What are your MUST-HAVE Windows programs/apps?

[PoetJC]

I'm curious to know what are the Windows programs/apps that you simply cannot live without having installed on your computer? For instance: Say you get a brand new Windows 10 PC or laptop... Foobar2000, VLC Player & uTorrent are among the first programs I'd install, along with PhotoImpact, Illustrator and a few other graphics programs. What about you?

What programs/apps do you absolutely must have?

J.

 

[batpool52!]

Steam and Pidgin

 

[PoetJC]

Steam and Pidgin

Speaking of Pidgin... I was looking at its featureset and did a brief research but didn't find any relevant info... But do you know if there's any Skype plugin for it? I'd love to give it a try, but saw that it has no skype compatibility right out-of-box

J.

 

[batpool52!]

But do you know if there's any Skype plugin for it?

I believe not. I prefer using standalone Skype application due to chat history log.

 

[doubt]

Classic Shell

 

[PoetJC]

I believe not. I prefer using standalone Skype application due to chat history log.

Same here. There was a recent discussion about Skype not being secure enough to share login details and other sensitive info. So I've been looking into alternative chat programs. But yes! Absolutely love how Skype allows you to keep a complete chatlog. Very useful. Trillian does the same, but no longer plays well with Skype integration. Anyone know of a chat program that is compatible with Skype?

J.

 

[Nebulous]

For windows? Hmmm... Lets see.

Chrome
Opera
Firefox
Filezilla
VLC media player
Gimp
Avast
Acrobat Reader
Drop Box
Google Drive
Google Earth
Hulu & Netflix & yahoo mail / gmail apps (as they tend to stay logged in, unlike on a browser)

 

[PoetJC]

For windows? Hmmm... Lets see.

Chrome
Opera
Firefox
Filezilla
VLC media player
Gimp
Avast
Acrobat Reader
Drop Box
Google Drive
Google Earth
Hulu & Netflix & yahoo mail / gmail apps (as they tend to stay logged in, unlike on a browser)

Every notice any quality difference between the Netflix app and viewing Netflix on a browser?

J.

 

[LeadCrow]

DmitriRender (paid). GPU-assisted video 'smoothing' utility. Mad improvement in videos. Cyberlink's PowerDVD uses something similar. SVP is free but troublesome to setup. See this video for an idea of the difference 'smoothing' makes (watch it at 60fps).

Krita (poor man's good Photoshop).
MyPaint, for quick sketches, especially using tablets. Alternative to Corel's Sketchpad.
MediBang Paint Pro. Very good for comics, includes 'collaborative editing' of image files ("I ink, you color").

Calibre. Ebook library management.
Jdownloader. No-BS download manager.
Everything. Near-instant file search on Windows. The missing must-have app on Windows.

 

[NickCF]

I'm on Mac OSX now, but when I was on Windows (only about 1 year ago) I would always install VLC, uTorrent, Chrome, Dropbox, OneDrive, MS Office and paint.NET.

 

[PoetJC]

DmitriRender (paid). GPU-assisted video 'smoothing' utility. Mad improvement in videos. Cyberlink's PowerDVD uses something similar. SVP is free but troublesome to setup. See this video for an idea of the difference 'smoothing' makes (watch it at 60fps).

Krita (poor man's good Photoshop).
MyPaint, for quick sketches, especially using tablets. Alternative to Corel's Sketchpad.
MediBang Paint Pro. Very good for comics, includes 'collaborative editing' of image files ("I ink, you color").

Calibre. Ebook library management.
Jdownloader. No-BS download manager.
Everything. Near-instant file search on Windows. The missing must-have app on Windows.

Nice list. First time I'm even hearing of some of the programs you've listed. I actually own Cyberlink PowerDVD. I use it to watch 3D movies. It's expensive - but a nice program; one of the only softwares I could find that either supports 3D video right out-of-box or 2D=>3D conversion.

Re: Jdownloader... Does it have browser integration like IDM (Internet Download Manager)?

J.

 

[Nebulous]

Every notice any quality difference between the Netflix app and viewing Netflix on a browser?

J.

Not really, then again I don't watch too much stuff on my laptop, there's a TV within viewing distance at all times.

 

[Danielx64]

Startisback, phpstorm, vmware player, putty, winscp, office and loads more.

 

[zappaDPJ]

Firefox
Chrome
Microsoft Office
Photoshop
dBpoweramp
JRiver Media Center
Avid Pro Tools

 

[Echo]

Crap Cleaner, Filezilla & Photoshop

 

[Digital Phoenix]

Steam
Origin
Teamspeak
Curse Beta

 

[Sim]

• Skype
• Chrome (Though I use IE more)
• BitComet
• Visual Studio
• NotePad++
• FileZilla
• VLC Player
• IMG Burn
• Microsoft Office

My first installs.

 

[Alpha1]

Speaking of Pidgin... I was looking at its featureset and did a brief research but didn't find any relevant info... But do you know if there's any Skype plugin for it? I'd love to give it a try, but saw that it has no skype compatibility right out-of-box

Skype4Pidgin

 

[PoetJC]

Skype4Pidgin

Thanks for that. Will give it a try a bit later

J.

 

[Solidus]

Fences
PuTTY
RealTemp
Steam
AIMP3