http://www.futuremark.com/ 3dMark - Benchmarking tools
http://www.7-zip.org/ 7-Zip - compression software (very high compression ratio)
http://www.adobe.com/acrobat/ Acrobat Reader - For reading PDF files
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/ Ad-Aware - Anti-spyware
http://www.slysoft.com/en/anydvd.html AnyDVD - Helps with DVD ripping (21 day trial period)
http://www.simtel.net/product.php?ur...uct_page=36425 AP Guitar Tuner
http://www.apache.org Apache - Worlds most popular http web server.
http://www.audiograbber.com-us.net/download.html AudioGrabber - CD ripper / mp3 creator
http://www.autogk.net/ Auto GK (Gordion Knot) - foolproof dvd to avi software
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...autoruns.shtml Autoruns - See what programs are configured to startup automatically when your system boots
http://www.avast.com/ Avast! Antivirus - Antivirus software
http://free.grisoft.com/ AVG antivirus - Free antivirus prog
http://www.grisoft.cz/beta/avgemc/avgemc_en.htm AVG Email scanner plugin for use with Mozilla Thunderbird. Setup instructions
http://broadbandnuts.com/drtweak/ind.....d=38&start=0 here .
http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html Belarc advisor - a snapshot of your system details
http://www.bitdefender.com/ BitDefender - Antivirus software
http://bittornado.com/ BitTornado - Alternative BitTorrent client
http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/ BitTorrent - Filesharing (There are other clients, this is the original)
http://www.bloodshed.net/download.html Bloodshed Dev-C++ - Free programming editor
http://www.cdburnerxp.se/ CDBurner XP Pro - great replacement for Nero
http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/ CDex - For Ripping CD's (also converts to compressed formats (e.g. MP3))
http://www.clamwin.com ClamWin - AV software to use in conjunction with AVG
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download425.html CPUZ - provides some information on your CPU
http://www.cygwin.com/ cygwin - a Linux-like environment for Windows
http://www.daemon-tools.cc/ Daemon Tools - For mounting ISO (and other) images
http://www.softpedia.com/public/cat/4/1/4-1-35.shtml Damn NFO Viewer - .nfo file viewer
http://dban.sf.net DBan - securely wipe hard drives
http://dcplusplus.sourceforge.net/ DC++ - Filesharing
http://www.desktopsidebar.com/ Desktop Sidebar - provides lots of useful system / application information.
http://www.deviantart.com/ DeviantArt - Free wallpapers
http://www.execsoft.co.uk/home/html/home/download.htm Diskeeper - Shareware defrag utility
http://www.dscaler.org/about.htm#dscaler4 DScaler - best video picture quality from TV card
http://www.dumeter.com/download.php DU Meter - Upload/Download speed for Internet
http://www.dvddecrypter.com/ DVD Decrypter - needed for AutoGK, also handy for copying single layer dvds
http://www.dvdshrink.org/ DVD Shrink - DVD Ripping program. Can also burn if you have nero installed.
http://www.exactaudiocopy.de EAC - For those who demand the highest quality ripping their own music collection
http://www.ephpod.com/ EphPhod - manage your iPod
http://www.heidi.ie/eraser Eraser - securely wipe files or free space
http://www.ethereal.com/ Ethereal - Packet sniffer
http://filezilla.sf.net Filezilla - FTP client and server software
http://www.filzip.com/ FilZip - compression software
http://www.mozilla.org Firefox - web browser
http://mbm.livewiredev.com/ Motherboard Monitor - Shows you lots of information from your motherboard...temperatures, voltage rails, etc.
