Im just sharing the love with friends who are as cheap as me who want no-cost solutions which are better than expensive underperforming retail software.I wont provide tech support; each of these programs have well documented instructions and are as easy as pie to set up. ;-Þ
Here’s the shortlist of top-priority programs I use:
Avast Antivirus – My favorite free software of all time.
http://www.avast.com
If you have the heavy and slow Norton’s or McAfee’s, install Avast instead and dump the other ones. This is fast and light and doesnt weigh down your system with a bunch of bloated bs. I cant count how many times Ive had to fix friends computers because they were running sluggish because of Nortons and McAfee.
Avast has the highest rating of all free antivirus programs, even better than AVG. Ive been using this for years, it verbally tells you when it has autoupdated. (Register at their site to get the free registration key in your email.)
Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware 1.28
http://www.download.com/Malwarebytes-Anti-Malware/3000-8022_4-10804572.html?tag=mncol&cdlPid=10878968
The newest up and comer in free malware detection. Great reviews.
Mozilla Firefox Internet browser
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/
Use this if you dont like Internet Explorer. (note that you can speed up Internet Explorer by turning off the “phishing” filter, but if you visit alot of pimp myspace type of sites you probably want to leave the phishing filter enabled)
YPOPs!
http://ypopsemail.com/
This program allows you to use Outlook Express or Outlook to access your yahoo email account.
Multimedia (combination of 2 items):
Combined Community Codec Pack and VideoLan
http://www.cccp-project.net/
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
Tired of video clips not always playing correctly?
Install both of these and you’ll be able to play almost all multidmedia files known to man.
Realmedia alternative and Quicktime alternatives:
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/real_Alternative.htm
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/quicktime_alternative.htm
I hated both quicktime and realplayer always hijiacking my media players and inserting themselves in my system tray even when i configured them not to. The alternative players use the old media player classic to play those two types of media using the classic windows media player which is hidden inside your operating system. Great programs both.
If you have any favorites of your own, by all means share ‘em!
