Best free necesary software

Hi i've had to install windows again because my hard drive has gone very noisy and apparently that means it could be breaking. Regardless I have a lot of crap on my hard drive and want to do a fresh install.

What programs should I install on vista?

I was thinkning:

AVG free

Comodo firewall

Malaware Bytes

MS Essentials

Total Uninstall

KM Player (I used VLC for a long time but this plays 1080p films better for me)

Tixati

Open Office

Adobe Reader

Virtual CloneDrive

Autoruns

Is a registry cleaning tool needed?

Any other programs or replacements for the list?

You don't need 3 programs that essentially do the same thing: MS Essentials, Malware Bytes, and AVG.

Theres no point or value in a registry cleaning tool. Theres marginal value in a firewall tool with a decent router.

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Thanks everyone

You don't need 3 programs that essentially do the same thing: MS Essentials, Malware Bytes, and AVG.

Theres no point or value in a registry cleaning tool. Theres marginal value in a firewall tool with a decent router.

XaosII

, which program one is best MSE, Malware bytes or AVG?

CCleaner pointless? ppl report it removing several hundred megabytes of useless info, I suppose that isn't much on a Terabyte.

So windows firewall is best?

K thanks

You don't need 3 programs that essentially do the same thing: MS Essentials, Malware Bytes, and AVG.

Theres no point or value in a registry cleaning tool. Theres marginal value in a firewall tool with a decent router.

XaosII

Unless he's paying for AVG, Malwarebytes finds things that the Free version of AVG won't. But yeah I don't think he needs AVG and MS essentials.

I use Avast, Malwarebytes and SuperAntiSpyware.

7-Zip is also good to download.

Try Ninite, it's a batch installer for most popular free software like 7-zip, firefox, ccleaner etc

Tick the boxes for the programs you want then click get installer and you can install as many as you want with one click.

Use Avast instead of AVG. fend_oblivion

GIMP (image manipulation)
foobar2000 (audio file player)
VLC (multimedia file player)
CCleaner (general system maintenance)
Avast (anti-virus)
7-zip (archive manager)
LibreOffice (if you do not have MS Office)
Adobe Acrobat Reader
Deluge (torrent client)
SRWare Iron (Chome web browser minus google's tracking stuff)

[QUOTE="fend_oblivion"]Use Avast instead of AVG. EZs

Try Ninite, it's a batch installer for most popular free software like 7-zip, firefox, ccleaner etc

Tick the boxes for the programs you want then click get installer and you can install as many as you want with one click.

kraken2109

ranked from importance:
spotify
neorouter
myentunnel

spotifyer (global hotkeys for spotify, this does get you kicked from punkbuster)

3rvx (global audio changing, this also gets you kicked from punkbuster)

putty

netbeans

msi after burner
no machine nx
tightvnc
blender... is kinda fun

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jun_aka_pekto

[QUOTE="jun_aka_pekto"]

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JigglyWiggly_

[QUOTE="JigglyWiggly_"][QUOTE="jun_aka_pekto"]

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kraken2109

Sure. But, which one of those you mentioned is free and usable offline? Mathematica costs $140 for students. I might as well just use the one I mentioned or even the KDE math app (has a Windows port).

Part of the KDE math apps:

KMPlot:

Thanks again

Whats the best free uninstaller I have read around and opinions seem mixed?

I don't have an issue at the moment just wandering.