Keeping clients' computers safe and profitable for over 30 years

Recommended Windows Programs

Backup

• Online backup: Spideroak; My articles on Spideroak
• Local backup: Second Copy
• Image Backup: Either Macrium Reflect or Acronis TrueImage

Security

• Intrusion detection and startup management: Winpatrol allows you to manage startup programs including scheduled tasks.
• Antivirus: Nod32 - I recommend the simple antivirus, not the complete Internet Security.
• Free 2nd opinion malware scanner: Malwarebytes
• Software Update management: Ninite Updater. My article about Ninite Updater. 
  
• Password Management: Either Keepass (this is what I use) or Lastpass. My articles on KeePass.
  

Maintenance

• Defragmenter: Piriform Defraggler. Remember, for spinning drives only, not for SSD.
• Full blown temp file removal for big jobs! Open source Bleachbit portable. I see no reason for the install version. Get the portable.
  

Office Tools

• Cross-device Note taking and web clipping: Evernote
• PDF Reader: PDFXchange viewer. Faster, more powerful and safer than Adobe's PDF Reader.  For a little more power, or just to support these people and their great free product, I recommend PDF Xchange Editor. A feature comparison. For articles about it click here.
  
• Pdf Writer: BullZip
  
• Contact management, Calendar, email etc.: Intellect from Chaos Software
• Browser: Firefox for Windows. If Firefox is working o  Lightening for Android. If you like the free version, try the paid one too. It's $1.50.
  
• Image Viewer: Irfanview
• Image resizer: Open source Image resizer for Windows

Other tools

• Spam protector: Mailwasher
• Hardware Monitor: Open Hardware Monitor.  An article I wrote on it.
  
• E-Book library manager: Calibre
• System Tray clock replacement
• FTP Client: Open Source FileZilla:
• Program Launcher: Launchy