The Best Desktop Programs That Will Make Your Life Easier

Dear Readers,

(Last Updated June 8, 2009 @ 8:01 pm EST)

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Today, I’m going to give a list of must have programs for your desktop and a brief description of what they do and where you can get them..(This list is in no particular order)

1. Virus Scan - Well this one is pretty easy…A Virus scan, scans for viruses and other unwanted malicious programming code. I would recommend getting AVIRA or AVAST. Both can be downloaded @ download.com

2. WinRaR- is used to decompress or compress files you can also password lock said files. WinRaR is a must have if you are using any P2P software programs and is needed for most files downloaded from the Internet. The main reason being because in can compress files to a really small size. You can download this program also from www.download.com and does not come with any adware or spyware bundled with it if it is downloaded from the site above. WinRaR is also trialware in most cases and there for also has a message that pops up after 15-30 days saying please register for full version.

3. Adobe Reader- is used to read PDF documents and a must have for any desktop. The Adobe site should have it and the reader is free with no limatations. (Currently Adobe is at version 9.1)

4. A Media player- Pretty much any type of media player will do. The media player is there so you can play media files such as music and movies. The main one I would recommend is VLC. VLC is free and easy to find and provided you download the K-lite codecs pack from www.free-codecs.com. VLC will play pretty much any file you can throw at it and believe me I have tried some pretty exotic combos and it has passed. Pretty much every time.

6. Windows Live Messenger- This program is used to monitor your hotmail account and to talk with friends or family via text, video or voice. (WLM) is really safe and I would not know what to do without it.

7. Mozilla FireFox 3- This is alternative Internet browser. FireFox is used as your Internet web browser  instead of pre-packaged Internet Explorer that comes with Windows. FireFox is generally a lot faster then IE and it is a lot cleaner looking. But that does depend on what set-up and theme you choose. I personally like darker themes so thous I use “REDSHIFT”. FireFox has hundreds of mods you can choose  from to find the one you like the best. Just remember to update both the mod and the FireFox itself. So you are less likely to run into an issue. There are also a  lot of add-ons you can use like adblock plus and different types of dictionary. But also be aware that some sites will not work well with certain add-ons.

5. Alcohol 52% - This program is used to mounts and dismounts cd/dvd on a virtual drive. So you can play games with out the CD in the drive. You can also play ISO’s files with Alcohol 52%. The best part is it is free and you can find it at www.download.com and there is no spyware or adware bundled with this software from my tests.

Till my next post,

Se7en