Elite Freeware

See ya!

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 17:07:00 +0000

It's been awhile my dear readers, as you know i haven't been updating the blog at all. Real life troubles and a lack of solid internet access (i moved, my ISP wouldn't transfer the service to my new house, no other ISP available in my area, using a 3G modem right now) have made me unable to work on finding good freeware stuff, in other words my life is shit right now so i can't update the blog anymore which is a real shame because i loved working on Elite Freeware. There's a good chance this will be the last update of Elite Freeware however if things get better i will start updating the site again tough i seriously doubt that. Anyway i'm writing all of this down because the correct thing is to make it all official so i don't get anyone hopes up. Thanks everybody who has visited the site and keep using freeware programs if possible!

-Ale

NANY 2010 Entry: SubDiv

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 00:04:00 +0000

SubDiv is another NANY 2010 entry, this very small app is used to organize files in folders according to their date of creation. This is handy if you want to tidy up the folder that you use to download all of your stuff. SubDiv drawbacks at least right now are that it doesn't offer any other sorting methods beside the date, also it doesn't monitor the folder for changes so you will have to run the app again if you add more files and there's no undo option. However the developer plans to update SubDiv in the future so hopefully some of the drawbacks will be worked on.
So in conclusion SubDiv is a small little app that does a very simple thing well, check it out.

NANY 2010 entry: Piggy Banks

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 17:17:00 +0000

Piggy Banks is one of the entries for NANY 2010, it's basically a fund tracker that you can use to calculate how much time it would take to save up for something. You set up the fund's name, it's money goal, daily accrual and the kitty which is the amount of money you start with. Piggy Banks will then calculate the estimated time at which you will reach your goal, the cool thing is that you can open Piggy Banks a week later and Piggy Banks will update your current funds according to the daily accrual you have selected.
So there you have it people, Piggy Banks is a nice little app that could be handy if you save up money for stuff. Also i suggest that you check the following screencast in order to know more about the app.

Happy New Year! (oh and NANY 2010)

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 03:08:00 +0000

A new year has come and with it lots of new stuff appear in the horizon like for example software, more specifically free software written and released by my friends over at Donationcoder.com
Of course this is all part of NANY 2010 (New Apps For The New Year) and i obviously shall be taking a loook at what these fine people have come up with in the coming days just after i get over this massive hangover of booze, drugs, ladies of the night and massive naked destruction of hotel rooms, you know the usual stuff. So everyone get ready while i gather enough money for bail and check these programs out.

NANY 2010 needs you, yes you.

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 17:55:00 +0000

Sorry if i was absent lately i was busy...fighting evil bears, yes evil bears! Anyway as you may remember a long time ago i wrote about the entries for Donation coder's NANY 2009, if you don't know what NANY is the idea is very simple: programmers pledge to release a new piece of software in january 1st, that's it. The 2009 NANY gave birth to all sorts of cool apps some of which i mentioned right here in my blog such as Dad's Around, Comparer, JustCloseSomeTasks, Etc.
The 2010 edition of NANY is coming up soon and that's where you coming in, if you are a coder you can write a program and submit it for NANY 2010, it doesn't have to be anything specially complicated, a small but well executed idea is just fine. Also if you participate you will get a ultra special deluxe rare Donation coder mug free of charge! So stop whatever you are doing and pledge to participate in NANY 2010. More info about NANY 2010 can be found here.

See all the wireless keys stored in your PC with WirelessKeyView

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 00:23:00 +0000

Every time you connect to a wireless network Windows saves the key for later use, you can't view the keys normally so that's where an external program like WirelessKeyView comes in. This portable app will let you see every key on your PC that has been used to connect to a wireless network, handy if you want to store in a text file for later use.
Just remember this is not a cracking tool of any kind, WirelessKeyView will only display the keys to wireless networks you are currently connected or connected in the pass. Definitely worth a look if you use wireless networks a lot. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wireless_key.html