http://www.networkingfiles.com/PingF...aceexpress.htm NeoTrace Express - visual traceroute
http://www.stumbler.net/ NetStumbler - WiFi diagnostic software
http://nettime.sourceforge.net/ NetTime - NTP client
http://www.insecure.org/nmap/nmap_download.html nmap - Network security tool
http://www.oo-software.com/ O&O Defrag - Disk defrag tool
http://www.stardock.com/products/objectdock/ Object Dock - Customizable Taskbar like in AppleOS
http://www.vorbis.com/ Ogg Vorbis Codec - The new mp3 but free & apparently better (winamp plays ogg files)
http://www.openoffice.org OpenOffice.org - Microsoft office replacement
http://www.opera.com/ Opera - Web Browser
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ Outlook Express - Email tool. Nice for managing multiple hotmail accounts.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/passwordsafe Password Safe - a password safe
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/ PDF Creator
http://www.plaxo.com/ Plaxo - program for keeping your Outlook (and Outlook express) address book up to date
http://www.powerarchiver.com/ Power Archiver - Compression utility
http://www.power-tab.net/ Powertab Editor - Best prog out there for tab editing/playback
http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm Prime95 - Stress Tester to check stablility (also a distributed attempt at finding mersenne prime numbers)
http://www.codeode.com/privacymantra/index.html Privacy Mantra - "cleans your computer from online and offline tracks"
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr.../procexp.shtml proexp - Process Explorer - Alternative to task manager
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/%7Esgtatham/putty/ PuTTY - SSH client
http://rbtray.narod.ru/ RBTray - allows you to minimise any program to the tray area.
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/...lternative.htm Real Alternative - alternative to real player
http://www.realvnc.com/download.html Real VNC - An implementation of VNC. VNC allows you to control a computers desktop (or "x-windows" session) remotely.
http://a1.edskes.com/r/realalt125.exe Realplayer alternative and
http://a1.edskes.com/q/quicktimealt135.exe Quicktime alternative
http://www.geocities.jp/br_kato/ Restoration - recover deleted files (better known as rest2514)
http://www.samspade.org/ Sam Spade - network query tool
http://www.sisoftware.co.uk/index.ht.....;langx=en&a= SiSoft Sandra - Information Tool for Checking your CPU,BIOS etc.
http://skype.com/download/ Skype - VOIP application
http://www.backwater.cz/chmelar/sc_main.php SmartClock - Clock tool
http://www.smartftp.com/ Smart FTP - Free for non-commercial use
http://www.slsknet.org/download.html SoulSeek - the best p2p for dance music
http://www.werkema.com/software/spacemonger.html SpaceMonger - to see what's wasting space
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html SpyBot Seach and Destroy - Anti Spyware
http://us.mcafee.com/virusInfo/default.asp?id=stinger Stinger - McAfee anti virus prog
http://yasoft.km.ru/eng/files.asp Switch Off - Put your PC on switch off timer.
http://www.sygate.com/free/spf_download.htm Sygate Personal Firewall - Firewall
http://www.sysinternals.com/ Sysinternals apps - Various freeware apps available here
http://www.goteamspeak.com/downloads.php Teamspeak - Talk program. Useful for talking to mates, or gaming.
http://www.gimp.org/ The Gimp - graphics software
http://theopencd.sunsite.dk/ The Open CD - A cd full of open source software for windows.
http://www.mozilla.org Thunderbird - email client
http://www.tightvnc.com/ TightVNC - VNC client
http://www.ghisler.com/ Total Commander - Windows Explorer replacement
http://www.jam-software.com/treesize/ Treesize - For working out whats taking up space on your system
http://www.trillian.cc Trillian - multi IM chat client
http://www.truecrypt.tk/ TrueCrypt - encryption software
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/software/xppowertoys TweakUI - Allows you to change your windows UI in lots of ways. Link is for XP version. Google for others, or search microsoft.com
http://www.wincustomize.com/ Various windows cusomisations
http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/ VirtualDub - Free video editing tool
http://virtualdubmod.sourceforge.net/ virtualdubmod - Virtual Dub alternative. Video editing software.
