[Esbenovich]

IrfanView - http://www.irfanview.net/

iTunes - http://www.apple.com/

Joost (could live without it but it's pretty cool ) - http://www.joost.com/

AVG free antivirus - http://free.grisoft.com/doc/1/us/frt/0

Ad-Aware 2007 - http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php

and
Alcohol 52% - http://www.alcohol-soft.com/

[ElusivePachyderm]

HostsXpert : Is a simple easy to use one time install and forget software that protects your host file, so nothing would ever Hijack it again . Also if your Host file is already hijacked,it will replace it with the default Host File

This is the authors site but if you have any questions you could run a search on Google for assurances from established sources:

http://www.funkytoad.com/content/view/13/

[ElusivePachyderm]

Description of the Windows Installer CleanUp Utility:

Some how this is not a part of the std. updates, anyways this is a utility to remove those hard
to remove registry entries:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301

[hewee]

Originally Posted by ElusivePachyderm

HostsXpert : Is a simple easy to use one time install and forget software that protects your host file, so nothing would ever Hijack it again . Also if your Host file is already hijacked,it will replace it with the default Host File

This is the authors site but if you have any questions you could run a search on Google for assurances from established sources:

http://www.funkytoad.com/content/view/13/

Does it really protect the host file? I mean lock it so nothing gets to it.
I did test some years back and it is posted here some where and Zone Alarm Pro was the only thing that keep any other program from opening it.
Others that say they lock the hosts file failed.
Found this thread on it.
http://www.dozleng.com/updates/index...pic=4606&st=10

I use HostsMan now and all is well. It even "Scan hosts for errors, duplicates and possible hijacks"
Plus I use it to backup.

I also know now scan from other programs will look there and at time still finds thing that are ok. Spybot has some sites that it will find because they don't think it should be in the hosts file but it is in the hosts file to block those sites.

Also you can do faster scans if you disable the hosts file. Also if you rename your bookmarks.html file to bookmarks.old.html it will not scan it either. I know I have a big host file and lots of bookmarks and Spybot takes a long time on those two so you really speed the scan time up if it does not have to scan them.

[ElusivePachyderm]

Personally it worked well for me . My computer was infested with viruses, (with shell corruptions, buffer overflows,explorer corruptions,corrupt drivers ...... and virtually no program ever worked without getting hijacked ) and did use quite a few programs( which I am trying hard not to name ) to keep it from getting hijacked including the the one you just mentioned. However It didn't really work for me at least .Every time I checked it via HJT it was gone ! ,with just a blank page. . There are very few programs which do use host file to block off sources, even so all you do need to do would be to make it writable
and only readable once you are done. Its also not recommended to use host file as means of blocking/filtering sites as it can get corrupted quite easily as far as I have heard at least

[Magikthise]

I second the vote for Irfanview. A great image viewer/manipulator, and it's FREE!

My 'can't do without it' program has to be Sitespinner, by Virtual Mechanics. Being almost completely illerate when it comes to HTML, Sitespinner is a comprehensive, full-featured WYSIWYG web page editor that's very easy to use. $99.00 CAN

I created this website using it (still a work in progress btw, and opinions would be appreciated):

The International Railfan Association

Not associated with Virtual Mechanics, just a big fan!

[mclarenvj]

CPU-Z
I really can't live without knowing how fast i'm going
really

[knucklehead]

Foxit Reader: Foxit Reader is a free reader for PDF documents. You can view and print PDF documents with it.

http://www.filehippo.com/download_foxit/