Altiris SVS let's you test any app without fear

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:25:00 +0000

I try a lot of apps in my search for quality freeware and sometimes you can run into apps that will mess with your system in unwanted ways, this happened to me a few times with...bad results, because of that i began to look for a way to test programs without having to worry about possible side effects and came up with the awesome Altiris Software Virtualization Solution (SVS). This is a virtualization program that basically lets you test any app without fear. Altiris SVS can put any program into a layer that sits outside Windows, while a program is in the layer it will act normal however once you decide to erase the program's layer all the changes that a program has made to Windows will be undone like they never happened! Altiris SVS can even put the entire system into a layer, handy if you want to test that a certain change in Windows actually works. Also since you can import and export layers you can potentially do some nifty tricks like for example installing games much faster that you can with the standard way, i haven't tried that myself tough. My only nag with the program is that you need a license in order to use it however one can be obtained without too much trouble by just going to a site. Anyway if testing a certain program or Windows change without having to worry sounds appealing to you then by all means give a Altiris SVS a chance. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at

Get Altiris SVS license (required)

http://www.altiris.com/Download/svsPersonal.aspx

Kameleon is a pretty good Foobar skin

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 02:14:00 +0000

I know that updates have been painfully slow lately and i also know that some of your comments haven't been showing up on the site (they haven't been moderated), the reason for all of this is simple: I am lazy bum. So now that we have that painful truth out of the way i am gonna talk about Foobar skins, more precisely a specific (will do a round up later) Foobar Skin called Kameleon which can be downloaded here. If you have ever tried installing a Foobar skins from deviant art or any any other place you may have run into the annoying problem that you have to download a certain Foobar component, Font or even a specific Foobar version. Well this is not the case with Kameleon since everything that you need is in a single compressed file that works with the latest Foobar version (0.9.6.9 as of this writing). As you can see my Foobar looks pretty good with Kameleon installed and besides a few minor nitpicks i feel pretty good about using this skin. So if the above screenshot looks good to you download Kameleon, extract it to your Foobar install directory and follow the configuration instructions on the Kameleon page and you will be set in no time.

Get Kameleon

Get Foobar2000

a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5 is free just for today!

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:05:00 +0000

a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5 is a commercial anti malware, trojan, spyware and rootkit solution that just happen to be free for today only! actually is more like a 40 dollar discount that it's applied to all the a-squared Anti-Malware orders which means that a license for a single computer for a year gets discounted to zero. Still a 1 year license for personal use isn't so bad of a deal so if you been having problems with malware lately you could give it a try, just remember that's just for today so hurry up and sign up!

Via: http://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/bb/index.php?topic=20580.0

Toddler Keys can prevent unwanted key presses in your PC or just help when you want to clean your keyboard

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:42:00 +0000

Overview:

It is a useful tool for parents that allows you to lock your computer keyboard, CD drive doors and power-off button. When the keyboard is used it will display images and play sounds every time a key is pressed, thereby preventing access to the desktop and applications, while adding some entertainment value for the kid. You can select the images and sounds to be used by copying them to the Toddler Keys folder. To exit the locked screen, just type the word QUIT.

Review:

Toddler Keys like the previously mentioned ToddlerTrap is a program that can lock down your mouse and keyboard preventing them from being used, this is handy if you want to clean your keyboard however Toddler Keys goes a step further and can also display images and sounds (that you can set) when in a lock down state, this should keep small children entertained. To exit the lockdown state of Toddler Keys all you have to do is to type a customizable word which is by default "quit". The program worked well when i used tough it looks like development has stopped which a shame.
In conclusion whether you want to stop your small children from messing with your PC or just be able to clean your keyboard without turning your computer off Toddler Keys is worth a look. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://tk.ms11.net/

Have all of Nirsoft apps into one small package with NirLauncher

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 22:36:00 +0000

If you check my blog archives you may notice that i have written a lot about programs made by Nir Sofer, his apps are pretty good so i like to keep an eye on his site. Anyway as it turns out Nirsoft recently made available a little portable package that holds pretty all of the programs that he has made over the years, it's called NirLauncher and while it's still in beta it works pretty well. Programs are organized in categories making finding a program a snap tough i would have appreciated having a search option.
In conclusion if you like Nirsoft apps then NirLauncher is a must. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://blog.nirsoft.net/2009/10/04/beta-version-of-nirlauncher-package-is-available-to-download/

Check important info about your hard drives with CrystalDiskInfo

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Overview:

CrystalDiskInfo is a HDD/SSD utility which supports S.M.A.R.T.

