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avast! Free Antivirus Expect great all-around protection against viruses and trojans. Download |
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AntiVir Free Version Lightweight and solid. Good ratings. Worth looking into. Download |
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AVG Antivirus Free Edition Not as good as Avast or Avira but with considerably less bloat. The most popular free antivirus. Download |
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Microsoft Security Essentials Simple, lightweight and competent protection suite. Download |
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Comodo Internet Security Free security suite, includes both a firewall and anti-virus protection. Download |
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Spybot S&D Detects and removes spyware. Compliments anti-virus apps. Download |
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Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware Easy-to-use, simple, and effective anti-malware application. Download |
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IObit Security 360 Free Advanced malware & spyware removal utility. Download |
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Threatfire Real-time antispyware protection. Lightweight and memory sparing. Download |
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Superantispyware Lightweight scanner to detect and remove spyware, adware, trojans, and other threats. Download |
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PC Tools Firewall Plus 6 Powerful firewall capable of providing excellent protection. Download |
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Comodo Firewall (standalone) Long been considered one of the best free firewall tools available. Download |
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ZoneAlarm Free Firewall Provides the best overall firewall protection for advanced users. Download |
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Online Armor Free All of the normal features of a firewall and more. Download |
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Ashampoo FireWall Free Very easy to use and navigate. For intermediate users. Download |
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Auslogics Disk Defrag Simple, reliable and quite fast. A must-have free PC tool. Considered no.1 by many. Download |
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Defraggler Another excellent defrag tool. Portable. From the same guys behind hugely popular CCleaner. Download |
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IObit Smart Defrag Extremely easy to use. Works continuously in the background. Download |
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Recuva Very effective in restoring deleted files. Extremely popular. Download |
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FreeUndelete No frills, just focused on the zen of file recovery. Download |
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ADRC Data Recovery Software The Renaissance Man of free data recovery. Not as popular as Recuva but still has its own fans. Download |
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Revo Uninstaller Free Fast and very effective at uninstalling just about anything. Popular choice for the purpose. Download |
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IObit Uninstaller New kid on the block. Gaining popularity. Boasts a bunch of features not found on other uninstallers. Download |
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Absolute Uninstaller Less popular than the other two but probably the simplest to use one. Download |
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Mozy Incredibly smart, highly secure, set-it-and-forget-it backup solution. Backups data to web. Download |
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FBackup Backup files and documents, personal settings and plugins. Download |
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Todo Backup Able to backup the entire operating system, program settings, browser data, emails and other data. Download |
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Clonezilla Live CD to completely clone your hard drive. Download |
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SyncBack Freeware Selective synchronisation, local and remote backup to an FTP server. Download |
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FreeFileSync Open source folder comparison and sync tool. Optimised for speed and usability. Download |
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CopyTo Synchronizer Wide set of options for backing up, updating, and synchronizing files. Download |
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Glary Utilities Includes over 15 useful tools. Been recommended by MakeUseOf several times! Download |
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CCleaner Scores high points all around. The most popular choice at the moment. Not as many features as in others. Download |
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IObit Toolbox The amount of system maintenance tools included in this free app is truly staggering. Download |
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Soluto Speed up Windows boot time by removing unnecessary apps from startup. Very effective. Download |
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IObit Advanced SystemCare Free One-click approach to help protect, repair, clean, and optimize your PC. Download |
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Google Chrome The fastest, minimal design browser now with extension support. Download |
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Firefox More than 6,000 add-ons for every possible feature. The most customisable browser to date. Download |
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Safari Designed to emphasize browsing. Also features extensions. Download |
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Opera The “fastest and most advanced” browser available today. Download |
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Thunderbird Increasingly popular. One of the best email clients for Windows. Download |
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Postbox Express A simple, yet powerful, new email application for Windows. Download |
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Google Notifier Alerts you when you have new Gmail messages. Download |
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Skype The most popular cross-platform VoIP application. Must-have for everyone online. Download |
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Pidgin Easy-to-use, cross-platform, multi-protocol chat client. Supports all major chat programs. Download |
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Digsby An alternative multi-protocol instant messaging app. Cross-platform. Extremely popular. Download |
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Trillian Astra Popular multi-protocol instant messaging client. Download |
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Paint.NET Strong candidate as a potential substitute for Photoshop for beginner/intermediate users. Download |
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FastStone Image Viewer One of the best image viewer, converter & editor bundles. Download |
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IrfanView The Swiss Army knife of image viewers/editors. Extremely popular. Download |
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Google Picasa Powerful photo manager software from Google. Includes 1-click photo retouching features. Easy online photo sharing. Download |
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GIMP Very capable graphic editor with Photoshop-like features. Often labeled as free Photoshop alternative. Download |
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PhotoScape Another good free photo editing application. Download |
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foobar2000 Highly customisable advanced audio player for Windows. Download |
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Songbird A popular music player based on Mozilla’s code. Includes plugins. Download |
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Audacity Very popular open source software for recording and editing sounds. Download |
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iTunes Music player and video library organiser. Hosts the iTunes Store. Download |
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MediaMonkey Full-featured music player and music collection organiser. Download |
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Winamp Well-known, lightweight, small-footprint media player. Download |
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CopyTrans Manager Alternative iPod manager app. Sync and transfer music & files to iPod, iPhone, iPad. Download |
