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Software Picks from FVCS |
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| Name | PDFZilla |
| Category | Utilities |
| Release Date | 2/19/2009 |
| Version | 1.0.1 |
| Description |
I love good, well thought out utilities and this qualifies. It wasn’t too long ago that a program to convert pdfs to another format cost several hundred dollars. Now for thirty dollars here is a VERY capable program to convert pdf files to numerous formats: With PDFZilla you can: The interface is well thought out and you probably won’t need to look at the help file. This program will become part of my working arsenal. I only have one gripe. I go back a long time and personally knew the father of shareware, Andrew Fluegelman, and I have a very limited definition for shareware. Shareware should be issued without limitations or it isn’t shareware. Period. There are time and capacity limitations here and I would prefer the description be changed to commercial demo. In any case – well worth your consideration. |
| Author’s Web Site | www.pdfzilla.com |
| Download Link | http://www.pdfzilla.com/down/pdfzilla.exe |
| The Rules |
Stuff you MUST know: The programs we describe are ones we use or have used and found them to be effective. Many of these are very powerful and could totally hose your computer!! Obviously we would never, knowingly, suggest a faulty program, but there’s always that possibility. Just as there is a possibility of a virus or spyware lurking inside. Very honestly, I find the free stuff better, on average, than the commercial products, but everyone has to decide for themselves. Just so everyone understands – many of these programs have the power to TOTALLY hose your system and we take NO responsibility for that!! |
Convert pdf files to Word, HTML and other formats
Out with the old
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Freeware Picks from FVCS |
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| Name | WinDirStat |
| Category | Utilities |
| Release Date | 9/2/2007 |
| Version | 1.1.2 |
| Description |
We do a lot of data recovery and many times we’re told “there’s not much on the drive” and we proceed to pull 60 gigabytes or more! Windirstat is a wonderful utility that scans your entire drive and shows you where the space is going. Generally, you will find that those pictures and videos are taking up a lot of space and invariably poorly written programs are leaving temporary droppings all over the place. There are a number of programs that will tell you where, but WinDirStat is the best at helping you remove the unnecessary files. Here’s our normal procedure:
Here’s the official feature table:
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| Author’s Web Site | http://windirstat.info/ |
| Download Link | http://windirstat.info/ |
| The Rules |
Stuff you MUST know: The programs we describe are ones we use or have used and found them to be effective. Many of these are very powerful and could totally hose your computer!! Obviously we would never, knowingly, suggest a faulty program, but there’s always that possibility. Just as there is a possibility of a virus or spyware lurking inside. Very honestly, I find the free stuff better, on average, than the commercial products, but everyone has to decide for themselves. Just so everyone understands – many of these programs have the power to TOTALLY hose your system and we take NO responsibility for that!! |
This is a no brainer
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Freeware Picks from FVCS
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| Name | Auslogic Disk Defragmenter |
| Category | Utility |
| Release Date | June 19, 2008 |
| Version | 1.4.16.307 |
| Description | The defragmenter* that comes with Windows is glacially slow. Until recently the best free alternative was Diskeeper, but it kept bugging you with buy now messages.Auslogic has a totally free and fast defragmenter that has become a regular part of my essential toolbox. Not much else to say except get it!(They also have a free Registry defragmenter and System Info tool, but I haven’t tested those. |
| Author’s Web Site | http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download |
| Download Link | http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download |
Stuff you MUST know: The programs we describe are ones we use or have used and found them to be effective. Many of these are very powerful and could totally hose your computer!! Obviously we would never, knowingly, suggest a faulty program, but there’s always that possibility. Just as there is a possibility of a virus or spyware lurking inside.
Very honestly, I find the free stuff better, on average, than the commercial products, but everyone has to decide for themselves.
*
Fragmentation is caused by creating and deleting files and folders, installing new software, and downloading files from the Internet. Computers do not necessarily save an entire file or folder in a single space on a disk; they're saved in the first available space. After a large portion of a disk has been used, most of the subsequent files and folders are saved in pieces across the volume.
When you delete files or folders, the empty spaces left behind are filled in randomly as you store new ones. This is how fragmentation occurs. The more fragmented the volume is, the slower the computer's file input and output performance will be.
Defragmentation is the process of rewriting non-contiguous parts of a file to contiguous sectors on a disk for the purpose of increasing data access and retrieval speeds. Because FAT and NTFS disks can deteriorate and become badly fragmented over time, defragmentation is vital for optimal system performance.
In June 1999 the ABR Corporation of Irvine, California, performed a fragmentation analysis and found that, out of 100 corporate offices that were not using a defragmenter, 50 percent of the respondents had server files with 2,000 to 10,000 fragments. In all cases the results were the same: Servers and workstations experienced a significant degradation in performance.
Firefox
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| Name | Firefox |
| Category | Internet |
| Release Date | 06.17.2008 |
| Version | 3.0 |
| Description | For a long time I have been putting the Firefox browser on our clients computers primarily as a diagnostic tool. If they were having trouble with a web page and Internet Explorer, we could try Firefox and begin to isolate the problem.I have, personally, preferred Firefox for a long time, but most of our customers preferred to stick with IE – it was known. More and more, however, I am finding people willing to change and this new version will make many more converts.
I really like it and I think you will too. |
| Author’s Web Site | http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/ |
| Download Link | Mozilla.com |
Stuff you MUST know: The programs we describe are ones we use or have used and found them to be effective. Many of these are very powerful and could totally hose your computer!! Obviously we would never, knowingly, suggest a faulty program, but there's always that possibility. Just as there is a possibility of a virus or spyware lurking inside.
Very honestly, I find the free stuff better, on average, than the commercial products, but everyone has to decide for themselves.
Once more: USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!
Software I pay for
Over the years I've become increasingly disenchanted with commercial software. I blame most of it on Microsoft. They've made Bill Gates the richest man in the world (actually 2nd now) by pretending their stuff works when it is barely functional in many cases. Owners using XP and Vista pay us thousands of dollars every year to unwind situations that have their genesis in poor coding.
This is why I try to use Freeware whenever possible. Number one - it's free! Number two - I'll probably get better support than commercial software and even If I don't I won't get frustrated trying to converse with some kid in New Delhi.
As I look over the stuff I have bought and use it's a pretty small grouping. Two items do stand out, however - Adobe Premier Elements and Adobe Photoshop Elements.You can buy the pair for about $150 I believe and you will have a near professional toolbox for image and video manipulation. They are worth your consideration.