takes care of that. Audacity Awesome freeware sound editing app. With plugins, lets you freely manipulate sound files - copy/paste, fade, rearrange, add effects etc. I just used it to seamlessly combine two .mp3 files into one, then fade out before a part that I didn't want and then ended the song there, then re-saved it as a smaller .mp3 to save space. Katmouse is an absolutely indispensable little Windows app which lets you scroll a window just by hovering over it with the cursor, rather than clicking to give the window focus. It's the default behavior in OSX and most Linux distros; use it for a day, and Windows without KatMouse feels like Windows with your right hand chopped off. EDIT: Oh yeah, by default, I think the program installs with a stupid "click mousewheel to send the window to the back" feature enabled. Disable it in the settings, and you're golden. wizmouse Haven't used it but it apparently does the same thing as katmouse Taekwindow This also does the same thing as katmouse but I can't get it to work with volumouse. Alt+leftclick to drag windows, Alt+rightclick to resize Powermenu When you right click a window it gives you options for transparency, always on top, and minimize to tray. It's old so not sure how it works with Windows 7 and 8 Overdisk OverDisk is a disk usage browser. It can be used to quickly find out how a partition's space is distributed among the file system hierarchy. Treesize http://www.jam-software.com/freeware/index.shtml Find what's eating up your HD space and such. Diskview Another one Spacesniffer and another SpaceSniffer is a freeWare (donations are welcome) and portable tool application that lets you understand how folders and files are structured on your disks. By using a Treemap visualization layout, you have immediate perception of where big folders and files are placed on your devices. hdgraph HDgraph is the best app i've found to figure out what is taking the space up on a drive. I love being able to re-center the graph on a problem directory and then right click to go directly to it. Ekahau Ekahau HeatMapper is a free software tool for quick and easy coverage mapping of Wi-Fi (802.11) networks. It's the only free, easy-to-use tool that shows, on a map, the wireless network coverage in your home or small office. HeatMapper also locates all access points. HeatMapper also provides a real-time view to all access points and their configurations. HeatMapper uses your built-in wireless network adapter, therefore, all you need is a Windows-based laptop with wireless. And it takes just one minute to install. Winroll Make a window roll into its title bar, send it to the back or make it stay on top. Minimize, maximize or close all visible windows, including minimizing to the tray area. Make a window translucent on Windows 2000 or above. WinRoll is lovingly hand-crafted in 100% pure assembly language to give the fastest response and the smallest memory footprint. WinRoll is proudly a FREEWARE and OPEN SOURCE application. Winsplit What is it for? WinSplit Revolution is a small utility which allows you to easily organize your open windows by tiling, resizing and positioning them to make the best use of your desktop real estate. Definitely one of my favorites. There's simple hot keys or moving a window to a certain position of the screen at a certain size. Launchy Hit alt+space and it opens a interface which lets you type in any keyword and find your program/folder/file instantly. You can also use it to open firefox or type amazon/google/etc (hit tab, I think) then the search string Volumemouse Hit left click and scroll wheel or whatever you want to adjust the volume. Rainlendar Awesome desktop calendar Foobar Awesome highly customizable media player. Process hacker A lot better than control alt delete. Let's you see what's running and allows you to terminate it. Process Explorer Like process hacker.. Ever wondered which program has a particular file or directory open? Now you can find out. Process Explorer shows you information about which handles and DLLs processes have opened or loaded. Rocketdock Puts a dock at the top of your screen (or wherever you want), sort of like a mac, Where you can put files, folders, recycle bin, for easy access. Taskbar slapper Taskbar Slapper is a little tool that hides the taskbar when it doesn't want to be hidden. Sumatra PDF Fast, easy, and simple pdf reader. I guess foxit reader sucks now CutePDF is great for printing to PDF. Lightweight and simple, but I think the installer tries to sneak in a toolbar. Hoekey Bind any combination of keys to do just about anything. Plus it's only 25 kB big. Auto hotkey Probably easier to configure than the above. Bind keys/mouse to do anything. xplorer2 Way better than windows explorer. One window with two panels and tabs instead of one bazillion separate windows of explorer. Lite version is free and has everything you'll need. Apparently not free anymore. Anyone got a good substitute? paint.net Has everything a simple and free image editing software needs. This is what windows paint should be. Use this for everything you don't need to fire photoshop up for. notepad++ This is what windows notepad should be. Tabs, auto-completion, syntax highlighting and so on... jdownloader This piece of software is pretty bloated