Review:

CrystalDiskInfo is a tool that can display technical information about your hard drives including but not limited to firmware, serial number, type of interface, how many times the hard drive has been started, how many hours has been on, Etc. This portable app also has the ability to tell you the status of your hard disks by a using a simple status message (it can be good, caution, bad or unknown) and the current temperature, it also displays S.M.A.R.T. statistics that can help you diagnostic a hard drive more accurately tough i wouldn't bother with this feature unless you can make sense of the very technical numbers that you are given. The last noteworthy feature i would like to mention is the controlling of certain special features that hard drives have, for example with CrystalDiskInfo you can manage the AAM and APM features of your disk, handy if you want to make your hard drives quiter or manage your power settings.
In conclusion i feel that CrystalDiskInfo is a pretty good program for knowing your hard disk info and optionally to do some very technical stuff, its' worth checking out. Available for Windows 2000/2003/XP/Vista.

Get it at http://crystalmark.info/software/CrystalDiskInfo/index-e.html

Enable/Disable context menu entries with ShellMenuView

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 18:19:00 +0000

Overview:

ShellMenuView is a small utility that display the list of static menu items that appeared in the context menu when you right-click a file/folder on Windows Explorer, and allows you to easily disable unwanted menu items.

Review:

If you would like view and either enable or disable context menu entries related to folders/files then ShellMenuView is worth a shot. This portable app can show you which context menu entries enabled/disabled, their file type, description, path, Etc. The app worked well for me tough some menu items from third party software didn't appear for some reason, for example ShellMenuView didn't list 7Zip menu items. Anyway i still think the app is worth a look so give it a try if you are interested. Available for Windows 98/2000/XP.

Get it at http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/shell_menu_view.html

Get reminded of your Google Calendar upcoming events with GMinder

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 00:45:00 +0000

Overview:

GMinder is a reminder program that waits in your system tray and alerts you when you have an upcoming Google Calendar event. GMinder supports multiple calendars and allows you to configure how you want to be alerted. Since it downloads your events, it works offline and enables you to preview your agenda of events. New events can be added to your Google Calendars using a Quick Add feature.

Review:

If you find yourself using Google Calendar too much (not me, definitely not me) then Gminder can be a good companion when trying to remember events. Gminder will download your Calendar's events and will warn you when they are coming up, it can manage multiple calendars on a same account and it even includes the ability to add new events into Google Calendar by just typing them. The app worked well for me for the most part however sometimes it crashed, something to do with the .NET framework. Also if you have a non english version of Windows XP you will have to choose a new sound for the alarm since Gminder points to a non existent file by default.
Anyway for all of you that use Google Calendar give this portable app a shot, even with the problems i have mentioned i feel the program is fully usable, who knows you might end up liking it. Available for all versions of Windows.

Get it at http://reflectivecode.com/gminder

Get the first episode of The Tales Of Monkey Island for free today only!

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 02:49:00 +0000

If you want to get the very first episode of the new Tales of Monkey Island series then you better hurry up because TellTale games is having a special promo just for today in which you can get the game free of charge. All you have to do is to sign for a TellTale games account or if you already have an account just login and get to the promo page. When this post goes up there will be only 4 hours left so you better hurry up if you want to make good use of the promo so go!

Get the game here: http://www.telltalegames.com/playlikeapirate

A small update about this blog

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 22:11:00 +0000

So yeah i am sure most of you have noticed that i haven't really posted much if at all lately, i might as well tell all my dear readers the reason for that. Before i mentioned that i am a college student, well right now i am doing the "practice" which means that i am testing my skills by doing actual work in an actual workplace, as you can guess this drains most of my time during the day leaving me with little time to update my small corner of the internet. I used to have a lot of free time to write about the freeware programs that i found on the web, remember those days where i updated the blog 5 days of the week? yeah i miss those days too and now i simply can't do that anymore. To make matters even worse my college tesis is due by the end of this year and i haven't even started it yet so i am gonna be full of work pretty soon.
Now i could just close down this blog forever and say goodbye, specially since web sites that don't update die but i don't want to do that just yet, i like this blog so i have an idea: i am gonna try to update on the weekends only, two post per week is not much i know but is something and i'd rather have something instead of nothing.
So dear readers i hope you stick around with my crappy blog a bit more, thanks for reading.

