Downloads from my site:

Please note that the version numbers for software downloads I link to on this webpage have not been updated in awhile, but I will fix it when I get around to it. Almost all of the links are still good. Please note my Firefox theme is for Firefox version 2.x ONLY and not for earlier versions like 1.x or later versions like 3.x. Other people have made equivalent Firefox themes for those versions.

The Firefox 2.0 theme I made:
I made this because my parents and many other people are used to the look of Internet Explorer 6.0 for Windows XP, but I believe people should move on and use the latest version of Firefox, because it is the greatest browser ever made. My objective with this theme is to duplicate the look of Internet Explorer 6.0 as closely as possible, for all parts of the browser which exist in Internet Explorer. For things such as the search bar, tab bar, Addons Manager, and Downloads Manager (among other things which do not exist in Internet Explorer 6), I am trying to find some sort of balance between the Firefox look and the Internet Explorer look, so that the theme has a nice, consistent, user-friendly, OS native appearance. It is kind of difficult to duplicate things perfectly, and there are still ways I need to fix this up, so it is an ongoing project of mine. Things that still need to be fixed: does not match as well in Windows XP visual styles other than Windows Classic, toolbar buttons do not look the same when they are pressed, disabled buttons do not look correct if toolbar background is not the right shade of light grey due to my lack of alpha blending, dropdown arrow button on right side of tab bar does not look nice when it is pressed down, and there may be unknown issues on other platforms such as Linux and Mac OS X (and of course the new Windows Vista).
Looks Familiar 1.2

Universal Boot Disk (made by me):
This boot disk is one of the greatest boot disks anyone has ever made. Now, as for how to create it: download the program WinImage 8.10, listed lower down on the page, and it can write this disk image file onto any 3.5" 1.44 meg floppies you have. You may find it useful if you want to play old DOS games or use other DOS programs, boot into Windows if your boot files in C:\ are corrupted or deleted, reformat your hard drive, or reinstall Windows from a CD. It supports all versions of Microsoft Windows except for Windows ME and I am unsure if it supports anything newer than XP (such as Windows Server 2003 or Windows Vista). In any case, this boot disk is extremely useful, with a great deal of powerful utilities on it and an optimized DOS setup with most of the features you need and minimal conventional memory usage. Complete documentation is provided in the file README.TXT.
Rich McGrew's Universal Boot Disk 1.0

Game Patches/Hacks (made by me):
Final Fantasy 4 MegaPatch 1.0 - turns the Japanese game Final Fantasy 4 into an English game for SNES; this is based on the J2e Translations patch version 3.21 (the final one they released), except I have made the font look much better than in the J2e version
Final Fantasy 6 MegaPatch 1.0 - a patch for Final Fantasy 3 (US) version 1.0, which combines together 47 patches made by other people, almost all bugfix patches, thereby fixing the vast majority of the myriad bugs in this wonderful game (it also changes the internal ROM name and the title screen from Final Fantasy 3 to Final Fantasy 6 because that is the proper numbering scheme)
Tales of Phantasia MegaPatch 1.01 - turns the Japanese game Tales of Phantasia into an English game for SNES, changing both the text and the audio into English; this patch is basically a combination of DeJap's translation of the text (version 1.2) and Topping Translations's translation of the speech (version .999) into a single patch, for convenience
I am working on more patches and hacks for old video games... stay tuned.