in comparison to everything else I have posted here, but you will come to love it if you ever download stuff from rapidshare/megaupload/mediafire/any public filehoster ever. You put everything you want to download in there, leave it running for the night and have it by next morning. No reconnects, 15 minute waiting periods, or even captchas. Regularly updated plugins for just about any filehoster. Mydefrag Nice and free defrager Fastone image viewer An image browser, converter and editor that supports all major graphic formats including BMP, JPEG, JPEG 2000, GIF, PNG, PCX, TIFF, WMF, ICO and TGA. It has a nice array of features such as image viewing, management, comparison, red-eye removal, emailing, resizing, cropping, color adjustments, musical slideshow and much more. Also a nice screen capture in that link too. Don't sleep Stop Windows from entering standby, temporarily Ninite is a really handy tool for installing a bunch of your favorite tools after a clean install. Turn off monitor Bind a key to turn off monitor Default Program Editor Default Programs Editor makes it easy to fix file association settings in Windows, including context menu items, icons, and descriptions. Also: autoplay settings and default programs settings ...all without fiddling around in the registry. Puretext Instead of pasting with Ctrl-V you can paste with Win-V and it'll paste and strip any formatting. Works even in Win7 x64. Vista Switcher This one is also great. Makes alt-tab 10 times better/prettier. Lets you do right click/mousewheel to change tabs. Switcher Another alt-tab alternative. Check the link for screenshots. You hit windows key + `. Or you can set it to activate if you mouse over the top left corner, or wherever. Lots of options. Great for those with big monitors or more than one screen. It's sort of like alt-tab but a lot better and for those with a lot of windows. Two finger scroll I'm sure every laptop can do this now but just in case. For a little Mac-Feeling on your Laptop, plus more configuration. Does only work with Synaptic touchpads. Everything Much faster than windows search. Caches everything and is just what everyone should use instead of windows search. Set it to open with a hot-key Locate32 Similar to "everything." Just as fast and more features Locate32 is a file finder which works by indexing all your files on your hard disk drive and thus is able to provide almost instant access to them. Direct Folders Double click in empty window space to bring up a list of favourites/add the current folder to favourites. When in a 'saveas' box just select any open folder from the taskbar to make that the save location and it's got the 10 most recently used folders in a drop down. Makes getting around the frame/projects server so much faster. Navigating folders used to annoy me immensly. Diskled Basically, it puts an icon in your system tray that blinks if there's any disk activity. My P180 is placed on the floor along the outer left edge of my desk, so bending around the corner of the desk to look at the activity LED is a pain. This makes it not be so much of a pain. Bulk Rename Utility Bulk Rename Utility is a free file renaming software for Windows. Bulk Rename Utility allows you to easily rename files and entire folders based upon extremely flexible criteria. Visipics Scans any drive or directory you want and finds any images that are the exact same. Good for finding duplicates of any wallpapers you have Filehippo The Update Checker will scan your computer for installed software, check the versions and then send this information to FileHippo.com to see if there are any newer releases. These are then neatly displayed in your browser for you to download. Secunia I'd recommend it if you need something more comprehensive (and informative) than FileHippo. Lifehacker writeup: http://lifehacker.com/339627/keep-your-software-up+to+date-and-secure-with-secunia Find and run robot Like launchy, but on crack. Can do much more than just launch programs quickly. One of the better plugins for it adds live google search. Type gpw followed by a query and it starts googling while you're typing, sticking the top 10 results in the window for you to run with one key press. It also integrates with Everything which is nice. Executor Like launchy and all of those other launcher programs, except without all of those useless features. You can have it index your start menu items, or only use keywords you configure. Batterybar Free and paid versions. BatteryBar is a simple, straight-forward, battery meter that monitors the status of your battery and displays your battery's status in the taskbar. BatteryBar constantly monitors the status of your battery as you use your laptop. As it monitors your battery, it keeps historical data on your battery and provide you with a very accurate estimate of how much time is remaining on your battery. Jumplist Launcher [url]http://en.https://www.ali.dj/jumplist-launcher/[/url] Simple hack that allows custom jumplists in Windows 7. mp3tag http://www.mp3tag.de/en/ Mp3tag is a powerful and yet easy-to-use tool to edit metadata of common audio formats where it supports ID3v1, ID3v2.3, ID3v2.4, iTunes MP4, WMA, Vorbis Comments and APE Tags. It can rename files based on the tag information, replace characters or words in