Good, Free Windows Software

  1. Mozilla.org offers the original Mozilla browser suite, though it is being phased out in favor of the FireFox browser and Thunderbird e-mail program, along with a few other separate applications. Each is described and linked for download on the home page. They are fairly secure, and can be configured to be extremely secure. The old Mozilla Suite itself has been replaced with the the Seamonkey Suite.
  2. Opera offers a complete browser suite, too. It is comes in a smaller package, runs a bit faster, and is also quite secure. At one time, the free version displayed ads in the browser fram, but recently Opera dicontinued that practice. Now they give you the same browser either way. However, support services will cost you.
  3. The Windows 98SE Unofficial Service Pack. This appears to work quite well in keeping 98 alive and as well as it can be. It adds a few features missing, however the user should know it will invariably cause problems on some machines. Still, I believe it's worth at try, in spite of being 10MB, a big time commitment on dialup.
  4. Zone Alarm (Free Version). The famous free firewall for Win-boxes. Nothing is perfect, but this works suprisingly well. For older machines, say under 500Mhz processor speed, or with less than 64MB RAM, I'd recommend you try to find the older version of Zone Alarm, something 3.x or 4.x. Some people have copies of the installer saved from an old machine (like I do) and it takes less resources than the latest 5.x. The primary difference is that the newer one checks and blocks more kinds of Net activity than just connection attempts.
  5. AVG Anti-virus (Free Version). For free, it's hard to beat this anti-virus software. The producer updates almost daily, so you can be sure you'll be able to stay on top of virus definitions. Grisoft has a paid version, and gladly offers a franchise to anyone who wants to sell it. For the free version, you have to go through the rigamarole of registering and waiting for them to mail you a free key to install. However, there's nothing that prevents you from using one key for multiple installs. Like any good AV product, it has a hook for checking e-mail against viruses, too.
  6. F-Prot Anti-virus is better for older machines and older versions of Windows. The Windows version is not free. The free version is a small DOS program that runs quietly in the background, and offers free updates.
  7. SpyBot Search & Destroy. This a very popular and effective program for removing spyware, and now blocks the installation of new spyware. The "Tea Timer" guard program will ask if you want to make changes to your system every time a program tries to install itself. You can permit safe programs by clicking "permit," while getting a warning if some sneaky program tries to hide itself in your system. Free to download, free updates can be downloaded through the program interface.

  8. Lavasoft AdAware. The original anti-spyware application. This one scans your Win-box for invasive junk that can slow your system and compromise your privacy. Those who install games, even from purchased CDs, will find this a perfect clean up tool to remove all the junk that gets bundled with some. Too bad I can't convince folks to boycott game producers who feel they have an inherent right to hijack your computer just because you install their games. AdAware offers periodic updates to the definitions file.
  9. Easy Cleaner from Toni Arts. This is by far the most full-service system cleaning tool I've found. It's primary function is to remove junk entries from the Windows Registry. Most software installers really botch the cleanup process when uninstalling. But this application also hunts down junk temporary files left by too many applications, along with duplicates you may not want, and a host of other maintenance tasks. This set of tools should have been built into Windows in the first place.
  10. 2X Explorer. I generally can't stand using Explorer. For file management, there's nothing like the original Navigator, but I like drag-n-drop. This thing pops up instantly on most machines, and has three window panes: one tree and two file lists. All the old F-keys work, but so does the mouse. Clicking icons works about the same as Explorer, as do all the context menu options. It simply works so much better, I can't imagine having to limit myself with the default file manager.

Everybody needs a good, reliable text editor. One of my favorites in win-world is NoteTab Light with a clips window, syntax highlighting, and quite configurable. Naturally the free version has limitations. NotePad2 is, in my opinion, the best drop-in replacement for Note Pad. You can also get my old favorite, Joe's Own Editor compiled for Win32. It's the same console-based interface, the same config options, everything, just like Joe on Unix/Linux. There's also a 16-bit DOS version. In fact, the link will show a page that offers quite a diverse collection of binaries.

Given the ubiquity of Windows systems in the world, it stands to reason googling for help and information is relatively painless. Quite often I've found precisely what I needed, with step-by-step instructions even I could understand, so there's not much need for listing help sites. However, a few stand out as good places to check on those unidentified processes you find in XP. I rather like AnswersThatWork just as a place that has a good list of system services. This one covers earlier versions of Windows, too. The Elder Geek is another good one, though I find the index a bit difficult to follow at times -- strictly keyed to official terminology. Beemer's site has a nice list of candidates for removal, with detailed explanations why. Googling for a specific process name or program name will usually turn up a collection of page links that will explain well, though you will likely get a few fakes. One outfit in particular labels anything and everything as spyware in an effort to sell their junk software, yet gets consistently high ranking on Google.

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