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VLC Media Player Extremely popular cross-platform app that plays almost any video file. Download |
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Handbrake Open source, cross-platform, multithreaded video transcoder and converter. Download |
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VirtualDub Open-source and portable video editor. Download |
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Media Player Classic Replica of WM Player. Includes only the most basic controls. Plays many formats. Download |
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Freemake Free video converter & DVD burner that’s easy to use. Download |
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Format Factory Multifunctional media converter. Supports MP4, AVI, WMV, FLV, SWF, RMVB and lots more. Download |
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KMPlayer Highly customisable, multi-format video player. Download |
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FileMenu Tools Customise the context menu of Windows Explorer. Add customised commands, utilities. Download |
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FreeCommander Free file browser and Explorer replacement. Two-pane browsing, secure file deletion. Download |
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TeraCopy Copy and move files at maximum speed. Pause and resume file transfers. Download |
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EASEUS Partition Master All-in-one partition manager. Create, resize and merge partitions. Download |
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Unlocker Kills or unlocks unresponsive programs or system processes. Download |
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TreeSize Free Shows you where your precious hard drive space has gone to. Download |
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DropIt Tiny, flexible tool to automate sorting and filing data files and folders. Portable version available. Download |
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LibreOffice Microsoft Office alternative. Open source professional productivity and office suite. Download |
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Dropbox Must-have for everyone. Sync folder with docs to web or other PCs / Macs. Share documents. Download |
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Notepad++ Popular open source text editor. Favoured by many, including programmers. Download |
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FoxIt Reader Really light alternative to Adobe Reader. Open PDF files. Download |
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doPDF Easily convert documents and pictures to PDF from any Windows program with two clicks. Download |
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PDF Xchange viewer Desktop and portable PDF viewer. Lightweight and fast. Download |
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Nitro PDF Reader Read, create PDFs. Extract content, annotate and fill PDF forms. Download |
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OpenOffice A popular free alternative to Microsoft Office. Download |
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PDFTK Builder Free graphical interface version of PDFTK. Merge, split, decrypt, encrypt, watermark PDF files. Download |
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Fences Provides rectangular containers for your desktop to visually organize your icons. Handy! Download |
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Rainlender Very easy to use and lightweight calendar for your Windows desktop. Download |
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Evernote Save your ideas on the go and instantly take notes. Access notes from anywhere. Highly recommended! Download |
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VirtuaWin Gives you multiple virtual desktops to organize your workflow. Highly customisable. Download |
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Launchy A powerful keystroke based program launcher. Replaces the Start button. Download |
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Send to Toys Enhances the Send To system menu. Personalise and configure the Send To menu content. Download |
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Dexpot Create virtual desktops to separate different running apps. Comparable to Spaces on Mac OS X. Download |
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Q-Dir Free multi-pane file manager to save you time. Portable version available. Download |
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ClipX Tiny, free clipboard history manager. Access up to 1024 items in your clipboard’s history. Download |
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7-zip Takes care of most of your extracting/compression needs. Download |
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Universal Extractor With over 50 supported file formats, Universal Extractor is superb. Download |
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IZArc One archive utility to rule them all. Supports almost all formats. Download |
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ImgBurn CD/DVD/HD-DVD/Blu-ray burning application. Also, lets you create image files from CDs and DVDs. Download |
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CDBurnerXP The most popular free alternative to Nero Burning ROM. Burn CDs, DVDs, Blu-Ray and HD-DVDs. Download |
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bitRipper Back-up your DVDs as AVI files or Mpeg to your hard drive. Excellent backup tool for DVDs. Download |
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CDex Open-source digital audio CD extractor. Saves CD tracks as MP3′s. Download |
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DuBaron CD2ISO A great tool to extract ISO images from CDs or DVDs. Very simple and easy to use. Download |
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Virtual CloneDrive Mount a virtual drive to open and playback ISO image files (CD/DVD images). Download |
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DVDShrink The easiest and one of the better free DVD ripping and backup tools. Download |
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Exact Audio Copy The most accurate and error-free audio CD extractor. Download |
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DVD Flick Easy-to-use DVD creation software. Subtitles, menu support. Download |
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uTorrent Speedy, efficient, and free. The most popular BitTorrent client. Download |
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Deluge An awesome but unappreciated cross-platform BitTorrent client. Download |
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YouTube Downloader HD Downloads YouTube videos with just a few clicks of the mouse button. Download |
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PeerBlock Control/block your PC’s communication with ad or spyware servers. Secures P2P activities. Download |
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Free Download Manager Open source download accelerator and manager. Increase download speeds and resume broken downloads. Download |
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LastPass Secure plugin to store and synchronise passwords across browsers. Download |
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TrueCrypt Free open-source, cross-platform disk encryption software. Encrypt and hide sensitive files. Download |
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TeamViewer Request remote technical assistance. Zero setup required. Download |
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PortableApps Suite A collection of useful portable apps. Carry the apps with you wherever you go on a thumbdrive. Download |
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Sticky Password Free password and identity manager. Browser add-on for automatic form-filling. Download |
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KeePass Free, open source, lightweight and easy-to-use password manager. Download |
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LiberKey Suite of over 300 free portable apps in a sleek graphical user interface. Download |
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Hiren’s BootCD All-in-one bootable CD providing an alternate boot environment to troubleshoot Windows problems. Download |
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Eraser Advanced security tool to completely remove sensitive data from your hard drive. Download |
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iPrint Print multiple pages on each sheet of paper, delete unwanted pages. Lowers printing costs. Download Source: http://www.makeuseof.com/pages/best-windows-software |
