Why use Freeware?

 

I know that the time will come that I will finally be able to shun Windows and use one of the open-source operating systems. I can feel that that time is nearing.

 

But this is not that time. I have to continue to being a Windows for a little while longer. It did not help after my experience when I tried my hands on a few Live CDs of two Linux flavors, Ubuntu and DSLinux.

 

After a few frustrating minutes in trying to make everything work, I gave up and went back to Windows.

 

I know that its not the Linux OS fault. In every thing new that we have to do, there is a learning curve, but I am just lazy to sit around and learn how everything works. I want to immediately in the thick of things. And that's where the frustrations arise.

 

 

 

And I know that these are both very promising Linux flavors and there are others out there that I haven't given a test drive. But I feel that that is one of the reason why open-source OSs' are struggling to compete with Windows, there are too many of them. I believe that one of the best way to compete head-to-head with Windows is for the OSS to work together, collate their very best features and integrate them into one monsters OS. They're getting there, let's give them time.

 

Going back to my topic, using freeware. Why bother? Is it worth it? There is a saying that you get what you pay for. And since we do not pay for freeware, does it mean that they're crap, not worth the trouble of downloading and using?

 

Ay, I beg to disagree.

 

There are a lot of very, very good freeware apps out there. You just need to know where to look for, what site to download them from, and be patient and read reviews about them from refutable blog sites or sources and you should download them either directly from the author's site or from known freeware provider sites like download.com, CNet.com, PCWorld.com, and the like.

 

Try to avoid torrent or peer-to-peer sites are as they are not always virus-free.

 

And to redeem myself from still being a Windows slave, I am making it a point to try to use freeware apps. Here are some of the apps that I have been using, check them out.

 

Adobe Reader - freeware reader for .pdf files. Haven't tried one of those freeware pdf readers. Will probably do it soon. 

 

Avast! antivirus Home Edition - has become my favorite anti virus software after trying out the lot of them. I particular like the on-demand scanner and resident scanner as it captures almost all of the viruses that I downloaded from the Net

 

Audiograbber - previously a shareware audio CD ripping tool, now offered as freeware

 

Auslogic Disk Defrag - the built-in defrag tool from Windows is already competent in doing a decent job. But I tried this one and its ok.

 

CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) - I use it to clean my temp files and clean my registry.

 

CDBurnerXP - to burn my CDs and DVDs. It is capable of handling Blu-Ray and HD-DVDs, but since we are in the Philippines, we need not worry ourselves with these media format ne, hehehe. 

 

ERUNT (The Emergency Recovery Utility NT) and  NTRegOpt (NT Registry Optimizer) - used both to back up and optiomize my registry

 

IZArc - archive utility that supports a lot of format. Bye-bye Winzip.

 

K-Lite Codec Pack - a collection of codecs that a solution for playing almost all video and audio files.

 

Media Player Classic - discovered this a few weeks ago and it works great. Its a WMP alternative that looks like the old WMP. Its fast and plays a lot of multimedia files, DVDs and even .3gp files. I no longer need to install the Nokia PC Suite. What I like most is that it supports seek even when playing .3gp, unlike the Nokia PC Suite.

 

Mozilla Firefox - an Internet Explorer alternative, but more secure than IE.

 

OpenOffice.org - sounds familiar ne, but it is a very good alternative to Microsoft Office. And there are a lot of companies who use it. Can you name one, hehehe.

 

Picasa - to manage my hundreds of pics

 

Regseeker - downloaded this just yesterday and tried it out last night. Very promising but a little scary because it found a lot of invalid entries from my registry. I don't know it that's a good thing. Will do more test with it. 

 

SUPER, Simplified Universal Player Encoder & Renderer - a multimedia file converter that can convert almost any media file to any media file. Lots of features and no need to get external codecs. Necessarycodecs are built in.

 

TrueCrypt - securing some of the files that are "for my eyes only". I created an encrypted 20 gig partition using this app and its just a matter of mounting the partition and dumping all my secret files there.

 

TweakUI - tweaking tool for Windows, very useful

TrueCrypt - Keep my files secret

In preparation for the event where I need to go somewhere and not be back home for a long time, I started looking for a tool that will protect my computer files from prying eyes, and I believe I finally found one.

Enter TrueCrypt, a free open source on-the-fly encryption (OTFE) program for Microsoft Windows.

I stumbled upon this one while searching last Thursday, was able to download a copy and tried it out this weekend.

This is how the program was described: Truecrypt will basically enable you to create a virtual encrypted disk within a file and mount it as a virtual disk, that can be accessed via a drive letter. Any file that is stored on this virtual drive is automatically encrypted on-the-fly, and can only be accessed while the drive is mounted with the correct password or key.

On-the-fly encryption means that data are automatically encrypted or decrypted right before they are loaded or saved, without any user intervention. No data stored on an encrypted volume can be read (decrypted) without using the correct password/keyfile(s) or correct encryption keys. Entire file system is encrypted (e.g.., file names, folder names, contents of every file, free space, meta data, etc).

TrueCrypt supports a variety of encryption algorithms, including AES-256, Blowfish (448-bit key), CAST5, Serpent, Triple DES, and Twofish.

(its a bit technical, the encryption algorithms, and even I am unable to understand them but what's comforting is the AES-256 is a new standard that may be used by US federal departments and agencies to cryptographically protect sensitive information, and Serpent has a high security margin and Twofish may be viewed as a collection of 2128 different cryptosystems, where 128 bits derived from a 256-bit key control the selection of the cryptosystem)

But bottom line, what this means is that if I encrypt my files, they will be next to impossible to decrypt.

Other features include support for FAT32 or NTFS formatting, hidden volumes, hotkeys for mounting/dismounting and more.

Its reminiscent of the DOS version of Norton Utilities Diskreet, but it is much, much secure.

And one thing that I like is that it is so easy to use, its easier to maintain your virtual disk, and its just a matter of remembering your password and securing your keyfile. If you forget your password or lost your keyfile, you can kiss your data goodbye.

And unlike other password protection programs that there is a glitch, you are already providing the correct password but the program won't let your access your files, I did not experience this on TrueCrypt.

Comparing it with Windows' Encrypted File System (EFS), TrueCrypt is more hassle-free because you will  just need to save your password and/or keyfile, with EFS, you need to save your certificate if you will need to reinstall windows, it takes to long to encrypt large files, and you can only use it with an NTFS file system. TrueCrypt allows you to create virtual disk with FAT file system.