40+ Free Windows Software alternatives

This post is the part 2 of my earlier post 20 Open Source Windows Apps For You, i got lot of feedback for that post and my readers suggested some excellent programs to be included in that list. So here i am listing all those programs which i have missed in my earlier post. Do check the earlier post for the complete software list.

The list is in random order. Most of these apps serve as alternatives to commercial windows apps.

I am sure that there may be some useful programs which i have missed here, if your favorite application is not listed here comment or shoot me an email i will include that in this list.

Security:

1. Open Antivirus:
OpenAntiVirus is not another virus scanner to put on a computer! OpenAntiVirus is a platform for people seriously interested in anti-virus research, network security and computer security to communicate with each other, to develop solutions for various security problems, and to develop new security technologies.

2. Truecrypt:
Free open-source disk encryption software for Windows Vista/XP/2000 and Linux. Creates a virtual encrypted disk within a file and mounts it as a real disk. Encrypts an entire hard disk partition or a storage device such as USB flash drive. Encryption is automatic, real-time (on-the-fly) and transparent.

3. ClamAV:
ClamAV application is primarily for unix based systems but now a windows version is available. This version needs a emulation layer like CygWin

4. RogueScanner:
RogueScanner is an open source vulnerability management tool that is used to gain greater network visibility. This enables you to quickly identify and remove rogue wireless devices that may provide back door access to your critical data and infrastructure.

5. Keepass:
KeePass is a free/open-source password manager or safe which helps you to manage your passwords in a secure way. You can put all your passwords in one database, which is locked with one master key or a key-disk. So you only have to remember one single master password or insert the key-disk to unlock the whole database.

6. Clipperz:
Clipperz is a free and anonymous online password manager. Local encryption within the browser guarantees that no one except you can read your data. Nothing to install. (earlier review)

7. SoftPerfect Personal Firewall:
The SoftPerfect Personal Firewall is a free network firewall designed to protect your PC against attacks from the Internet or via a local area network. SoftPerfect Personal Firewall offers customizable security using user-defined rules for packet filtering. It works at a low level and also allows you to create rules based on non-IP protocols such as ARP.

File Transfer / Sharing:

1. WinSCP:
WinSCP is an open source free SFTP client and FTP client for Windows. Legacy SCP protocol is also supported. Its main function is safe copying of files between a local and a remote computer.

2. PuTTy:
PuTTY is a free implementation of Telnet and SSH for Win32 and Unix platforms, along with an xterm terminal emulator.

3. ShowMyPC:
ShowMyPC is now a Community for Remote Support providers. Providing tools for Instant Support to Service Providers and Users. It started as an open source Desktop Sharing and Remote PC access project, an alternative to subscription based sites like WebEx or Gotomypc.

4. Ares:
Ares is a free open source file sharing program that enables users to share any digital file including images, audio, video, software, documents, etc.

Multi Media

1. Media Player Classic:
Media Player Classic (MPC) is a compact free software media player for Microsoft Windows. The application has a similar look and feel to the old light-weight Windows Media Player 6.4. Underneath, however, it is a completely different application which has all the options and features one might expect from a modern media player.

2. Media Coder:
MediaCoder is a free universal batch media transcoder, which nicely integrates most popular audio/video codecs and tools into an all-in-one solution. (earlier review)

3. Hanbrake:
HandBrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded DVD to MPEG-4 converter, available for MacOS X, Linux and Windows.

4. musikCube:
musikCube can be an alternative to iTunes to manage your music collection.

5. popCorn:
popCorn is a desktop-oriented MPEG-1 audio (MP3) and video software capable of playing data streamed directly from the network. Compatibility with existing media servers is provided by the support of the industry standard RTSP protocol.

6. ImgBurn:
ImgBurn is a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application. It supports all windows versions.

7. AVS Disc Creator:
Write your data to CD, DVD and Blu-ray Discs quickly and easily using FREE AVS Disc Creator.

8. DVDStyler:
DVDStyler is a cross-platform DVD authoring application that makes possible for video enthusiasts to create professional-looking DVDs.

9. mp3mymp3:
Record any audio playing on your computer as mp3 or wav file with mp3mymp3 recorder. It can record any sound originating from your computer, it works by recording all audio through your sound card. (earlier review)

10. Media Portal:
MediaPortal is an Open Source application ideal for turning your PC / TV into a very advanced Media Center. MediaPortal allows you to listen to your favorite music & radio, watch and store your videos and DVDs, view, schedule and record live TV as a digital video recorder and much much more.

11. VirtualDub
VirtualDub is a video capture/processing utility for 32-bit Windows platforms (95/98/ME/NT4/2000/XP), licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL). It lacks the editing power of a general-purpose editor such as Adobe Premiere, but is streamlined for fast linear operations over video.

Video Editing Tools

1. Vivia-The Video Editor:
Vivia is a video editing program for Linux and Windows. It provides extremely easy editing of clips and transitions in real-time, along with multi-camera support for editing scenes that were recorded by more than one camera simultaneously.

2. MiNi Video Studio:
MiNI Video Studio is a program for non-linear video editing. It means this application allows creating of a movie from other movies in a way, that the elements of the final movie overlap, creating a series of layers, that can be rendered one by one, or all at once.

