Essential Software for new computers

Oooh forgot about music. I'll add that in. Screen recorders are iffy, buuuut they come in handy if you do trades in the market, so I will add it this Sunday when I get home.

 

Check out www.ninite.com. it has installers for all of the bare necessities and they download and install as 1 installer, no add-ons.

Foxit reader is a great alternative to Adobe reader. Adobe flash and shockwave are also needed. Java is also needed. Auslogics disk defrag is another very nice optimization tool.

uTorrent for downloaders is crucial. UltraVNC, Teamviewer, or Radmin is a good alternative to LogMeIn on a LAN. Flux helps the eye strain for long gaming sessions. iTunes or Songbird is good for music.

For other audio things, I suggest the Klite mega codec pack for video and audio codecs, skype for video conferencing, VLC media player for videos and audio files with wonky extensions.

Pigin or Trillian for IM clients.

Rocketdock for a clean desktop.

Daemon tools for ISO mounting.

Speedfan to hack your computers fans and set them to high. Windirstat to figure out where the hell all your files are and what is using up your HDD

 

I literally have all but like two of the programs you posted lol.. but thanks yo

 

/5char

 

Actually, statistically speaking, torrents are more widely used for downloading legal applications than illegal. Their utilization of bandwidth distribution makes them an idea downloader for large applications, especially across a LAN.

 

You definitely could post a link to uTorrent if you wanted. A lot of free/open software is distributed by torrents:
http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/alternative-downloads
http://www.openoffice.org/distribution/p2p/
http://www.libreoffice.org/download/
http://www.debian.org/CD/torrent-cd/
etc
Blizzard's updater is basically a torrent client. Torrents are used for a lot more than piracy.

 

I DON'T WANT TO THOLOL updating after classes

 

you cant forget malwarebytes (http://www.malwarebytes.org/)

 

Just got a new laptop and decided to get AVG and Skype. Thanks for the info!

 

Awesome, would you say that AVG is the best free anti-virus software out there?

 

It's always what I've used, but that doesn't mean it's the best. It does its job, so I'm sticking with it

 

That's the same with me - I've had no problems so why try fixing what isn't broken.

 

I would like to suggest a section highlighting portable applications that you can easily throw on a flash drive and take as you please. Or even for daily use if the user doesn't want to install programs or if maybe they don't have admin privileges on their new computer. Many of the applications you listed also come in this portable format. Portable Apps

Also, possibly a music section. I know WMP is already mentioned, but I personally refuse to use it. I prefer WinAmp for a similar feel and much better functionality. It an rip an audio CD to the .flac format natively (had to throw this in). It also has a free (and decent) add on for online radio from shoutcast (possibly other sites as well).

And there is also ImgBurn for burning basically anything you need to burn to a disc. I have used it to burn all my Linux distribution .ISO files and have had zero problems no matter how small or big (500MB to 1.5GB or more) the disc image is. I also use it to burn audio CDs and they sound wonderful. Great utility to have.

Lastly, maybe you could include a section on free software for backing up files. I use Cobian Backup 11 Gravity. The available options are far beyond what any normal user needs but also is very simple and easy to use. So it has the needed basic functionality and also the ability to expand as needed without looking for new software.

 

Just out of curiosity, but why is Google Docs not on the list here? I think it's qualified as a decent document builder at this point? And the fact that you can transfer/view documents between/from multiple PCs...

Also, should put up Amazon Cloud Drive & Google Drive as they both, while not pertinent... are highly advantageous. Both provide 5GB of (free) storage for whatever you want (provided it's not illegal).

 

There is a very useful page we use at college for setting up computers.

http://ninite.com/

It's very useful honestly. You can install multiple programs at once. Someone can verify it as well.

*LOL WOOPS SOMEONE BEAT ME TO IT, HAHA SORRY*

Add Virtual clone drive to that list, as well as Dropbox!

 

Adding ninite.com as a footnote for a go-to place for most of these downloads

 

A pretty decent sticky, when I build my next personal computer I'll definitely go down the list here and see if I missed anything. I'll check back in the morning and see if there are any important downloads that I can think of.

 

I would recommend f.lux. It's a great program to use if you do anything on your computer at night. Definitely lessens the strain on my eyes.

 

This, Tuneup Utilities and Game Booster.

 

Ninite is absolutely amazing. Thanks for adding it to this list. It's one I'll definitely use in the future.