And here are some patches/hacks by other people:
Bahamut Lagoon Translation Patch 1.3 - turns the Japanese game Bahamut Lagoon into an English game for SNES; this was done by DeJap Translations, Tomato, and Neill Corlett
Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 6 Bugfix Patches - fixes grammar errors Ted Woolsey made in the official USA English versions of those games (Final Fantasy 6 was called Final Fantasy 3 here, but I still call it 6); this was done by ManuLoewe, and since his website is in German, I link to Google's translation of it
Final Fantasy 2 Translation Patch 1.03 - turns the Japanese game Final Fantasy 2 into an English game for NES; this was done by Neo Demiforce (the game SquareSoft released in the USA and called Final Fantasy 2 was actually Final Fantasy 4, a completely different game)
Final Fantasy 2 Title Screen Fix - fixes the title screen for the patched translated version of Final Fantasy 2, either making the Neo Demiforce one work correctly, or restoring the original SquareSoft one
Final Fantasy 3 Translation Patch 1.1 - turns the Japanese game Final Fantasy 3 into an English game for NES; this was done by Alex W. Jackson, Neill Corlett, and SoM2Freak (the game SquareSoft released in the USA and called Final Fantasy 3 was actually Final Fantasy 6, a completely different game)
Final Fantasy 5 Translation Patch 1.10 - turns the Japanese game Final Fantasy 5 into an English game for SNES; this was done by RPGe
Final Fantasy 6 Retranslation Patch 1.2b - turns the Japanese game Final Fantasy 6 into an English game for SNES; this was done by RPGOne Translations (this is the same game released in the USA as Final Fantasy 3, but better)
Radical Dreamers Translation Patch 1.4 - turns the Japanese game Radical Dreamers into an English game for SNES; this was done by Demiforce and Radical R
Secret of Evermore 2 Player Edition - lets you control 2 characters at once in Secret of Evermore for SNES; this was done by FuSoYa
Secret of Evermore Patches - some bugfix patches for Secret of Evermore for SNES; they were all done by Assassin17
Secret of Mana Variable Width Font Edition - vastly improves the font in Secret of Mana for SNES, and also adds a lot to the dialog; this was done by FuSoYa
Secret of Mana Color Correction Hack - improves the colors in Secret of Mana for SNES; this was done by Tenchi
Star Ocean Translation Patch 1.0 - turns the Japanese game Star Ocean into an English game for SNES; this was done by DeJap
Romhacking.net - the largest central repository for ROM hacks and patches

Old Windows 3.1 Games by Microsoft
These games may be old, but they are awesome, and they work perfectly well in ANY version of Windows (except for versions even older than 3.1). They include Chess, Dr. Black Jack, Fuji Golf, JigSawed, Life Genesis, Rattler Race, Rodent's Revenge, and SkiFree. They were called the Windows Entertainment Pack for Packard Bell; Packard Bell is now out of business (at least in the United States). There are other games that were included in other Windows Entertainment Packs; however, none of them are a part of this package. I have found other websites that make various Windows Entertainment Packs available for download, including ones run by the actual people who wrote the games for Microsoft, so I am fairly certain Microsoft is fine with it if you download these games. I would be happy to remove this download if that turns out not to be the case. Now, if you like these games, I do ask that you please donate money to Microsoft. I am sure a donation of any size would be greatly appreciated; the only division of Microsoft that is really profitable is the operating systems division, and they haven't had a new one out since Windows XP in 2001, so they could really use the money. Please make all checks out to Microsoft Corporation, and mail them to the following address:
Microsoft Corporation
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052-6399
Windows Entertainment Pack for Packard Bell (WEPPB)
Other Windows Entertainment Packs for Windows 3.1 can be found online, including the Best Of Windows Entertainment Pack (BOWEP) here. BOWEP includes several of the same games as WEPPB (Dr. Black Jack, Rodent's Revenge, and SkiFree), a game that comes with all 32-bit versions of Windows (FreeCell), and a bunch of "new" ones: Chip's Challenge, Golf (a card game!), Jezzball, Pipe Dream, Taipei, Tetravex, Tetris, Tri-Peaks, and Tut's Tomb. Other Windows Entertainment Pack games that aren't in either package: Cruel, Go Figure, IdleWild, Klotski, Maxwell's Maniac, Pegged, Stones, Tic Tac Drop, TicTactics, and WordZap. Minesweeper and Solitaire were also originally in Windows Entertainment Packs, but, like FreeCell, they come with all 32-bit versions of Windows. And here is the latest (1992) version of Reversi, which Microsoft has made available free to anyone who has a licensed copy of Windows 3.x (Reversi came with Windows 1.0 thru 3.0 but not 3.1 or later):
Reversi

