Dropbox Easy sharing of documents across all devices, including smartphones. www.dropbox.com
Keepass Password manager, allowing you to store all your online passwords in a single and secure database. www.keepass.info
Revo Uninstaller It's not enough to use Windows to uninstall programs, as remnants get left behind. Uninstalls software and allows you to manually remove additional data otherwise left behind. www.revouninstaller.com
Filezilla Best FTP client. Easy to use and highly customizable. www.filezilla-project.org
Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware Second line of defense to your AV program of choice. Doesn't run auto scans and won't conflict with your other AV solution, and often finds and fixes as many if not more issues. www.malwarebytes.org
PC Decrapifier When you build a new PC, you have control over the software that gets installed. When you buy a PC, however, it's practically guaranteed to host a number of unwanted apps with little use and bloatware to slow your PC's performance. Get rid of that crap via this free tool that walks you through the process of removing unnecessary programs, startup items and icons. www.pcdecrapifier.com
CPU-Z Excellent free utility to query your CPU and report model, cache size, clock speeds, temps of the chip in real-time. (For EVGA users EVGA's proprietary version of CPU-Z is called E-LEET). www.cpuid.com
GPU-Z A CPU-Z like interface, but with more detailed info reports on your graphics speed and memory speeds for your GPU. www.techpowerup.com/gpuz
Prime95 Stress test your CPU's overclock with its "torture test". A properly configured and cooled system should have no problem running Prime95 for hours on end. www.mersenne.org/freesoft
CCleaner Cleans all areas of your computer, protects your privacy and makes your computer run faster. Use daily. www.piriform.com/ccleaner
Must-have Apps and Utils
Ultimate Windows Tweaker App that lets you change things in the Windows UI that you never knew were changeable. Basically Tweak UI for Windows 7. http://www.thewindowsclub.com/ultimate- ... ws-7-vista
7-Zip Free and powerful. Unpacks and compresses all types of formats remarkably efficient. Supports encryption and can be configured to utilize multiple CPU cores. www.7-zip.org
TMonitor Coupled with Prime95 shows you if all of your cores are running at maximum clock speed. If TMonitor shows sags on some cores, your system has a thermal issue. www.cpuid.com
HWMonitor Another of CPUID's gems. Want to know the maximum temp of core #2? Voltages, temps and fan speed monitoring. www.cpuid.com
HijackThis Generates a full report of everything running on your computer. Helpful to combat malware and spyware. free.antivirus.com/hijackthis
Memtest86+ Simply download the prebuilt ISO, burn it to a disc or bootable USB key, plop it in and boot to it. Memtest86+ will immediately run test patterns across your memory and flag any problems. www.memtest.org
7-Zip Free and powerful. Unpacks and compresses all types of formats remarkably efficient. Supports encryption and can be configured to utilize multiple CPU cores. www.7-zip.org
TMonitor Coupled with Prime95 shows you if all of your cores are running at maximum clock speed. If TMonitor shows sags on some cores, your system has a thermal issue. www.cpuid.com
HWMonitor Another of CPUID's gems. Want to know the maximum temp of core #2? Voltages, temps and fan speed monitoring. www.cpuid.com
HijackThis Generates a full report of everything running on your computer. Helpful to combat malware and spyware. free.antivirus.com/hijackthis
Memtest86+ Simply download the prebuilt ISO, burn it to a disc or bootable USB key, plop it in and boot to it. Memtest86+ will immediately run test patterns across your memory and flag any problems. www.memtest.org
Check out:
Irfanview Image viewer (the classic)
VLC Media player
Ninite (bulk installer for popular utilities you'll want on a new OS install)
Launchy
Desktop Icon Save and Restore (great for those of us with cluttered desktops who LIKE it that way)
Notepad++ (excellent for writing small code snippets, scripting, etc)
Irfanview Image viewer (the classic)
VLC Media player
Ninite (bulk installer for popular utilities you'll want on a new OS install)
Launchy
Desktop Icon Save and Restore (great for those of us with cluttered desktops who LIKE it that way)
Notepad++ (excellent for writing small code snippets, scripting, etc)
Everything Free file-indexing app for speedy search of your PC's contents. www.voidtools.com
Glary Utilities Cleaning software that gets rid of leftover files. Also uninstalls programs, making it a less messy experience than when done in Windows. www.glarysoft.com
Heaven DX11 Benchmark GPU benchmarking program great for testing your overclocked graphics card's stability and performance. unigine.com/products/heaven
3DMark11 Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results. Use it to test your PC's limits and measure the impact of overclocking and tweaking your system. www.3dmark.com/3dmark11
Glary Utilities Cleaning software that gets rid of leftover files. Also uninstalls programs, making it a less messy experience than when done in Windows. www.glarysoft.com
Heaven DX11 Benchmark GPU benchmarking program great for testing your overclocked graphics card's stability and performance. unigine.com/products/heaven
3DMark11 Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results. Use it to test your PC's limits and measure the impact of overclocking and tweaking your system. www.3dmark.com/3dmark11