01.In brief
Free software is appealing because you can find useful office and multimedia applications without the hefty price tag. But there are a few drawbacks to consider.
Free software doesn’t usually come with any support, so you’re more or less on your own if something goes wrong. There are unlikely to be regular updates to correct bugs and security flaws. Also, some free programs may not have all the features that paid programs offer. You probably won’t get any discs, but you can easily re-install the software from the internet if you need to.
On the plus side, there may be a loyal following of users who can provide advice and help if you’re experiencing problems. User forums are often the best places to go for support. There are usually both Windows and Mac versions, but you may need to wait before there are versions available for the latest operating systems such as Windows Vista or Mac Leopard, which goes on sale in October.
There are so many programs available, it’s hard to know what worth a try. To get you started, we’ve compiled a list of useful programs that you can install in place of paid software. We haven’t tested them, but we have installed and tried them to determine how they run.
Please note: this information was current as of September 2007 but is still a useful guide to today's market.
Programs we've looked at
Office applications
- Google Docs & Spreadsheets
- OpenOffice
- Primo PDF
- SyncBack Freeware
- ThinkFree Office
Handy tools
Browsers
- Mozilla Firefox
- Flock
- Opera
Messaging
Audio/video
- CDBurnerXP Pro
- Audacity
- Lame MP3 Encoder
- VideoLAN
- RealPlayer basic
- jetAudio 7 Basic
Photo editing
- Paint.NET
- GIMP
- Serif PhotoPlus
- Movavi
- PhotoMesa
Security
- AVG Anti-Virus
- Spybot Search & Destroy
- ZoneAlarm Basic
Find your own
- download.com
- fileforum.betanews.com
- majorgeeks.com
- nonags.com
- snapfiles.com
- topshareware.com
- tucows.com
- voodoofiles.com
4 Feb 2010
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