I have broken this article into four parts to make it easier on both you, the reader, and me.  As I publish the other sections of this article, I will add a link to them.

• Part 1 – Communication/Business Tools
• Part 2 – Security/Performance Tools
• Part 3 – Media Tools
• Part 4 – Miscellaneous Tools

Avast! Antivirus

Replaces: Norton Antivirus, McAffee Antivirus
Alternatives: AVG, Avira
Pros: Unobtrusive, Lightweight, Fast

Avast! antivirus is powerful anti virus software, but, unlike its mainstream competitors, Norton and McAffee, you’ll barely be able to tell that it’s there.  Avast! is lightweight and unobtrusive, it wont bog down your system and barely bugs you unless it finds a virus or other malicious code.  The home edition of Avast! is free for 13 months if you register it, and when it expires, all you have to do is register again to get another 13 months of updates.

Download Avast! Antivirus: http://www.avast.com/eng/download-avast-home.html

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_avast_antivirus/

Windows Defender

Replaces: Ad-Aware
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Unobtrusive, Lightweight, Fast

What’s that?  A product by Microsoft that isn’t a piece of crap?  And it’s free to anyone with Windows XP or Vista?!  It’s hard to believe, but it’s true, Windows Defender is actually a solid product, and free so long as you’re using XP or Vista.  Also, unlike it’s alternatives, Windows Defender never bugs you unless it finds some malicious software.  The one thing I will say that it has working against it though is that it uses Windows Update for maintaining its spyware list.

Download Windows Defender: http://tinyurl.com/dyvaw

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_microsoft_antispyware/

CCleaner

Replaces: N/A
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Lightweight, Fast, Automation

From CCleaner.com:

CCleaner is a freeware system optimization, privacy and cleaning tool. It removes unused files from your system – allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history. Additionally it contains a fully featured registry cleaner. But the best part is that it’s fast

Download CCleaner: http://www.ccleaner.com/download

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner/

Defraggler

Replaces: Windows Defrag Tool
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Lightweight, Fast

Defraggler is a freeware hard drive defraging tool by Piriform, the same people who created CCleaner.  Defragglers differs from most defrag tools on the market, by allowing you to easily defrag individual files, without the need to defrag the whole drive.  All you ahve to do is run it, select the file(s) you would like to defrag and in seconds that file will be fully defragmented.  Of course you always have the option to defrag the whole drive.

Download Dfraggler: http://www.defraggler.com/download

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_defraggler/

I have a fairly complex, yet powerful, Windows box that I run as my primary machine and it runs great.  Now this is by no coincidence, it’s taken some hard work to make this thing run like a well oiled machine.  I do, however, owe a great deal of thanks to the plethora of free (as in beer), lightweight software I have installed.  What software you might ask?  Well here’s a list I’ve compiled of some of the best software I’ve run into that will keep your computer from slowing down and your resources free so you can do more important things, like surf for porn.

I have broken this article into four parts to make it easier on both you, the reader, and me.  As I publish the other sections of this article, I will add a link to them.

• Part 1 – Communication/Business Tools
• Part 2 – Security/Performance Tools
• Part 3 – Media Tools
• Part 4 – Miscellaneous Tools

Firefox

Replaces: Internet Explorer
Alternatives: Safari, Chrome, Opera
Pros: Speed, Extensions, Open Source

Firefox is an open source alternative web browser by Mozilla that provides a much better web browsing experience than it’s defacto alternative, Internet Explorer.  Some of the key features of Firefox include enhanced security features, increased speed, and virtually limitless customization through themes and extensions.  Be sure to pay attention as Mozilla will soon be releasing Firefox 3.1 which is supposed to include a few new features and even more speed improvements.

Recommended Extensions: Adblock Plus, Filterset.G Updater, Foxmarks Bookmark Synch, and IE Tab

Download Firefox: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_firefox/

Thunderbird

Replaces: Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express
Alternatives: Gmail, Yahoo! Mail, Windows Live Hotmail
Pros: Extensions, Open Source
Cons: No Exchange support (yet)

Another great product from the Mozilla team, the Thunderbird email client, is a great alternative to the pre-installed Outlook Express and, with the right extensions, an adequate replacement for Microsoft Outlook.  The biggest drawback with Thunderbird right now is the lack of MS Exchange support, but (as far as I know) they plan on changing that with the release of Thunderbird 3.0.

Recommended Extensions: Lightning, Provider, Enigmail

Download Thunderbird: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/thunderbird/

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_thunderbird/

Pidgin

Replaces: AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, MSN Messenger
Alternatives: Trillian
Pros: Ad Free, Plugins, Open Source
Cons: No Video Chat (at the moment)

Pidgin is a free instant messaging platform designed to centralize the vast array of popular instant messaging protocols in to one easy to use program.  Pidgin allows you to be logged on to multiple instant messaging systems at the same time through one simple user interface.  The following protocols are supported: AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, Gtalk/Jabber, ICQ, Gadu Gadu, and more…

Download Pidgin: http://www.pidgin.im/download

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_pidgin/

OpenOffice.org

Replaces: Microsoft Office
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Plugins, Open Source, Can read from and write to MS Office files
Cons: (Very) Slight Learning Curve

Just get a new computer and don’t want to fork out another $150 for word processing software?  Well then OpenOffice.org is your answer!  OpenOffice.org is a free and open source office software suite.  Included are applications for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and more.  And just when you thought it couldn’t get any better, OpenOffice.org 3.0 is currently in it’s third revision of a release candidate and will hopefully be out with a final version soon.

Download OpenOffice.org: http://download.openoffice.org/index.html

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_openoffice/

Notepad++

Replaces: Notepad
Alternatives: Notepad2, Jedit
Pros: Lightweight, Plugins, Open Source
Cons: N/A

Notepad++ is one of many Notepad replacements.  Unlike typical Notepad, however, Notepad++ features many front and back end improvements.  On the front end you have such noticeable features like tabbed files, line numbers, syntax highlighting, syntax folding, and code completion.  In terms of back end improvements, the following is taken from the Notepad++ homepage:

Based on a powerful editing component Scintilla, Notepad++ is written in C++ and uses pure Win32 API and STL which ensures a higher execution speed and smaller program size.

Download Notepad++: http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_notepad/

Foxit Reader

Replaces: Adobe PDF Reader
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Lightweight, Fast, Plugins, Annotation Tool
Cons: Occasional Rendering Mistakes (very rare)

Of all the software on this list, you will probably notice the biggest difference in speed and performance when using Foxit Reader.  Compared to the “official” Adobe PDF Reader, Foxit Reader is incredibly small (just over 2.5MB),  blazing fast, and its core function is compatible with PDF Standard 1.7.  Foxit Reader also comes standard with an annotation tool, unlike Adobe, who would charge you $299 for their pro version to get feature.

Download Foxit Reader: http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/reader_2/down_reader.htm

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_foxit/

CutePDF Writer

Replaces: Adobe PDF Writer
Alternatives: N/A
Pros: Lightweight, Fast
Cons: N/A

Lastly, CutePDF Writer is a very lightweight PDF creation program.  After installing CutePDF Writer, creating a .PDF document is as easy as 1, 2, 3.  All you have to do is 1) choose the print option from the document you wish to convert.  2) Select the CutePDF option under the list of printers.  3) Choose a location to save the document and hit the save button.

Download CutePDF Writer: http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp

Mirror: http://www.filehippo.com/download_cutepdf_writer/