Duplicate Music Files Finder (DMFF) can search for file duplicates inside your PC

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 20:45:00 +0000

Overview:

With Duplicate Music Files Finder you can track your music files duplicates and delete them. The program uses advanced search techniques to detect duplicates(it searches MP3s TAGS, detects duplicates even if the file names are not the same etc). If duplicates are found you can delete the files you want: just check them and press the right mouse button. You can also play the selected files in your favourite Media Player to see if they really are duplicates.

Review:

If you want to find out if you have duplicates of your music files (or any other type of file) inside your computer then you might wanna give Duplicate Music Files Finder a look. With this portable app you can scan your hard drive for duplicates of music files, you can use various methods for searching like for example only comparing files if they are of the same size, comparing by filename, by music tags, Etc. I found DMFF search matches to be decent for the most part tough sometimes false matches were a problem so before deleting any supposed duplicates you better double check with your favorite music player. Besides finding file duplicates DMFF can also rename music files and rename music files tags however i found these parts of the program pretty lacking because i couldn't get them to work as i think they were intended, so if you want to rename music files and tags i would suggest you better use other programs like for example Renamer and MP3Tag respectively.
In conclusion is my opinion that DMFF is a competent duplicate file finder most of the time but it's other features could use a lot more work so i am leaning to recommending that you try it at least once and make up your own mind. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://www.lcibrossolutions.com/dmff

Convert units online by visiting onlineconversion.com

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 04:11:00 +0000

If you would like to make quick unit conversions and don't want to use the programs i have mentioned before like Convert and Converber then onlineconversion.com may fill your needs. This website can pretty much convert all the units of measurements available into different units which is cool.The site works pretty well so give it a try if you need to convert stuff using your internet browser.

Trout is a lightweight and portable music player

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 03:23:00 +0000

Overview:

Small, simple audio player (Freeware)

Features:

Supported audio formats (standard): AIFF, AIF, AIFC, MP1, MP2, MP3, OGA, OGG, WAV, MO3, XM, MOD, S3M, IT, MTM.
Supported audio formats (w/ plugins): FLAC, WMA, WMP, WMV, ASF, MID, MIDI, RMI, KAR, WV, WVC, AAC, MP4, M4A, M4B, M4P, APE, AC3, SPX, TTA, OFR, MPC, ALAC.
Basic freeDB support for audio CD track titles.
Support for internet radio streams.
Supported tag formats:
ID3v1, ID3v2.2/3/4
OGG/FLAC Vorbis comments
WMA
APE, OFR, MPC, AAC (APE tags)
MP4/ALAC/AAC (not available under 9x/ME)
WinampAPI support for external control and display.
Commandline parameters for external control (/play, /stop, /prev, /next, /mute).
Extremely customizable hotkey system.
Basic custom string formatting (see Options screenshot).
Basic album art support (folder.jpg)
Horizontal/vertical "minibar" controls (see main screenshot).
Toaster style popup.
Play modes (Play file, play list, repeat file, repeat list, random, shuffle).
Simple tag editing (not available under 9x/ME).
last.fm support.

Review:

If you find most music players these days are full of features that you don't need then Trout is worth a look. This portable music player has a straightforward interface and just the right amount of features that that don't get in the way of listening to your tunes, some of Trout's highlights include Last.fm support, slick toaster popups on song changes, customizable hotkeys and many more things that i think you would like. Trout doesn't use many resources of your computer, it's simple and gets the job done, so for all of these reasons i suggest you give it a chance, i did and now Trout is my main music player. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/bb/index.php?topic=16157.0

Quickly compare text files and folders with TextDiff

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 04:05:00 +0000

Overview:

TextDiff can compare either text files or folders.