tags and filenames, import/export tag information, create playlists and more. Another option to the above is - MusicBrainz Picard http://musicbrainz.org/ Album Art Downloader http://sourceforge.net/projects/album-art/ The Album Art Downloader is a program designed to make life easier for anyone who wishes to find and update their album art for their music collection. The sources for the pictures can be defined by creating plugin scripts. Ifranview Is the go application to for bulk image converting, renaming, resizing, and just about every else you would ever need to do with a group of images. Greenshot Is great for taking, editing, and annotating screenshots. Clover An extension of the Windows Explorer, to add multi-tab functionality similar to Google Chrome browser(Acts like a browser ctrl+w closes tab, ctrl+t is new tab, ctrl and click a folder opens it in a new tab etc. ). After install Clover, you will be able to open multiple folders within the same window, and you can also add folder bookmarks. Windows snipping tool The Windows Snipping Tool, which is included with Windows. It's also much better than PrtScn, it lets you snip portions of the screen and save them as image files or copy it to clipboard. There's no shortcut key for it but you can make one easily Windirstat Gives info about drive space and a graphic representation of your file system. Handy for quickly finding space hogging files. Shows real size of folders Chocolatey Chocolatey NuGet is a Machine Package Manager, somewhat like apt-get, but built with Windows in mind. 7-zip Best .rar, .zip etc program Some of my favorites (from the perspectiive of a software engineer): Console2: Upgrade to crappy DOS command prompt Cygwin: Unix shell for windows GVIM: VI editor for windows Putty: Terminal HWiNFO Awesome program for in-depth, hardware diagnostic/monitoring stuffs Aero Glass Window transparency/customization for Windows 8/8.1 Classic Shell start menu/windows explorer replacement for Windows 8/8.1 (startisback is the best one but it costs $3) Meld Awesome file/folder visual comparison (GUI frontend for diff on Linux). Easier installer with Python/PyGTK packaged with it here: http://sourceforge.net/projects/meld-installer/ Gimp free alternative to photoshop SQLite Database Browser RWEverything Utility to access/modify more hardware-related poo poo than you will probably ever want to mess with. I can't live without alt-drag, volume mouse, everything, f.lux, and katmouse. Highly recommend you get volume mouse and enabling it to left mouse click + mouse wheel up/down. Also a ton of poo poo here you can look through - http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/index.html Windows Shortcuts I think it's also worth looking through these links to find usefull Windows shortcuts Windows 8 Windows 7 Off the top of my head the most handy ones are F11 - Full screen Winkey + d - Display and hide the desktop Winkey + m - Minimize all open windows Winkey + x - Menu shortcuts F2 rename files highlighted in explorer Alt + Prinscreen - Screen capture current window only. Good for people with dual monitor setups. Windows 7 - Winkey + x = show mobility center (Try it out) Browser Shortcuts I'm sure by now everyone does Alt-W, Alt-tab, Ctrl-tab, and shift-ctrl-tab. But in google chrome, and possibly other browsers there's some other useful shortcuts https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/157179?hl=en Highlights: Ctrl -L or alt-d Highlight address bar F6- Highlight address bar Ctrl J - Downloads Ctrl n - new window Ctrl + shift + esc - Opens the Task Manager. Ctrl + enter - Adds https://www. and .com to your input in the address bar and open the resulting URL ALt + enter - Opens the URL in a new tab. shift+F5 clear cached data and refresh browser window F3 - Next search match Ctrl + R - Refresh Nostalgia4Dogges fucked around with this message at 19:38 on May 23, 2014 |
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May 22, 2014 08:01
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Added some good stuff!
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May 23, 2014 19:12
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I have heard someone say that Volumouse does not work in Windows 8. However, Volume2 does. MacType allows you to customize your Windows font rendering without going through the mess that is GDIPP. Always-On-Top is a neat little utility that is super simple, and extremely lightweight: a keypress of ctrl-space will toggle any window's "always on top" status. It's not freeware, but I like Total Commander for handling file management in Windows.
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May 23, 2014 20:10
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Using volumemouse in Windows 8.1 now. For some reason it doesn't work on the desktop or toolbar anymore though. Only on open programs or explorer Volume2 works well enough but it doesn't have a left click/mousewheel option Is there an option for always on top but where you can just right click the title bar?
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May 23, 2014 20:33
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Could I please ask that you get rid of the extra line breaks after each title? It's quite difficult to read otherwise.
