The Freeware Thread v2.0 (Updated: 3/16/2008)

[JustinC939]

The Freeware Thread v2.0

• Anti Malware/Security
  • firewalls, anti-virus. removal tools
    
• MultiMediaMayhem
  • media players, cd/dvd burning ripping, codecs
• Office & Productivity
  • office suites, document readers, file management
• Web Communication & E-Mail
  • web browsers, email, IM clients, remote desktop
• Download & File Transfer Tools
  • FTP, bit torrnt, p2p
    
• Benchmarking & Diagnostics
  • you get the idea
• Games & Related
  • free games!
• SFX & Compression Utilities
  • unzip programs, sfx install builders, setup creators.
• Operating Systems
  • in a world without walls and fences, who needs windows and gates?

Acknowledgments: Andrew M., JustinC939, Alexander "Namek" Hames, Ned Slider

[JustinC939]

Anti-Malware/Security

• Spybot S&D
• Lavasoft AdAware
• Super Anti-Spyware
• Spyware Blaster
• AVG Anti Virus
• Avira Anti Virus
• SecretMaker - multi-use privacy utility
• MoveOnBoot
• Comodo Firewall
• Ashampoo Firewall
• Linuz Torvalds's Anti Malware Suite

[JustinC939]

MultiMedia Mayhem

Media Players

• VLC Media Player
• FLV Player
• Windows Media Player Classic
• Divx Player
• WinAmp Media Player
• Xvid Codec
• XP Codec Pack - various codecs for WinXP
• Vista Codec Pack - For Vista
• QuickTime Alternative
• Real Player Alternative

CD/DVD Burning & Ripping

• CD Burner XP Pro
• BurnAware
• InfraRecorder
• DP CD DVD Burner
• Donar CD Ripper
• DVD Shrink
• DVDFab HD Decrypter
  
• nlite - tool for customising Windows XP CDs and slipstreaming updates.
• IMGBurn - standalone tool for burning CD images.
• K3B - KDE CD Burning for Linux
• Brasero - Gnome CD Burning for Linux

Media Editing

• Audacity - Audio editing tool
• SoundEngine
  
• The GIMP - Photoshop alternative
• Paint.NET - free image editor
• Picasa - see above.
• Dia for Windows tool for drawing diagrams

Online Media Players

• Google Video Player
• TV Free online TV
• Joost Online TV by free subscription
• Pandora OpenPandora Free Internet Radio

[Namek]

Office and Productivity

• OpenOffice.org
• StarOffice
• Notepad++ - Source code editor
• PDF Creator
• Blender - 3D content creation suite
• Google Pack - various useful programs
• BullZip PDF Printer
• Foxit Reader - Acrobat Alternative
• doPDF
• Free Commander - Alternative File Manager
• DAMN NFO Viewer
• VirtuaWin - program for managing desktops similar to the way it's done in Linux
• Ebay TurboLister
• CloneZilla - Norton Ghost alternative
• Wordpress - Blogging Tool

[JustinC939]

Web, Communication and Email

• Firefox
• Opera Web Browser
• Maxthon
• Safari 3 - still in beta
• Internet Exploder
• Mozilla Seamonkey - internet application suite
• Thunderbird Email
• Foxmail
• Miranda IM Client
• Pidgin IM Client
• Omea RSS Reader
• Xchat free for linux
• Tight VNC free remote desktop solution

[JustinC939]

Download & File Transfer Tools

• FTP Commander
• WinSCP - FTP program
  
• FileZilla
• SmartFTP
• uTorrent
• Official BitTorrent Client
• Save2PC - YouTube Downloader
  
• YouTube Grabber

[Namek]

Benchmarking & Diagnostics

• CPU-Z - CPU / Motherboard Information
• Speedtest.net - Bandwidth Testing
• Memtest86+ - RAM Testing
• Futuremark's Benchmarks
• Wireshark - Network Monitoring (Formerly Ethereal)
• Hot CPU Tester Pro (lite)
• Speedfan - Fan & Temperature Monitoring
• TestDisk - Hard disk testing
• CPU-ID PC Wizard - Replacement for the aging AIDA32 & Everest

[Namek]

Games & Related

• Flight Gear- Flight Sim
• Phun- 2D Physics Sandbox
• Knight Online- MMORPG
• XFire - Connect with gaming friends
• ZSNES- SNES Emulator (Homebrew ROMs only!)
• FCEU - NES / Famicom Emulator (Homebrew ROMs only!)

[JustinC939]

SFX & Compression Utilities

• IZarc - File Compression
• 7-Zip - File Compression
• SFX Compiler - Self Extracting File Compression
• SFX Tool - Setup Creator
• Paquet Builder - Replacement for DSFX Wizard - Self Extracting FC & Setup Creator
• Inno Setup - Setup Creator

[Namek]

Operating Systems

• Wikipedia Comparison of Linux Distributions
• The *buntus: Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu
• Slackware
• Fedora
• Debian
• ReactOS
• SimplyMEPIS
• Windows XP Professional ... just kidding

Alex's Todo: Add programming section with compilers and such. (activestate activeperl / python / c / java / etc etc) Add descriptions for some of the lesser known programs.

[IAmGhostDog]

Nice job.

Here are two that I use regularly.

FireFTP

PCWizard 2008

[Ned Slider]

Great job guys

Some thoughts on stuff for inclusion, but I don't know what category it would fit into... Virtualization is currently a hot topic and there are many freely available products like VMware Server, VMware Player, MS VirtualPC, VirtualBox, Parallels, QEMU, Xen etc

^^ There's probably enough there for it's own category

...I'll leave you to google the links, and feel free to delete/tidy up when you're done

[JustinC939]

Great job guys

Some thoughts on stuff for inclusion, but I don't know what category it would fit into... Virtualization is currently a hot topic and there are many freely available products like VMware Server, VMware Player, MS VirtualPC, VirtualBox, Parallels, QEMU, Xen etc

^^ There's probably enough there for it's own category

...I'll leave you to google the links, and feel free to delete/tidy up when you're done

Darn, I completly forgot about those

We decieded on using fewer, more general categories in hopes this woul be easier to update than the old one, but I'm not sure where virtualization can go in the existing categories.

I suppose it would loosley fit in "Productivity" as a sub-category....

[hunter4u]

wasnt there a section on for use on hard drives and such before, like partitioners and all that jazz?
came looking for one for a friend and it is gone@
lol

[JustinC939]

I plan on updating this thread in the near future, so if anyone has found some good free proggys in the past year, please post them here!

Thanks!