Defraggler is a freeware utility from the developers of CCleaner and Recuva. Its a defragmentation tool for hard drives.

It can defragment individual files as well as entire hard drives.

Website Download

Paint.NET is the most comprehensive free image editor. It supports layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a a great variety of useful tools.

With it you can edit, compose, retouch, fix and repair images of any type.

You can export them to a wide array of image types as well.

Highly recommended.

Website Download

This freeware text editor can replace notepad and add many useful features.

Description

Notepad2 is a light-weight, free and open source Notepad-like text editor with syntax highlighting for a few commonly used languages.

It’s based on the Scintilla source code editing component.

Features

- Syntax highlighting: HTML, XML, PHP, ASP (JS, VBS), CSS,
JavaScript, VBScript, C/C++, C#, Resource Script, Makefiles, Java,
Visual Basic, Pascal, Assembly, SQL, Perl, Python, Configuration
Files, Apache Config Files, Batch Files, Diff Files
- Drag & drop text editing inside and outside Notepad2
- Basic regular expression search and replace
- Useful word, line and block editing shortcuts
- Rectangular selection (Alt+Mouse)
- Brace matching, auto indent, long line marker, zoom functions
- Support for Unicode, UTF-8, Unix and Mac text files
- Open shell links
- Mostly adjustable

Website Download

Microsoft released Windows Search 4.0 Preview. This is an improved version which has been optimized for better performance, includes a few more options and replaces the search engine that comes with Vista (it includes Windows Search 3.0 engine from factory).

For Windows XP users, thie release will upgrade their Windows Seach 3.0 installation if they have it installed. If not, Windows Search will install completely with all features.

For Vista users it will replace the default engine that shipped with Vista, according to the Windows Vista Team Blog. It also addresses bugs that users had reported before. You need Service Pack 1 installed before installing this release.

Microsoft published a KB (Knowledge Base) article regarding this release. Read it to find out more about it.

Download XP | Vista

This is one of my favorite freeware image viewers, if not the number one. Its fast at displaying pictures and has tons of features.

You can customize it by choosing among all the options it has. Can apply lossless transformations, which is great for digital photos because you can rotate them, either automatically or manually without any single loss of quality.

You can download it with an installer or in a zip file. I use the latter because i can set it to store all settings in an .ini file inside the program’s folder. This way, i make it portable or i can make an installer to use in unattended installations.

Supports various languages. Read about all the features.

Highly recommended.

Website Download

Comodo Firewall Pro is the best free firewall i have tested. I has a nice set of features, the interface is good and has options for everyone. I read also that it has passed some standard tests before so it can protect you against know network attacks.

Download

There is a new version of Winamp. This media player finally has grow into a great media library manager now that there are many offerings, free or commercial that follows the trend of media libraries instead of the old winamp’s scope to be only a player.

Here’s the description of the Lite and Full versions, who are both free.

• The Full version plays MP3s, AAC, WMA, and more; Compatible with Winamp 2 Plug-ins; Full Support for classic and modern skins; Plays Videos; has a Powerful Media Library; Browse Internet Radio & TV Stations; Integrated Internet Music Videos & Songs; Bundled Visualizations; and Burn & Rip CDs.

• The Lite version plays MP3s, AAC, WMA, and more. It is compatible with Winamp 2 Plug-ins and has full support for classic skins.

For the latest changes, please read the version history.

Website Download

Mozilla released Firefox 2.0.0.13 today.

There is no changelog at this time. I will update this post with more info as soon as it is available.

Edit: Here are the release notes for this version.

Website Download