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May 23, 2014 20:41
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Portable Apps Has a ton of very useful windows applications, many of which have already been posted in this thread. What is great about the site though is they are all specifically configured to run directly without needing to install them. They also have a launcher application that automatically updates the apps for you. I keep a USB drive loaded with a ton of different applications from this site on my keychain. f.lux Changes your color settings of your monitor to better match the time of day. Evernote Cloud syncing note application. Works best when paired with a mobile app on your phones/tablets, as well as the browser extension Evernote web clipper. WinSCP Free SFTP, FTP, and SCP client.
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May 24, 2014 06:53
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ShareMouse By far the easiest way to share a single mouse and keyboard with another PC. Works cross-platform with Mac as well. It's literally a no bullshit setup, even more so with the portable version. There are some features you have to pay extra for (such as drag and drop or sharing with more than two PCs), but otherwise I find it very convenient with just the vanilla version.
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May 24, 2014 07:08
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Steam Tile Creates adjustable-size Tiles to Steam games with the game's cover art as the tile background. Also shows achievements. CrystalDiskInfo View your hard drive's SMART statistics and get an early warning when it's about to fail. Creates a virtual magazine from postings in your social networks or other sources.
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May 24, 2014 09:12
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AutoIT Like AutoHotkey except it has a syntax that isn't terrible. Soundswitch A script I wrote years ago in AutoIT for switching audio devices in Windows with a hotkey. Looking back at the source now is a little embarrassing, but it works great if you're using English-language Windows.
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May 24, 2014 16:30
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hirvox posted:Steam Tile Not a program, but a link: Steam cover art for many games, so you can do the same thing with your non-Steam games.
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May 24, 2014 16:58
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SymmetryrtemmyS posted:Not a program, but a link: Steam cover art for many games, so you can do the same thing with your non-Steam games.
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May 24, 2014 17:50
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hirvox posted:Steam Tile's FAQ says that third-party games are not yet supported, but they're working on it. That's too bad. Still an awesome program.
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May 25, 2014 03:34
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Christoff posted:xplorer2 Cubic Explorer is pretty great.
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May 27, 2014 05:22
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XYplorer is also a pretty nice Explorer replacement, and it's portable. Here's an old link I dug up. Despite the 4chan presentation, it has some good information and links: Windows 7 Ricing Reference. It's focused on aesthetic tweaks, but there are quite a few programs recommended as well. Just stay in the top third or so for programs, most of the rest is all visual customization.
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May 27, 2014 06:33
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I've been using Clover which I just updated the OP with recently Clover An extension of the Windows Explorer, to add multi-tab functionality similar to Google Chrome browser(Acts like a browser ctrl+w closes tab, ctrl+t is new tab, ctrl and click a folder opens it in a new tab etc. ). After install Clover, you will be able to open multiple folders within the same window, and you can also add folder bookmarks. Going to give those others a try though. XYplorer looks like xplorer2 but I haven't downloaded either yet.
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May 27, 2014 08:15
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Here is a nice too for making animated .gifs right off your desktop. http://blog.bahraniapps.com/?page_id=21 It is very easy to use and has a built in editor.
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May 28, 2014 23:40
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I tried out the other windows explorer options and I think I'll stick with Q-Dir It's pretty nice, I think clover is the most simple and slick one but if you want up to 4 panes check out Q-dir.
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May 29, 2014 01:57
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Wierd question, but do any of those explorer replacements have a middle-click on a link to open in new tab and/or middle click to close tab functionality?
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May 29, 2014 03:59
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Endymion FRS MK1 posted:Wierd question, but do any of those explorer replacements have a middle-click on a link to open in new tab and/or middle click to close tab functionality? Just checked and clover definitely does -edit and so does q-dir
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May 29, 2014 04:24
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Cubic Explorer has middle click to open, but you double click a tab (or hit the x on the tab) to close it.
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May 29, 2014 04:37
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NinetySevenA posted:Here is a nice too for making animated .gifs right off your desktop. I use GIFcam regularly, but LICEcap is a better option if you're recording high-quality content - it can record in a lossless animated giflike format, .LCF, and I've heard it has a better editing GUI. GIFcam, on the other hand, produces smaller filesizes.
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May 29, 2014 05:41
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I hear Gooncam tends to compress better than Gifcam.
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May 29, 2014 13:11
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FePsTools - graphical front end for SysInternal's PsTools.
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May 29, 2014 14:36
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Christoff posted:Just checked and clover definitely does Lprsti99 posted:Cubic Explorer has middle click to open, but you double click a tab (or hit the x on the tab) to close it. Cool, thanks. I can live with doubleclick if I end up preferring Cubic.