3. DVD Flick:
DVD Flick aims to be a simple but at the same time powerful DVD Authoring tool. It can take a number of video files stored on your computer and turn them into a DVD that will play back on your DVD player, Media Center or Home Cinema Set. You can add additional custom audio tracks as well as subtitles of your choice.

4. OpenVIP:
OpenVIP editor. It provides a user-friendly GUI to the core and is based on the timeline concept – you place multimedia files on the timeline, apply filters, transitions…

5. Avidemux:
Avidemux is a free video editor designed for simple cutting, filtering and encoding tasks. It supports many file types, including AVI, DVD compatible MPEG files, MP4 and ASF, using a variety of codecs.

Image Viewing & manipulation

1. Irfanview:
IrfanView is a very fast, small, compact and innovative FREEWARE graphic viewer for Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003/Vista.

2. Paint.net:
Paint.NET is free image and photo editing software for computers that run Windows. It features an intuitive and innovative user interface with support for layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools.

3. XnView:
XnView is a free software to view and convert graphic files, really simple to use. It Support of more than 400 graphics formats.

3D Graphics:

1. Art Of Illusion:
Art of Illusion is a free, open source 3D modelling and rendering studio. It is written entirely in Java, and should be usable on any Java Virtual Machine which is compatible with J2SE 1.4 or later.

2. OpenFX:
OpenFX is an Open-Source 3D modeling, animation and rendering suite. A powerful feature-set includes a full renderer and raytrace engine, NURBS support, kinematics-based animation, morphing, and an extensive plugin API.

Office / Productivity

1. AbiWord:
AbiWord is a open source and fully cross-platform word processor.

2. Launchy:
Launchy is a free windows utility designed to help you forget about your start menu, the icons on your desktop, and even your file manager. Launchy indexes the programs in your start menu and can launch your documents, project files, folders, and bookmarks with just a few keystrokes! (earlier review)

3. Cygwin:
Cygwin is a Linux-like environment for Windows. It consists of two parts: A DLL (cygwin1.dll) which acts as a Linux API emulation layer providing substantial Linux API functionality. A collection of tools which provide Linux look and feel.

4. Pandora Recovery:
Pandora Recovery is a powerful free tool that provides its users an effective way to attempt recovery of permanently deleted files. (earlier review)

5. CCleaner:
CCleaner is a freeware system optimization and privacy tool. It removes unused files from your system – allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history.

6. Wink:
You can create presentations or screencasts with Wink in just minutes, you can record mouse movements or take screenshots of your application and save them as flash files. (earlier review)

7. Freemind:
FreeMind is a premier free mind-mapping software written in Java. The recent development has hopefully turned it into high productivity tool.

8. jetToolbar:
Despite Microsoft’s best intentions, the Start Menu isn’t everybody’s cup of tea. If you’re looking for an alternative way to launch your programs, take a look at jetToolBar. During installation this well-done utility creates 14 default categories, registers shortcuts for many of your applications, and adds bookmarks for recommended Web pages.

9. MyUninstaller:
MyUninstaller is an alternative utility to the standard Add/Remove applet of Windows operating system. It displays the list of all installed application, and allows you to uninstall an application, delete an uninstall entry, and save the list of all installed applications into a text file or HTML file.

10. Flashget:
Flashget is a freeware for downloading files. It uses MHT(Multi-server Hyper-threading Transportation) technique, supports various protocols

11. ZScreen:
ZScreen is an open-source screen capture program that allows for region/window/full-screen screenshots. It can FTP screenshots and put the URL in your clipboard in a single keystroke. It supports automatic custom naming conventions with variables. It can also interface with image editing software.

12. CamStudio:
CamStudio is able to record all screen and audio activity on your computer and create industry-standard AVI video files and using its built-in SWF Producer can turn those AVIs into lean, mean, bandwidth-friendly Streaming Flash videos (SWFs)

13. Libra
Libra is a library software to organize your stuff: Books, Audio CDs, Movies, & Games (for a start). Hook up your webcam, and Libra turns it instantly into a barcode scanner. Point your webcam towards the barcode (in any orientation) on the back of your books, DVD’s or CD’s and Libra will auto-retrieve the product information automatically, and add it to your library. Its free for non commercial use.

Web / Development

1. PSPad:
PSPad is a freeware programmer’s editor for Microsoft Windows operating systems, useful for people who:

2. HTTrack:
HTTrack is a free and easy-to-use offline browser utility. It allows you to download a World Wide Web site from the Internet to a local directory, building recursively all directories, getting HTML, images, and other files from the server to your computer.

3. NOTEPAD++:
Notepad++ is a free source code editor (and Notepad replacement), which supports several programming languages, running under the MS Windows environment.

Google Pack

I haven’t listed any of the programs from Google Pack because most of the users are aware of these. Except one or two all the programs in this pack are must have for anybody, if you havn’t downloaded google pack get it from here

Miscellaneous

Virtual Box:
VirtualBox is a family of powerful x86 virtualization products for enterprise as well as home use. Not only is VirtualBox an extremely feature rich, high performance product.