Downloads from other sites:

The first things you should download, if you don't already have them, are in the Internet Security section. Once you have most of that stuff installed, it is best to move on to Performance Enhancing Software, to make your computer faster. Then, pick whatever you want. By the way, none of these programs I link to here are ones that I have anything to do with whatsoever; I did not work on them nor am I associated with their developers, or the websites that host their downloads, in any way. I am not being monetarily compensated or anything like that for linking to these programs; I am just linking to them because I think these are good programs to download. Not that you should download all of them, or anything like that... this is just meant to serve as a resource for people who want to download quality software off the Internet, and want some good recommendations.

One thing that might confuse you when looking at the downloads below, is Microsoft Windows version numbers. So here is a brief explanation:

Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition (or 98SE for short), and Windows Millennium Edition (or ME for short) are one series of operating systems, each built on top of the previous one with new features; this is referred to as the Windows 9x series of operating systems. Here is another nomenclature: Windows 95 is actually Windows 9x 4.0, Windows 98 and 98SE are actually Windows 9x 4.1, and Windows ME is actually Windows 9x 4.9.

Windows NT 3.1, Windows NT 3.5, Windows NT 3.51, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Vista are another series of operating systems, each built on top of the previous one with new features; this is referred to as the Windows NT series of operating systems. Here is the other nomenclature: Windows 2000 is actually Windows NT 5.0, most editions of Windows XP are actually Windows NT 5.1, Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP Professional x64 Edition and Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 are actually Windows NT 5.2, and Windows Vista is actually Windows NT 6.0.

There are earlier versions of Windows but those are all so hopelessly obsolete that nobody writes software for them anymore. It is widely accepted that the best version of the Windows 9x series is Windows 98SE. There is less agreement on which version in the Windows NT series is best (some people contend Windows 2000 is the best), although my favorite is Windows XP Professional. Something that is universally agreed on, though, is that the Windows NT series operating systems are all superior to the Windows 9x series, in terms of stability, security, and performance.

