slapdash entry of things i will need in a few hours

msmoocow — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 08:06:41 GMT

After about a month of hiccups, I think it's time to restore Helena Elizabeth von Housenschmire de Bouzhnia Fontaine III to factory settings. :( Poor girl. So I'm making this post as a reference for all the crap I need to redownload afterward. Feel free to raid it, and if you see something interesting that you have to pay for...chances are I didn't pay for it, so um, let me know. ;D

Listed in a kind of flying-by-the-seat-of-the-pants-order, and cut because massive list is massive:

INITIAL DESKTOP SETUP AND MISCELLANY:
- RocketDock - imitation Mac dock for Windows
- WinRAR - way better than WinZip, so definitely set this as your default archive extractor
- CubeDesktop - allows you to have up to six desktops at once. Not recommended for those low on RAM, but it's very pretty ~~and useful for when you want to clandestinely IM people at work~~. I keep one desktop for internet and music and one for school/work, typically.
- ZScreen - feature-rich screencap program, which >>> the prnt scrn button for sure. I especially like how you can assign a hotkey to the program to import the cap automatically into the graphics editing program of your choice.
- Foxit Reader - Adobe Crapobat Reader is major bloatware. Get yourself Foxit ASAP, and you won't wait three minutes for a PDF to open ever again. (See Firefox add-ons for the in-browser PDF fix.)
- Virtual CloneDrive - mount .iso files on a virtual drive (yay for piracy)
- uTorrent - speaking of piracy...um, yeah. I used to use BitTorrent and I thought waiting a month for downloads to finish was normal. Then I got uTorrent. The end.

MAINTENANCE:
- 10 Quick Fixes To Make Your Windows Computer Run Faster - likely unnecessary once I restore factory settings, but handy to have anyway, especially for links to CCleaner and Defraggler

CONDOMS FOR YOUR COMPUTER:
- Spybot Search & Destroy - every computing magazine's favorite spyware killer, so it seems
- ThreatFire - great malware detector that looks for suspicious BEHAVIOR instead of searching through a database of known threats

BROWSERS:
- Firefox - the king of browsers. Not perfect, but extensively customizable.
- Flock - basically Firefox but geared towards social media. I like it for its integration of YouTube, Photobucket, Facebook, Twitter, del.icio.us, nifty feed reader, and pretty much EVERYTHING. Would be my default browser if it didn't take up so many resources and was less buggy, and if the Firefox-to-Flock extension converter were still online.
- Opera - I use this when Firefox and Flock infuriate me, though it's great on its own
- Chrome - Google kicks ass at everything, and does minimalism very well

FIREFOX ADDONS:
- Download Statusbar - might be my favorite and most basic addon. It eliminates the download manager popup and lets you view your downloads from within your browser window without them getting in the way.
- Nodobe Viewer - click on PDF files and they won't lag your browser anymore
- LJ Hook - recent addition, but one that I;m falling in love with. Icons are a ridiculously simple concept, yet so integral to LJ culture, and the random icon selector in this is GENIUS. I used to use LiveJournal Addons, which I really liked for the auto comment thread unfolder and the flist update notifications, but it's a little too laggy.
- Flashblocker - blocks Flash (no, really?) until you feel like seeing it
- Firebug - a must-have for web development, or even just if you're changing your LJ layout and want to see how it'll look

INSTANT MESSAGING:
- Pidgin - all-in-one chat client to replace Trillian (which I stopped using last summer). Might go back to consolidating my IMs, though. Or at least use it for Yahoo, since Y!M apparently hates me (fuck you too, Yahoo). Will update this with opinions once I use it.
- AIM - ...yep.
- MSN Messenger - ...uh huh.
- Messenger Plus - addon for MSN that is fifty kinds of awesome, but mostly for the sounds feature
- Google Talk - if you have Gmail and you're using the in-browser chat...stop. Download this and make your life SO much easier. The new email notifications are also lovely.
- ooVoo - video chat with up to six people at once, until the trial runs out. Then it's three people.
- Skype - voice calls, chat, blah blah blah. i don't use it much these days because some creeper from my class added me and I don't have the ladyballs to block him. >_>

MEDIA PLAYERS:
- KMPlayer - currently my media player of choice. Lightweight, skinnable, and takes the best screencaps I've seen, and has a very easy-to-use frame-by-frame pause-y thingy.
- Zoom Player - second favorite, though the free version can't play DVDs directly from your hard drive so boo. I do like its shortcuts a lot though, and I love the default skin.
- VLC Media Player - my OTHER second favorite. All of these three play every file type ever, and aren't too bloated. Only thing is that it's hard to pause and get clear caps without the weird tween scanlines showing up, and the shortcuts aren't as intuitive as KM or Zoom's.
- Songbird - pretty much Songbird:iTunes::Firefox:IE. Fantastic addons and runs nicely, though it has the tendency to crash on me. iTunes did, too, so oh well. Does get a bit bloated, however, and no support for video yet. last.fm scrobbler doesn't work either, even though it's supposed to.
- foobar2000 - lightest-weight, probably, of ALL of these, and audio-only. Fantastic for organizing your library, converting audio formats, and regular playback. Oh, and it scrobbles, too!
- last.fm - to scrobble my music, of course

MEDIA CONVERSION AND HANDLING:
- SUPER Converter - convert basically everything into anything, and is especially handy with VOB -> AVI conversions
- Jodix - a more basic, simpler iPod video converter
- DVDFab HD Decrypter - rip entire DVDs to your hard drive, easy as cow pies
- Audacity - edit sound files, record sound, rip sound from the web, track audio, etc
- HJSplit - split and rejoin files that are too big to send or upload whole. I've recently started using WinRar to archive and split big stuff, though.

WEB WORK:
- FileZilla - super duper FTP client
- HTML-Kit - great freeware alternative to Dreamweaver ~~since my boss wouldn't let me use pirated software, boo~~
- Handy ImageMapper - does its job well

Note to self: Also, reinstall Office 2007 and search for some CS4 torrents?
Note to others: Anything essential that should be up there?

i am nothing

slapdash entry of things i will need in a few hours