Software recommendation thread

[. . .]

Use this thread to recommend great apps you've recently come across.

Here are a few of my recent discoveries:

PDF reader: SumatraPDF (bloody fast and minimalistic for a PDF reader. Goodbye Foxit Reader).
Disk defragmentor: Auslogics Disk Defrag (been using this for the past few months. It's very fast and does a great job of defragging. I've replaced JKDefrag/MyDefrag, which is seldom updated and takes forever to defrag, with this. I set it to automatically defrag every morning).
System maintenance/tweak utility: Auslogics BoostSpeed* (by far the most powerful and stable maintenance/tweak utility I've ever used).
Web browser: Pale Moon (Firefox on steroids).

* Not freeware.

 

[WildCat]

I can't help but recommend HWMonitor and CPU-Z for those who would like to gain more information about their hardware and to check for stability issues. Both are created by CPUID can be found on their website here.

I also recommend Microsoft Security Essentials if you're looking for a free but efficient anti-virus program. It may not be up to par with some of the other retail AV software but for free software it does come very close. The only catch: you need to be running a genuine copy of Windows first before you can install it.

 

[Droopy]

Process Lasso - Optimizes system processes, power management and more.
CCleaner - I'm sure most will have heard of this one. Used to delete junk files and clean the system registry.
ImgBurn - For ripping DVDs/Bluray to ISO files.

 

[Caspar]

Free software

Media
Clementine: Amarok based music player
SMPlayer: Media player for music and video.
GIMP: Picture editing; Photoshop substitute
Audacity: Sound editor

Internet
Smuxi: IRC client
Deluge: BT client

Math and Science
Texmaker: LaTex typesetting editor (for math, science, and equations)

 

[. . .]

Three more things:

File Management: TeraCopy (if you copy and move files often, you'll want this. It's speedy).
Screen-capturing: Winsnap* (time-saver. I leave this running in the background all the time. Whenever I need to take a screen-shot I press Prt Scr and it automatically saves a screen-shot to my hard-drive and adds a subtle shadow to it on the fly).
Video player/codec pack: Combined Community Codec Pack (it's an installation package containing Media Player Classic - Home Cinema and video codecs which I've been using for years, but it's nice to get all the essentials at the same time. It's the only codec pack I recommend. Most codec packs include a bunch of stuff you don't need; CCCP contains only what you need. If you have a newer computer with a fairly good graphics card in it, I recommend that you download MadVR and use that instead of Haali renderer which comes with CCCP. If your computer can't use MadVR -- which isn't very unlikely -- use Haali).

*Not freeware.