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2009 Windows Utility Guide

Eric Griffith
 & Eric Griffith Senior Editor, Features

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    Buying Guide: 2009 Windows Utility Guide

    2009 Windows Utility Guide

    Contents

    Windows, in its myriad forms, remains the most-used operating system around. Therefore, it has the most developers creating software. And many of those hardworking coders write programs that improve on, replace, or insert functions that Windows got wrong or completely lacks. Not to mention all the functions that can be done on data, from documents to photos to music to videos.

    We call these bits of code utilities, and they come in all shapes and forms. This year we've gathered our largest list of them ever, and you'll find the vast majority of them share a great feature: They cost exactly zero dollars. Free means you can try these tools to your heart's content. (If you're worried they may harm your system, skip to the section on "Virtual PCs and Layers" for a solution to that.) And many of them are also portable, so you can easily put them on a USB flash drive to use on any Windows system, anywhere you go.

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    All the utilities listed here work with Windows XP and Windows Vista unless noted. Quite a few claim to work with Windows 7 as well. Overwhelmed by the concept of more than 200 utilities? We've highlighted one in each of the 25 categories that we find particularly interesting, useful, or strange—a QuickPick to get you started. But what do you like? And what did we miss? If your favorite was left off the list, visit our AppScout blog to let everyone know!

    (You may note a lack of security utilities here. That's because our own Neil J. Rubenking systematically puts those suites through their paces in a way that goes well beyond the scope of this story; his latest security suite roundup featured the top 16 software suites from the biggest names in security.)

    About Our Expert

    Eric Griffith

    Eric Griffith

    Senior Editor, Features

    My Experience

    I've been writing about computers, the internet, and technology professionally since 1992, more than half of that time with PCMag. I arrived at the end of the print era of PC Magazine as a senior writer. I served for a time as managing editor of business coverage before settling back into the features team for the last decade and a half. I write features on all tech topics, plus I handle several special projects, including the Readers' Choice and Business Choice surveys and yearly coverage of the Best ISPs and Best Gaming ISPs, Best Products of the Year, and Best Brands (plus the Best Brands for Tech Support, Longevity, and Reliability).

    I started in tech publishing right out of college, writing and editing stories about hardware and development tools. I migrated to software and hardware coverage for families, and I spent several years exclusively writing about the then-burgeoning technology called Wi-Fi. I was on the founding staff of several magazines, including Windows Sources, FamilyPC, and Access Internet Magazine. All of which are now defunct, and it's not my fault. I have freelanced for publications as diverse as Sony Style, Playboy.com, and Flux. I got my degree at Ithaca College in, of all things, television/radio. But I minored in writing so I'd have a future.

    In my long-lost free time, I wrote some novels, a couple of which are not just on my hard drive: BETA TEST ("an unusually lighthearted apocalyptic tale," according to Publishers' Weekly) and a YA book called KALI: THE GHOSTING OF SEPULCHER BAY. Go get them on Kindle.

    I work from my home in Ithaca, NY, and did it long before pandemics made it cool.

    The Technology I Use

    My first computer was a Laser 128, an Apple II-compatible clone with an integrated keyboard, matched with an eye-straining monochrome green monitor. I used it to type papers in college for other people for money...until I discovered the Mac SE in the college computer room. That changed my life. My first cellphone was a Samsung Uproar—the silver one with the built-in MP3 player from the Napster days (the pre-iPod era).

    I use an iPhone 15 Pro hourly and an iPad Air infrequently (but I'm always in the market for a cheap Android tablet). I have a PlayStation 5 just to play Spider-Man, and several Windows machines, including a work-issued Lenovo ThinkPad. I talk to Alexa and Siri all day long. I do the majority of my computing on a 15-inch LG Gram laptop attached to a Thunderbolt hub to run a multi-monitor setup—I overdid it on the power needed to simply work from home.

    I'm most at home in Microsoft Word after decades of writing there. More and more, I turn to services like Google Docs, using tools like Grammarly. I use Google's Chrome browser due to an addiction to several extensions I think I can't live without, but probably could. I use Excel extensively on data-intensive stories, but for chart creation, we've switched over entirely to using Infogram for interactive features that are hard to find elsewhere. I do a lot of graphics work for my stories, but limit myself to the free and amazing Paint.NET software to edit images.

    I'm a firm evangelist for using the cloud for backup and syncing of files; I'm primarily using Dropbox, which has never failed me, but I also have redundant setups on Microsoft OneDrive, plus extra picture backups on Amazon Photos and iCloud. Why take chances? For entertainment, mine is a streaming-only household—my kid has never seen network TV and barely been exposed to commercials, thanks to Roku and Amazon Music. The house is peppered with smart speakers from Amazon for instant gratification and control of smart home devices like multiple Wyze cameras and Nest Protect smoke detectors. I've got accounts on all the major social networks, to my horror. I have a robot vacuum for each floor of the house. I want a 3D printer, but not sure what I'd use it for.

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