An update on recent technical problems and more from the admin: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/250292/on-technical-difficulties-mod-coverage-and-other-things/p1?new=1
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New Windows 7 install. What's essential, and what's cool?
harvest
By birthright,a stupendous badass.Registered User regular
By birthright,a stupendous badass.Registered User regular
I just nuked and paved my Windows install because some malware was too hard to fix and I'm lazy. This is a good opportunity to install new apps and utilities. Let me give you an idea of what I already use. This shit is all free.
Notepad++ for text and code
VLC for video
Itunes for music (I have some iOS devices)
Handbrake for video conversion
IrfanView for images
Impulse and Steam for games
Mumble for voice
Firefox for web (trying out Firefox 4, usually I use Chrome)
Microsoft Security Essentials for ... security
OpenOffice for office stuff
Google Talk for IM
ImgBurn for burning discs
DisplayFusion for multi monitor stuff
So... that's the basic stuff I use on a regular basis. Not surprisingly you can get most of it off Ninite, which is how I always install apps on a new machine/new install. Surely there are more great free softwares out there and I must have them. Lets hear it.
Notepad++ for text and code
VLC for video
Itunes for music (I have some iOS devices)
Handbrake for video conversion
IrfanView for images
Impulse and Steam for games
Mumble for voice
Firefox for web (trying out Firefox 4, usually I use Chrome)
Microsoft Security Essentials for ... security
OpenOffice for office stuff
Google Talk for IM
ImgBurn for burning discs
DisplayFusion for multi monitor stuff
So... that's the basic stuff I use on a regular basis. Not surprisingly you can get most of it off Ninite, which is how I always install apps on a new machine/new install. Surely there are more great free softwares out there and I must have them. Lets hear it.
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i like cdburnerxp for burning
picasa is great for image stuff
I'd also recommend CCCP over VLC for video watching needs, but that's just me.
uTorrent for, well, torrents.
Also, I like Free Download Manager.
Paint.NET and GIMP for image editing.
DOSBox and VirtualBox always have a home on my system as well.
I second the use of WinDirStat, it's very nice.
Oh, and Stellarium. Because, stars.
pcdecrapifier
ccleaner
That being said, that could be untrue.
3rd'd for WinDirStat. Install it now, because you won't want to try to remember the name of it when you want/need it.
I honestly can't imagine not having it around.
Also, I'm assuming you made an informed decision on VLC but in case not I highly recommend checking out Media Player Classic - Home Cinema as an alternative.
Instead of installing a damn codec pack on your system like we had to do in the past, just install a player that can handle a wide varieties of formats like MPC-HC or VLC.
if you're looking to keep things organized, something like Belvedere could come in handy
Windows Live Essentials
Chalk up another vote for 7zip and CCleaner.
int main(){while(1)std::cout<<"Hi! Ho! ";}
It's pretty much identical to how Outlook Express works.
You mentioned code: do you do web development?
If so, I recommend grabbing Fiddler2 (http://www.fiddler2.com/fiddler2/). Lets you see the details of what you're sending, if you run into strange issues like missing resources or errors that are hard to debug.
I also highly, highly recommend AstroGrep (http://astrogrep.sourceforge.net/), which is probably the best GREP GUI I've ever seen. Simple yet flexible, and extremely fast.
I'm also a fan of WinMerge (http://winmerge.org/) as a diff tool personally. Try it out!
I find MagicDisk to be a superior virtual drive option. (Sans certain emulation features I suppose.) I've had a lot of problems with Daemon Tools over the years such that I don't really trust it any more.
It's kind of slow and the inbox pane has a lot different modes that that basically have one thing in common: they are confusing as fuck because it seems to want to offer both "physical" inboxes and "virtual" inboxes but the two concepts just bleed into each other and create a nonsensical mess. (What the hell is "add to global inbox" when making an account? So confusing.)
I pretty much just got fed up with desktop POP clients and switched to gmail because hilariously it has the desktop ones beat in a lot of ways.
Interesting. While I had one or two bugs in the past, I've haven't had any problems Daemon Tools Lite recently (far less than MagicDisk anyway). Then again, DTL is literally only virtual drives--it's useless for things like burning images, etc. Then again, that also makes it far smaller and less obtrusive.
I use a separate small program for burning images, CDBurnerXP.
Outlook Express has been discontinued, it wasn't avaible for Vista either. I did like the password function and miss it.
Windows Mail gets more development than Thunderbird. I also liked some of the archive functions of Windows Mail that I had to use a plug-in for with Thunderbird.
I don't remember how Thunderbird handles web calendars but Windows Mail plugs them right in along with RSS Feeds.
If you use Hotmail like I do then Windows Mail is the one you want if you want more than a POP3 connection.
Yeah I mean it could just be my shit luck, but at some point I had a version of DTL that refused to completely uninstall and its virtual device driver conflicted with another program I needed to use (MacDrive). Then I had one that came with adware. Then I had one that literally caused BSOD's regularly. Not fun. MagicDisc (free version) just seems like the same thing but with fewer fancy features (emulation, boot off iso) and I haven't had any BSODs so that's always a plus.
For burning: http://www.imgburn.com/
I would suggest Avast! Free Antivirus. Disable sounds, enable gaming/silent mode, and the only time it'll make itself known is when you're on the desktop and it has updated - it'll tell you by popping up a small notification that quickly goes away.
I love Avast.
Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
I installed it yesterday. It tries to install a toolbar, to change your homepage and to change your default search.
Another tip of the hat to VLC player and Dropbox (I have all my college files in here, which means I can very easily work on files from my desktop or laptop depending on where I am and I'm not dependant on USB sticks which are easily lost.)
Ninite is freaking amazing. We use it at work to deploy updates for about 10 different applications.
Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware for Malwarebytes-based anti-malware goodness.
[edit] Also, I run Spybot Search and Destroy a single time for the immunization feature. Then I delete it.
Excellent, free, barebones PDF Printer
This is awesome.
It turns out, even though I told the installation to wipe everything old out, it kept my old stuff in a folder called Windows.old. It's taking A LOT of gigs. I already backed everything up externally, and can delete this, but it says I need permissions from SYSTEM. How do I delete this crap?
Also, as I type, occasionally, the cursor will reposition after a few seconds based on where I leave my cursor. How do I turn that off?
Well, there may be an easier way, but maybe a Ubuntu LiveCD? Boot, mount the hard drive, delete the folder.
I concur!
I personally use Foxit for PDFs, it's pretty fast.
I also use Foxit for PDFs, much better than Adobe for casual PDF reading.
Also, one massive vote for IE9 & GOOGLE CHROME. Firefox and its bloatware-inspired memory management can suck it.
PSN: HooverFanPA
Steam: HooverFan