http://www.videolan.org/ VLC - Video Player with lots of codec support
http://www.autodesk.com/prods/volo/download.htm Volo View Express - views autocad drawings
http://www.winamp.com/ WinAmp - Excellent music player
http://www.winbar.nl/ Winbar
http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scri...p;DwnldID=3764 Winbond hardware doctor - a basic server hardware monitoring tool which alerts a system administrator if a hardware problem occurs on their SAI2 based server system
http://windump.polito.it/ Windump - network sniffer
http://www.httrack.com/ winhttrack - View websites offline
http://www.winrar.com/ WinRar - (Shareware) Compression software
http://winscp.sourceforge.net/eng/ WinSCP - GUI based SCP client
http://www.winzip.com/ Winzip - (Shareware) Compression software
http://www.workrave.org/welcome/index.php WorkRave - RSI recovery software (break reminder with exercise suggestions)
http://www.xp-antispy.org/ XP Anti Spy - lets you disable some built-in update and authentication features in WindowsXP
http://www.xvid.org/ Xvid Codec - Free video compressor codec
http://www.zonelabs.com/ ZoneAlarm - Security suite</div
http://flac.sourceforge.net FLAC - Lossless (i.e. perfect cd quality) music compression
http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/...ShockwaveFlash Flash and
http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/ shockwave players - For running flash and shockwave stuff inside your browser
http://www.foobar2000.org/ Foobar2000 - Audio media player
http://fox.foxmail.com.cn/english/ Foxmail - Mail reader
http://www.fraps.com/download.htm Fraps - handy for taking screenshots of games and monitoring their performance
http://sourceforge.net/projects/feedreader FreeReader - RSS and XML reader
http://www.feyrer.de/g4u/ G4u - Hard Disk cloning
http://blog.yumdap.net/archives/20-G...r-Windows.html Gimpshop - gimp with photoshop look and feel.
http://users.otenet.gr/~jtcliper/tgf/ Godfather - MP3, Ogg, etc. tagging
http://googlebar.mozdev.org/ GoogleBar - Google toolbar for Mozilla / Firefox
http://gordianknot.sourceforge.net/ Gordion Knot - DVD backup software
http://www.jumaros.de/rsoft/index.html GPGShell - Front endd to GPG
http://www.spychecker.com/program/hijackthis.html Hijackthis - lists all installed browser add-ons, other features
http://www.id3-tagit.de/ ID3-TagIT - manage your mp3 id3 tags
http://www.incredimail.com/ Incredimail - Email prog add-on (emoticons, etc.)
http://www.irfanview.com/ IrFanView - more graphics software
http://www.smart-projects.net/isobuster/ iso buster - Rescue lost files from a bad or trashed CD or DVD
http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/isorecorder.htm isorecorder - Tool for burning iso files in XP
http://www.itunes.com iTunes - Apple's itunes music player / purchasing tool
http://www.java.com/ Java JRE - For running applets, or anything else java based.
http://www.jcreator.com/download.htm JCreator LE - Free Java editor
http://www.click-now.net/download/K-..._Pack_last.htm K-Lite codec pack - every video and audio codec you could need (and media player classic)
http://www.kerio.com/kpf_download.html Kerio Personal Firewall
http://lavalys.com/products/download.php?pid=1〈=en Lavalys Everest - Gives you lots of system information (like sisoft sandra, but completely free)
http://www.limewire.com Limewire - File sharing prog
http://www.classicgaming.com/mame32qa/down.htm Mame32 - Arcade machine emulator
http://www.acc.umu.se/%7Emax/maxlister/ MaxLister - allows you to create virtual images of harddrives, floppy disks, CD-ROMs or other removable media
http://www.download.com/3000-2094-881470.html?tag=list Microsoft regclean - Cleans your registry. COuldn't find a microsoft.com link. This one is for download.com.
http://www.mirc.com/get.html mIrc - IRC (chat) client
http://www.pspvideo9.com/ - PSP Converter - for converting dvds to PSP compatible files for viewing on the Sony PSP
Essential Programs 
Linear Mode