Internet Security:
DiamondCS Process Guard 3.410 - calls itself "the first and best anti rootkit software", runs on Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, prevents programs from terminating each other or interfering with each other without your permission, but it can get annoying having to give permission to every program you run, if you run a lot of different programs like me, but anyway, this program offers an added layer of security beyond antivirus and firewall and does not require definition updates (I don't actually use it because I find it way too annoying with all the questions it asks about whether to let other programs do things, where I have to answer yes 99% of the time or else none of the other programs will work)
Spybot - Search & Destroy 1.5.1 - removes spyware, and prevents it from being installed; a must-have, trusted and reliable (the TeaTimer component is rather annoying if you turn it on because it bugs you all the time with annoying questions about whether to let other programs do things, just like DiamondCS Process Guard's annoying questions, so I would recommend enabling all protections except for the TeaTimer thing)
Lavasoft Ad-Aware 2007 Free 7.0.2.5 - removes spyware, a very straightforward program that has been trusted to get rid of spyware almost as long as spyware has existed, over 100 million downloads from download.com (the Free version is free because it does not prevent any spyware from being installed, it only removes spyware after it is installed; you can pay money to get more expensive editions that protect you from getting infected in the first place, but it is not really necessary to do that)
Microsoft Windows Defender 1.1.1593.0 - Microsoft's new antispyware program, the replacement for Microsoft AntiSpyware (Beta 1), it is free but requires you to have the Windows Genuine Advantage to download it, as well as Windows XP/Server2003/Vista
Javacool SpywareBlaster 3.5.1 - prevents spyware from being installed, to keep you safe in the future, without having to run in the background all the time, and very fast and efficient; the only drawback is it cannot search for or remove infections you already have
Trend Micro CWShredder 2.19 - detects and cleans up CoolWebSearch infections, quickly and easily (CoolWebSearch is a very common Internet Explorer hijacker with many variants, and I have often seen computers infected with it)
Trend Micro HijackThis 2.0.2 - a very useful, very confusing little utility - you can use it to fix all sorts of spyware infections, but you might need to read lots of tutorials if you aren't good with computers, and you should Google anything HijackThis finds if you can't tell if it's good or bad, because it doesn't tell you whether the things it finds are good or bad, and you have to figure out everything on your own
Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer 2.1 Beta 2 - make sure your Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista is secure against attack; quite inconvenient, because this program doesn't fix any of the problems it finds, and it makes you solve them all yourself, manually; I suppose the good part is, it doesn't change any of your settings without consulting you, and it just gives you guidance on what to do, so it is good if you like to be in control of what is going on
Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool 1.36 - removes certain very common infections from Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista computers; mainly for people with no antivirus (if you go to Windows Update at least once a month or have Automatic Updates on, you don't need to ever download this because you will get it once a month anyway)
Foundstone Free Tools - a bunch of small free utilities for Internet security; you probably don't need any of them, but who knows, maybe you do
Windows Live OneCare - Microsoft's new antivirus program, which has a free 90-day trial
Eset NOD32 3.0 - the best antivirus program in existence, because it has the fastest scan times and the best heuristics for finding unknown viruses and worms, and unlike its competitors (Norton, McAfee, Panda, Kaspersky, and Trend Micro) it will not slow you down to a crawl, plus it is backwards compatible with Windows 95 and NT 4.0, unlike its competitors (you need a username and password to download the full version, or you can download the 30-day trial for free)
avast! Version 4.7.1098 Home Edition - the best free antivirus out there, in case you are a cheapskate: better than AVG, Antivir, or BitDefender (the 3 main competitors, among free antivirus programs)... now compared to the antivirus programs that cost money, it is not as good, but what can you expect
AVG Anti-Spyware 7.5.1.43 - wonderful free program (formerly called ewido security suite, ewido anti-malware, and ewido anti-spyware) that searches for things other anti-virus and anti-spyware programs miss, like trojans, dialers, backdoors, keyloggers, spyware, and worms; combine this with NOD32 or avast! to be safe against all the most dangerous programs (while there are better programs of this type, they all cost money, and ewido is good enough)
ZoneAlarm 7.0.362 - the best free firewall program, it will keep hackers and worms from infecting your system; don't bother buying anything more expensive from Zone Labs because their antivirus, etc. is not as good as their firewall
XP TCP/IP Repair 1.0 - if the Internet stops working in Windows XP, this handy little tool can fix it, but after the Internet stops working it is too late to download this file, so this is sort of like a paradox; only use it if the Internet is no longer working - if you have an antivirus that scans incoming files over the Internet, you might need to reinstall it after using this utility, because this program resets the all TCP/IP and Internet settings to their defaults and removes any 3rd party LSP's (Layered Service Providers) such as virus scanners for incoming network traffic
LSP-Fix 1.1 - just like XP TCP/IP Repair, this can fix your Winsock LSP's (Layered Service Providers), and it also gives you additional control to decide exactly which ones to keep and which to get rid of; it works on all 32-bit versions of Windows; the only problem is, it does not have a feature to fix TCP/IP (instead, you need to uninstall and reinstall the TCP/IP protocol, which is possible in all versions of Windows PRIOR TO BUT NOT INCLUDING Windows XP, thus necessitating the XP TCP/IP Repair tool above)

