Ok, it is late as I am typing this and I was wondering how everyone would feel about a Recommended Downloads topic. If it proves worthwhile, maybe it could be sticked.

Internet:
FireFox
http://en-us.www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

Opera
http://www.opera.com/

Security:
Ad-Aware
http://www.download.com/Ad-Aware-SE...045910.html?part=dl-ad-aware&subj=dl&tag=top5

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition 7.5
http://www.download.com/AVG-Anti-Virus-Free-Edition/3000-2239_4-10645435.html?tag=lst-0-1

CCleaner
http://www.ccleaner.com

SpywareBlaster
http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

Spybot
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html

ZoneAlarm
http://www.zonealarm.com/store/conte...try=US&lang=en

Sunbelt Personal Firewall
http://www.sunbelt-software.com/Home...onal-Firewall/

Comodo Free Firewal
http://www.personalfirewall.comodo.com/


Audio/Video

K-Lite Codec Pack
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/K_Lite_Codec_Pack.htm

Winamp 5.0
http://download.oldversion.com/winamp50.exe

Media Player Classic - also available in K-Lite codec
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=82303&package_id=84358

VLC Media Player
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

The Combined Community Codec Pack
http://www.cccp-project.net/

Chat/Instant Message

Windows Live Messenger
http://get.live.com/messenger/overview

Yahoo Messenger
http://us.lrd.yahoo.com/_ylt=As8WCsCxIvEVhYVZDaGzuaJjMMIF/SIG=126qlefom/**http%3a//us.dl1.yimg.com/download.yahoo.com/dl/msgr8/us/msgr8us.exe

mIRC
http://www.mirc.com/get.html

Snak - IRC for Macintosh
http://www.snak.com/

Other Stuff

Adobe Reader 8
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html

OpenOffice
http://www.openoffice.org/

WinRAR
http://www.rarlab.com

Total Commander - File manager
http://www.ghisler.com/

Unlocker - File/Folder Removal
http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/

HijackThis
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/programs.php

OS

Ubuntu - Linux for Human Beings
http://www.ubuntu.com/

This is just a starting list, more will hopefully be added later. I hope that I can add more, also does anyone got any suggestions about how I can clean up the post any? ie. what categories are, what is in them, that sort of thing. Perhaps if given enough time have reviews of the programs and compile them into a text file or something like that.

*edit*
Just viewing the main board and perhaps this belongs in the real life section? I don't know, I will let the mods use their judgement

 

The most important one for me:

Total Commander
http://www.ghisler.com/

File management. Honestly, I don't understand how some people manage to get ANYTHING done by dragging and dropping files in Windows Explorer *shudder*.

 

Hmm. No reccomendations here at the moment, but though winamp may be good, it's hell on earth for those with a short fuse.

For me, who has like 900+ songs on my computer, it often freezes when you switch artists, or songs. It especially sucks when you click a song, hear it play, but have everything else freeze so bad that you have to wait like 30 seconds after clicking firefox to start browsing again.

That said, it's still good, freezing considered. Sure as hell beats Media Player 10 or 11 out of the water.

 

Someone recommend a free firewall that isn't bloated.

 

Spacks: Free ZoneAlarm.

 

Keywords: isn't bloated.

 

Like Spacks requested, here are some recommended free firewall programs.

ZoneAlarm
http://www.zonealarm.com/store/content/catalog/products/sku_list_za.jsp?dc=12bms&ctry=US&lang=en

Sunbelt Personal Firewall
http://www.sunbelt-software.com/Home-Home-Office/Sunbelt-Personal-Firewall/

Comodo Free Firewal
http://www.personalfirewall.comodo.com/

 

Video/Audio
Media Player Classic - Plays more formats and loads quicker than WMP, also has lots of useful features
Link

I have moe but I broke my clavicle and only have one hand to type so I'll edit later.

 

I have added everything that has been posted as of the time of this post.

 

One of the best media players around

VLC Media Player: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

 

I think it's best if you take out half of that and just add:


OS:

Ubuntu - Linux for Human Beings
http://www.ubuntu.com/

 

Totally second this suggestion.

 

I would recomend the CCCP codec pack. While it was put together for playing anime, its still a great pack to have in general. Last time I checked it came with optional installs of Media Player Classic and Zoom Player(my prefered media player).

err... I can't realy think of anything off the top of my head that isn't on the list(and free) other than HijackThis for troubleshooting

 

Everything that has been posted has been added to the list. I have some more that I will add later on. Getting ready for bed, I have a horrible headache.

 

Filehippo.com is a good resource for files and usually a good mirror for downloading them.

 

HijackThis is a lifesaver. Quadrupally seconded.

 

i recommend ffdshow as a codec pack that covers just about any video format

 

http://windirstat.info/ Life-saver of a program, especially if you have a hard drive that has a crazy amount of content on it (or an external)

 

What exactly does windirstat do? I checked the site and couldn't gather what the main points about it are. At the minute it just looks like a graphically enchanced Windows Explorer...

I've got nothing to add to the list so I'll be going now...

Aekiel

 

I guess in some ways, it is. Its a pretty small download, so I don't know if you want to check it out yourself. I find it hard to explain. I use it mostly to find out big files on my harddrive, since it just sorts everything into folders and then you can sort it from top to bottom using the size of the file/items in the folders etc. The graphic blocks you see at the bottom represent the files, the bigger the file, the bigger the blocks. The colours of it are to show what sort of file it is. Helps me a lot, at least.