Features:

- customizable color highlighting of differences
- drag and drop enabled
- accepts commandline parameters for file and folder comparisons

Folder compares:

double click modified (green) files to view file differences

File compares:

- a very fast compare algorithm
- space characters and case can be ignored during a compare operation
- also highlights differences within individual lines.
- easy navigation between differences
- easy two-way merging
- in-place text editing
- search and replace text
- multiple undo/redo of text changes
- supports unicode text files
- generates a report of file differences

Review:

If you are a coder or programmer that keeps different versions of a same text file then the portable TextDiff can help in you in spotting the hard to see differences, it will take two text files and will quickly show all the changes line by line, you can select to disregard blanks and capitalizations when doing a comparing and even choose to only show the differences. TextDiff can save a pretty detailed report showing exactly what was added, removed or changed from a text file including the offending line's number which can be pretty handy when hunting for a specific change. The app can also compare folders but i didn't find that feature all that useful or straightforward compared to the text file comparer so didn't use it all that much.
In conclusion TextDiff is a handy tool for the comparing of text files that shouldn't be so easily overlooked, give it a try. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://www.angusj.com/delphi/textdiff.html

Cool PDF is a portable PDF reader

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 03:26:00 +0000

Overview:

The world's smallest PDF viewer/reader to view, print, and convert PDF files to TXT, BMP, JPG, GIF, PNG, WMF, EMF, EPS. It is only 650KB for download and doesn't need lengthy installation, just download and run.

Review:

Cool PDF reader is a portable app that like the name says it allows you to read PDFs. While Cool PDF reader did it's main job which is to read PDF decently i found it to have several shortcoming compared to my main PDF reader, for starters you can't set your own hotkeys for navigating and have to use the default which are not of my liking, the fullscreen option doesn't work at all which is weird, there's no search function and i found the interface pretty unintuitive however you can save pages of a PDF document in lots of different formats like JPG which is nice, tough it would be a lot nicer if it allow you to do for the whole PDF at once. In conclusion for all the previously written reasons i suggest that if you want a PDF reader you are better off with Foxit Reader, Sumatra PDF or PDF X-Change Viewer. Available for all windows versions.

Get it at http://www.pdf2exe.com/reader.html

vSubst lets you transform folders into virtual drives

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 01:25:00 +0000

Overview:

vSubst helps assign virtual drive letters to any folder on your hard disk. It is a graphical interface for the SUBST command. Limitations:

• SUBSTed-drives don't operate 100% in networks
• Some copy-protected CD-ROMs check for the physical presence of a disk...
• Volume-Label is always identical to the host label.
• vSubst just creates a virtual drive like the old subst-command - nothing more or less

Review:

vSubst is a small and portable program that lets you assign unused drive letters to folders allowing to quickly access them from "My PC" screen. vSubst works pretty well tough it does have some minor issues like not being fully operational in networks but overall this a good app that can help you in making folders into virtual drives. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://home.datacomm.ch/t.bigler/utils.html

Remove suspicious autorun files with Autorun Eater

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:17:00 +0000

Overview:

Autorun Eater will remove any suspicious 'autorun.inf' files even before the user attempts to access the drive. These files are auto-backup'ed in case of false positives.

Review:

Autorun Eater is a handy little application that can save you a lot of trouble if you pendrive or hard drive has their autorun.inf files infected by a virus or malware, the app will do a real time scan of your drives and will remove any autorun files that it deems infected, this can prevent infections from nasty stuff. Other features include disabling autoplay so that no viruses can be spread using that method and fixing registry entries that are related to the running of the task manager, regedit and folder options.
In conclusion Autorun Eater is not a replacement for your antivirus, it's just another layer of security that can prevent viruses or malware from being spread inside your PC, at 2 to 3MB of memory usage Autorun Eater certainly can find a place in your everyday life, i think it's pretty good. Available for all Windows versions.

Get it at http://oldmcdonald.wordpress.com/

Watch two youtube videos side by side with youtubedoubler.com

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 03:38:00 +0000

Youtubedoubler.com allows you to play two youtube videos at the same time by just inputting their URL, this could be useful for comparison purposes like this example. The site is still in beta but it worked well for me, just keep in mind that playing two flash videos might use a lot of CPU causing decreased perfomance in your PC. Anyway give the site a try, you might end up liking it.

Sorry....again

noreply@blogger.com (Elite freeware guy) — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 19:29:00 +0000

So i am sure most of you have noticed that i haven't really posted anything at all this week, the reason for that is that this was finals week in my college, i had to do a bunch of work that caused Elite Freeware to fall by the wayside. For all of this i apologize...again, so have a picture of a cute hamster holding some flowers, i am sure this enough to make amends with all of you.
Now we will continue with our scheduled posting of quality freeware programs that can be found on the web, stay tuned!