You have to admit that
Windows OS - though rather powerful and versatile - is a bit
underequipped. That's what makes you dread the idea of reinstalling it:
you know you'll face the inevitable question: “Now, what apps do I
download to be able to actually do some work on my PC?” If this rings
true, I'm sure you'll find the following guide quite handy.
I've put together a list of apps that I think every Windows XP user
must have on their computer. Yes, my list is primarily intended for XP,
but I don't think it should come as a surprise to you. Loathe it as you
might, but you'll have to agree that XP is still going strong with its
30% share among all users. With that aside, let's move on.
WindowBlinds
OK, what is the first things you see after system startup? A barren
Start menu and an empty desktop, I believe. Would you like to make those
less boring? Try out
WindowBlinds,
RocketDock,or
VistaMizer.
Each of them can give a good visual look to your good old Windows
interface. After you install one of them, you'll be able to customize
your WinXP's appearance with animated menus and various skins, bring
your shortcuts and useful apps within reach to have fast access to them,
or give your decade-old system the look of Windows Vista or a Macintosh
operating system. It's worth a try.
VistaMizer
After you'll have reshaped the interface to your heart's content, you
should see about some form of protection and defense against spyware
for your PC. With this idea in mind, you should go on and install one of
the mainstream antispyware and antivirus tools. In my case, the choice
is
AVG Anti-Virus.
Besides the fact that AVG gives your computer some basic real-time
protection by scanning downloads, your system folders, etc., it does all
that absolutely free of cost. Yes, it's a free antivirus, so there's no
excuse not to try it out.
AVG Anti-Virus: Scanning for Virus and Malware
Since we're talking about essential apps here, you may want to clean
up and keep your system well maintained, and for that you'll need a tool
like
WinUtilities.
This versatile app is a system cleaner, a system optimizer, and a
system monitor rolled into one. A pretty good one, without any cons.
If you're going to carry out some kind of image editing operations,
you'll need a high-quality and preferably professional-grade
application. However, not everyone can justify spending a heap of money
on Photoshop, especially when all they need is to crop and retouch an
occasional photo. I'm happy to let you know that there's a good freeware
alternative -
GIMP.
Its capabilities are up to those of Photoshop - well, maybe with the
exception of a few fancy proprietary features - but you won't have to
pay a penny.
GIMP
As for entertainment, there's a perfect app to play all your favorite videos – the well-known
VLC media player.
This multimedia player comes equipped with all the required codecs for
various audio and video formats (unlike Windows Media Player, which
doesn't seem to be able to play anything out of the box), so you won't
need to bother about which codec pack to download for this video or
that.
VLC media player
If you're one of those people who prefer to do all their work in a text editor, you should try
Notepad++
as one of your productivity apps. Being absolutely free, Notepad++
offers such goodies like line numbering, colored text, syntax
highlighting, and autocompletion. It supports over 40 languages and
allows you to edit multiple files in the same window. What else could
you need?
Notepad++
Going on with productivity apps, I'd recommend downloading a
standalone messaging client instead of the inbuilt Windows Messenger -
for example,
Pidgin.
This open-source messenger will satisfy avid ad-haters and social
junkies alike, as it contains no ads at all and suppports multiple
chatting protocols via plug-ins. So with this single instant messaging
client you'll be able to chat on MSN, Google Talk, Yahoo, and dozens of
other networks simultaneously, and even group all your contacts
together.
Pidgin
And of course we shouldn't forget about file archivers, as most of
the apps you'll try to download will come as archived installers. What
shall I recommend? I'll probably go with
WinRAR.
It's not exactly free, but it does a good job at compressing files,
which makes sending them over the Internet an easy task. It's a
well-needed upgrade from XP's inbuilt compressed folders feature, and
it's a little bit more friendly than most free alternatives. If you
haven't got it yet, give it a go.
Here you can read about must-have applications for Windows 7.
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