What Are Your Essential Apps?

[Chris Gohlke]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/maximum_pcs_32_totally_essential_apps?page=0,0&EMC-R3A917316679=' target='_blank'>http://www.maximumpc.com/article/fe...C-R3A917316679=</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"We've put together a list of what we think are the most essential PC apps for every Maximum PC reader. These are all free programs (except one) that should be immediately installed after a fresh build or reformat; 32 indispensable programs and utilities that we couldn't imagine computing without. From the best IM client to FTP browser and Notepad replacement, these essentials truly enhance the Windows experience (much more so than Microsoft's own Windows LIVE Essentials). We're not saying you'd use all 32 entries in our list on a daily basis, but if you are at all serious about utilizing your PC, we promise our picks will not go unused."</em></p><p>Pretty good listing.&nbsp; I've got my own list of essentials which have a few in common with their list.&nbsp; When I set up a new PC, I install the following:&nbsp; AVG anti-virus, Spybot, Zone Alarm Free, OpenOffice, Firefox, Irfanview, and Miro.&nbsp; What is your list of essentials?</p>

[Eriq Cook]

Outlook
Quickbooks
Dreamweaver
Photoshop
Zune (gotta listen to music while I work LOL)
All open 24-7.

[EDIT] Almost forgot:

Roboform
eWallet
Life would be mess without 'em

[kettch]

I must not be very hard core. I've only got a bare handful of the apps on their list. Every once in a while I try out some app based on one of these lists, but I inevitably go back to the built in tools, or something from a better known vendor. They may have more features, but far too many of these utility ISV's have absolutely no concept of a proper user experience, or even simple fit and finish.

Some notable apps for me are always MS Office, Visual Studio, Expression Studio, Adobe Lightroom, and Adobe Creative Suite. However, my total list of items in my installed items list usually hits at 200-250 before I start to feel comfortable on a machine.

[Rob Alexander]

So they have some good apps listed, but I don't get the sense that there was any real consideration given to their choices beyond just these being what they happen to use. There were several apps listed that I thought were outclassed by their competitors. My own list? I'll let some of my choices be inspired by theirs.

Syncplicity. This is so much better than their suggestion of Drop Box that I'm amazed they haven't tried it. As with DB, you get 2GB for free or 50GB for $100/year, but the software is extremely well-done. It takes almost no system resources when it's idle, it gracefully defers to your foreground applications when it's working and it's quite fast and reliable. I use it to keep my data files synchronized between the three computers I use and I can't tell you how much of a pleasure it is to work for a few minutes on a file, then head off to a meeting with my UMPC and find the changed file right there for me to access. Same between moving from work to home. Among the competitors, I give easiest interface award to MS Live Mesh, but it's a total CPU hog, grabbing most of one entire core while sitting idle. If MS ever solves that problem, I'll probably move back to it because it also includes a Windows Mobile client so you can also keep files synced between your desktops and your smartphone.

Windows Search 4.0. Look, they're just not going to list anything by MS on principle, but this is completely integrated into your system, it's light on resources and it does everything they list for Copernic. This is a no-brainer, doing exactly what you want it to and doing it well.

Winamp. Sorry if it's not trendy anymore, but no one else has ever bothered to put a nice light MP3 player into a package that rolls up into a tiny bar at the top of my screen and that also responds to my keyboard controls. They can fill their screen with foobar2000 if they want. I'll stick with an unobtrusive player that does exactly what I need.

eWallet. Excellent data safe software for storing account numbers, ID, passwords, health information, etc. Yeah, this was first written for Pocket PCs, but the desktop client is great also and it will sync between the two. Same thing for Listpro from the same people.

Winzip. The trouble with 7-zip and all those other free ones is that they're instrusive, changing lots of default settings in your system without asking and sneaking in toolbars and such. With Winzip, you can configure the perfect little compression app that works simply and easily. I turn on the context menus, but then I uncheck all of the options except unzip to here and unzip to <filename> folder. It's quick and easy and still works better than any other zip application out there. Plus it supports all the compression types they mention in their article.