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May 29, 2014 18:29
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I have a huge folder full of these, Ill try to remember and post them. Id also recommend the whole sysinternals suote besides process explorer.
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May 29, 2014 21:21
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I'm not sure exactly what needs changing, but the OP looks kind of disorganized / messy and would probably benefit from reformatting. Also collating the recommendations from the thread as people post them? I might take a shot at re-writing an updated OP when I get a chance.
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May 29, 2014 21:49
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Read posted:I'm not sure exactly what needs changing, but the OP looks kind of disorganized / messy and would probably benefit from reformatting. Also collating the recommendations from the thread as people post them? I might take a shot at re-writing an updated OP when I get a chance. code:Example Application name1 Text description Application name2 Text description Application name3 Text description
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May 29, 2014 21:54
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Also, maybe some kind of grouping?
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May 30, 2014 03:24
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What's the go-to free antivirus nowadays? All my old standbys have gone premium or invasive-ad-supported or they pop up all sorts of annoying poo poo.
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May 30, 2014 17:36
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Evilreaver posted:What's the go-to free antivirus nowadays? All my old standbys have gone premium or invasive-ad-supported or they pop up all sorts of annoying poo poo. My understanding is that Security Essentials is still pretty good for home use even though its quality has been on the decline as of late. I know a few people who really like Avast! but I can't comment on it.
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May 30, 2014 17:56
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Evilreaver posted:What's the go-to free antivirus nowadays? All my old standbys have gone premium or invasive-ad-supported or they pop up all sorts of annoying poo poo. I'm liking avast! quite a bit since switching from Security Essentials.
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May 30, 2014 18:15
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Hrm, I was getting a bunch of annoying popups last I used Avast. Welp, never mind me then.
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May 30, 2014 18:22
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Evilreaver posted:Hrm, I was getting a bunch of annoying popups last I used Avast. Welp, never mind me then. You can turn most of them off if you dig around the settings, if I recall correctly.
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May 30, 2014 18:24
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BlueScreenView Get some more information about your crash. Orthos Test up to two Cores per instance. DNSBench Powerful tool to find the best DNS Servers for a location. Desktop Restore Save and restore Location of Desktop icons. Sadly it seems a bit buggy with multiple displays, still better than not having it at all when updating nvidia drivers. WirelessKeyView Recover the preshared secret for Wireless Networks. Nmap The ultimate tool in network analytics. All I could find quickly, minus one thing I forgot while writing this post.
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May 30, 2014 20:19
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Evilreaver posted:What's the go-to free antivirus nowadays? All my old standbys have gone premium or invasive-ad-supported or they pop up all sorts of annoying poo poo. Avira is really good but the free version does pop up offers in the bottom right every three days or so. But it's one click to dismiss. The last thing I heard on Microsoft Security Essentials is that you don't want to solely rely on it. e: Actually, less often than that, maybe once a week - I just use a bunch of different computers with Avira on them. Manky fucked around with this message at 22:48 on May 30, 2014 |
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May 30, 2014 21:21
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KeePass Open-source password management software. Makes it trivially easy to keep unique and strong passwords for all your accounts, and allows you to customize their format to whatever you need (only letters, letters + numbers, symbols, # of characters, options to collect additional entropy, etc.) and other generally useful features (auto-type on hotkey, option to set an expiration timer to remind you to update to a new password, etc.) There are third-party plugins as well for things like using it from a mobile device or through the web.
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May 30, 2014 21:35
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I'll gently caress around with the OP and clean it up. I was under the impression that Security Essentials is all you need. It seems like a good free anti-virus comes out and then they slowly get lovely because they start adding spyware themselves, installing toolbars, ads, telling you to get the paid version multiple times a day, etc. AVG, Avast!, avira. I'll add poo poo that's been posted so far
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May 30, 2014 21:45
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MikeJF posted:You can turn most of them off if you dig around the settings, if I recall correctly.  That's what you want to hit.
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May 30, 2014 21:49
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Mo_Steel posted:KeePass Seconding this recommendation. Use this with your favorite free cloud backup solution and get synced passwords for your devices. I'm not sure why people are paying for password management software when this is around. It's cross platform with pretty much everything.
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May 31, 2014 00:45
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lostleaf posted:Seconding this recommendation. Use this with your favorite free cloud backup solution and get synced passwords for your devices. I'm not sure why people are paying for password management software when this is around. It's cross platform with pretty much everything. Lastpass auto fills passwords in apps and in the browser on Android. For this one feature alone I gladly pay $1/month.
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May 31, 2014 02:54
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