I'm always amazed by the wealth of useful, free utilities you can find on the Web. That's why every so often I like to take a break from all the gadgets and commercial products we show on the
Fox 8 Morning News and share some
fabulous freebies!
Let's start with removing malware and those
rogue anti-virus attacks, in particular. I still swear by the "blessed trinity" when it comes to dealing with these threats:
RKill by Lawrence Abrams (available from
BleepingComputer.com),
TDSSKiller, the free anti-rootkit utility from
Kaspersky Labs, and
MalwareBytes Anti-Malware Free (Note: You must now decline a free trial of the "Pro" version during the installation in order to get the free version of MalwareBytes Anti-Malware.)Instructions on how to use this potent combination are available
here, but don't get the idea that there isn't room for improvement. I wish, for example, that MalwareBytes would allow you to stop its so-called "Quick Scan" after it finds several threats and let you proceed with their removal. It doesn't. You have to wait 15 - 30 minutes until the scan completes, although the threats are usually found in the first few minutes. The waiting drives me crazy, which is why I'm currently on the lookout for something better.
Ideally, I would like to find a portable tool that does the job quickly. "Portable" means you don't have to install the software on the infected PC. It should run from a USB thumb drive or a CD/DVD-ROM. It should also work in
Safe Mode or
Safe Mode with Networking, since booting Windows in either option is often the only way to circumvent vicious infestations.
Comodo Cleaning Essentials
When I first stumbled upon Comodo Cleaning Essentials (CCE), I thought I had hit pay dirt! Here at last was a well-designed utility to remove malware and/or unsafe processes that looked like the total package. CCE analyzes both running processes and all the bells and whistles your system loads when boots up. Also included is a fully-customizable malware scanner for removing viruses, rootkits, hidden files, and malicious registry keys.
You can download a version for either 32-bit and 64-bit Windows (XP, Vista, or Windows 7), and a thorough, well-written guide is available online. Since no installation is required, you can get right to work by double-clicking the main executable, CCE.exe.
Access to the Internet is also required, because the first thing the software does is download the latest threat information from "the cloud." I would ordinarily applaud this, but the process takes longer than you would expect and stalls along the way.
Once the scanner finally gets underway, I was disappointed to find that Comodo Cleaning Essentials is no match for MalwareBytes Anti-Malware Free when it comes to rogue A-V attacks. Its Killswitch feature (basically, Windows Task Manager on steroids), Autoruns Analyzer, and other tools are more impressive.
CCE's user interface is attractive and easy-to-understand. Computer savvy individuals will appreciate the granularity of its settings and the abundance of information provided. Furthermore, the software is designed to co-exist peacefully with other security software, so it's ideal for use as a second-opinion malware scanner.
In the fight against malware, the more tools in your arsenal, the better. Since Comodo Cleaning Essentials is 100% free, it's now part of my toolkit, but the membership of the blessed trinity remains intact. For more information, visit Comodo.com.
Regain hard disk space by de-duping your media files
Digital photos can take up a lot of space on your hard drive, and it's not uncommon to discover that you're storing several copies of the exact same image! Finding duplicates, however, is tricky, because you can't necessarily go by file names.
Two free products tackle this problem nicely. One goes above-and-beyond, finding duplicates not only among images but throughout your entire multimedia collection, including music, videos, etc.
Awesome Duplicate Photo Finder is a free Windows program that is able to compare images that were resized or color-corrected, so you can decide whether you really need to keep them all. The software supports all major image types (JPG, BMP, GIF, PNG) and is very easy to use. You can quickly eliminate superfluous images with a few mouse clicks. For more information, visit Duplicate-Finder.com.
Auslogics Duplicate File Finder has an MD5 search engine (think "digital fingerprint") that allows the application to search for duplicate files by content, regardless of other match criteria. The software is designed to work with media files, such as music, video, images and photos. If you have hundreds or even thousands of MP3 files, Duplicate File Finder will help you identify and delete identical tracks. The software works with Windows 7/2008/Vista/2003/XP (32-bit & 64-bit) and is absolutely free, containing no spyware or adware. For more information, visit Auslogics.com.
App provides access to almost any file
Have ever encountered a file you couldn't open, because your computer didn't have QuickTime, Microsoft Office 2010, Adobe Photoshop, or some other program installed? It's pretty frustrating. Granted, you can easily download the free QuickTime Player, the free VLC Media Player, or one of several Microsoft Office viewers, but what about RAR, PSD, TIF, FLV, PNG, and other file formats?
Free Opener by EZ Freeware works on any Windows-based system and allows you to view, edit and print many different types of files without having to download specialty software. The software currently supports over 80 different formats, including Microsoft Office Files (.doc, .docx, .ppt, .pptx, .xls, .xlsx, .xlsm, .msg, .vcf), Adobe files (.swf, .flv, .psd, .pdf), and many others. It is 100% free, of course, and can be downloaded at FreeOpener.com.
Take control of your favorite YouTube videos
DVDVideoSoft.com provides 45 freeware programs to help you download, manipulate, convert, upload, burn to CD/DVD, and otherwise get the most out of videos posted on YouTube. Keeping track of all those programs, however, is somewhat messy.
The solution is Free Studio 5, an all-in-one package that bundles the whole shooting match into an easy-to-use, slick-looking GUI. All 45 programs are available for easy access, allowing you to convert video/audio files between different formats and/or transfer them to iOS-powered devices, Sony PSP, BlackBerry and other mobile devices. There is even an app to assist you with uploading videos to Facebook, YouTube, and other social networking sites.
The suite also burns and rips DVDs and audio CDs, uploads/downloads videos and music to your computer, iPod, PSP, iPhone or BlackBerry, performs basic editing of audio/video files, and much more.
Free Studio 5 contains no spyware or adware. The software is 100% free, but be advised that the installation tries to saddle you with a DVDSoftVideo search toolbar, which isn't needed to use the software. You can easily opt out, however. No biggie. For more information, visit DVDVideoSoft.com.