Bulk Rename Utility. The developer stopped adding new versions, but it's still the best, most flexible renaming tool I've ever used and it's free. Because it can take a few minutes to work out the best settings for a particular camera or MP3 ripping program, it lets you save your settings in files so that you can open it right up ready for files from that particular source.

Norton Internet Security 2009. Forget everything you think you know from the big, bloated Nortons of the past. This is what every security program should always have been. For this version Symantec went back to the drawing boards and coded an application with the user in mind. It's extremely light on resources while sitting idle and it defers to the rest of your system for anything but a serious threat. For example, remember the old style of scanning once a week at 6:00 pm? Now it still scans once a week (or however often you ask it), but now it does it in pieces when your computer is idle. You stop working for awhile and it scans some files. You come back and it stops. When it has finished scanning (which might even take a few days), it's done for the week and it starts that over again next time. Yet for all of its newfound unobstrusiveness, it's even better than before at protecting you. You still have regular live updates, but if a threat arises, it will burst an update to your system without waiting for the next scheduled update. If you watch the deal sites, you can get it for free if you're lucky, or for about $10 most of the time. One little trick that not everyone knows is that the CD Key for NIS 2008 also works with NIS 2009. So you can buy an obsolete 2008 version at next to nothing, then download the 2009 trial from Symantec and use your 2008 key to unlock it. I haven't paid a penny for any of my four copies (yet they're all legal).

I also differ with them on major apps (I use MS Office 2007, Photoshop CS4, Premiere Pro CS4, etc.), but those aren't so much things you add to your computer as they are the reason you own a computer in the first place. Everyone has reasons why they make their own choices there.

I second their choices of: AnyDVD, Filezilla, Skype, Picasa, Google Earth and Virtual Dub.

[Stinger]

I keep a USB memory stick with all of my essential apps and drivers on it.

Free: Google Chrome (web browser) Filezilla (FTP software) Picasa (photo ablum software) SyncToy (back-up tool) iTunes (media player) GIMP (photo editor) Handbrake (video encoder) Steam (games content delivery system) VLC Media Player (media player) 7-Zip (zip/rar software) Nokia PC Suite (various phone tools) DVDShrink (DVD ripper)Commercial: Office (office software :)) AnyDVD (DVD decrypter) I'm surprised at how little commercial software I use!

[Jason Dunn]

I have some apps that I install on specific systems for specific purposes, but in general every computer I'm at has the following installed:

Picasa
Office 2007
VLC Media Player
Zune software
FlexWallet
Windows Live Mail
SnagIt
Live Sync (formerly FolderShare)
Live Messenger
WinZip

...and that's about it.

[Jason Dunn]

Handbrake (video encoder)

I swear that Handbrake works great for everyone except me. I installed it a few days ago, and tried to convert a few of my files. I find it a very puzzling application - some presets work, some don't. Some let you specify the resolution (useful if you want to down-sample), some don't. It either crashed or errored out on the encoding for me six times. The next day, my computer wouldn't turn on the display - the monitor would stay in sleep mode. I did a reset, Windows would boot, but right before Windows would load, the monitor would do the same thing again. Totally baffling. I did a system restore, and all was working again. The only program I installed during that time was Handbrake, yet it's illogical that it would do something like that to my system. Very strange all in all, but I remain very dubious on Handbrake...

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

Norton Internet Security 2009. Forget everything you think you know from the big, bloated Nortons of the past. This is what every security program should always have been.

Oh man, I wish the office would use this then. Bloody thing is freaking irritating in the morning...

[Stinger]

I swear that Handbrake works great for everyone except me. I installed it a few days ago, and tried to convert a few of my files. I find it a very puzzling application - some presets work, some don't. Some let you specify the resolution (useful if you want to down-sample), some don't. It either crashed or errored out on the encoding for me six times.

Do you have VLC Media Player installed? I believe that the latest version of Handbrake (0.9.3) requires it.

Odd that it won't let you change the output resolution. Everything works fine under Vista x64 for me.

[Jason Dunn]

Do you have VLC Media Player installed? I believe that the latest version of Handbrake (0.9.3) requires it.

Yes, I have it installed. It was an older version (0.8.x), so I'll upgrade it and maybe try again...