Performance Enhancing Software:
PageDefrag 2.32 - defrags your registry hives and virtual memory pagefile on boot, speeding up your computer and putting less wear and tear on your hard disk (requires Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista)
Power Defragmenter GUI 2.0.125 - awesome free defragmenter, requires Contig 1.54
Contig 1.54 - a utility to defragment a single file in Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, required to use Power Defragmenter 2.0.110, unzip them both into the same directory
Intel Application Accelerator 2.3 or Intel Matrix Storage Manager 7.8.0.1012 - speeds up hard disks, CDROM drives, Zip Drives, and other types of ATA/Serial ATA drives (requires one of various Intel chipsets to be on motherboard; the chart I link to tells you what chipsets support which of these... don't get Intel Application Accelerator RAID Edition or Intel Matrix Storage Technology because they are superceded by Intel Matrix Storage Manager 6.2)
NVIDIA nTune 5.05.54.00 - performance enhancing, tweaking, and overclocking program for motherboards with NVIDIA chipsets (probably a little less common than Intel chipsets, I dunno)
NVTweak 2.1.4 - enables advanced settings in NVIDIA ForceWare drivers for NVIDIA's GeForce brand of video cards
Microsoft BootVis 1.3.37.0 - makes Windows XP boot up as fast as possible, by rearranging the files used in the boot process to be optimally placed on the hard disk - if you set up PageDefrag to run on every boot (which everyone should do), you can use BootVis to cancel out this added time in the startup sequence
TCP Optimizer 2.0.3 - speed up your Internet, regardless of whether you have dialup, cable, DSL, or whatever
Cacheman 5.50 - optimize your cache and other Windows settings to speed up your computer
Free Download Manager 2.5 build 738 - speed up and manage Web and FTP downloads with this free program (no ads or spyware)

Useful Utilities:
WinImage 8.10 - lets you format floppies to be 1.68 or 1.72 megs instead of just 1.44, and make and use disk image files (30-day trial; also note that the 1.72 meg format only works in Windows 95/98/98SE/ME, and does not work in anything else, so the 1.68 meg format is the one you should use for everything since it's much better than 1.44)
Style XP 3.19 - adds a bunch of awesome new visual styles to Windows XP (install both the Ladies and Men versions for all the styles; it's a 30-day trial, but you can keep the styles and use them with the Neowin.net UXTHEME.DLL Patcher lower down on this page, for the same result as this program)
7-Zip 4.57 - the best file compression/decompression utility, supporting many formats, and unlike most competitors it's free; what makes it the best is its proprietary 7z format, which has a higher compression ratio than any other compressed file format (such as ZIP, CAB, RAR, ACE, etc.)
Apache Web Server 2.2.6 - a high-quality web server program... if you want to host a web page on your own server, this is the best program to use
SSH Secure Shell Client 3.2.9 - a much more secure alternative to FTP and Telnet that combines the features of both, but it can only be used to connect to SSH servers, not anyone else
RefreshForce 1.10 - free utility to change refresh rate in Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista (refresh rate is number of times per second image on monitor is updated) - this can give you smoother graphics by setting a higher refresh rate, but don't set it too high or your monitor will just display nonsense (if you have an NVIDIA card with Detonator Driver 41.03 or later and RefreshForce doesn't work try this instead, and once it generates a string, copy and paste it into the Registry Editor wherever you find a string value called "NV_Modes")
QuickResNT - a Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista system tray utility to change video modes, especially useful in combination with RefreshForce, duplicates a feature in Windows 9x
Belarc Advisor 7.2v - program for all 32-bit versions of Windows that tells you all about your computer, including hardware and software; it even tells you the serial numbers for Windows and Office just like the Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder below
Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder v2.0 Beta 4 - lets you view and possibly change your Windows and Office serial numbers, for many different versions of MS Windows and MS Office; it is a single small standalone .exe file that fits on a floppy disk and requires no installation
Alcohol 120% 1.9.5.3823 - the best CD burning program for getting around copy protection, unfortunately this is just a 30-day trial
ClonyXXL 2.0.1.5 - the best program to detect exactly what kind of copy protection a CD/DVD has
Alcoholer 4.1 - the program that integrates Alcohol 120% with ClonyXXL, so you can copy CDs and DVDs with copy protection
OpenOffice.org 2.3.1 - the free open-source alternative to Microsoft Office, which opens the same file types and has similar features, except for the annoying ones (this program is the basis for another program, Sun Microsystems' StarOffice)
MS PowerPoint Viewer 2007 - if you don't have PowerPoint, Microsoft lets you use this free viewer
MS Excel Viewer 2003 - if you don't have Excel, Microsoft lets you use this free viewer
MS Word Viewer 2003 - if you don't have Word, Microsoft lets you use this free viewer
Microsoft Visio Viewer 2007 - if you don't have Visio, Microsoft lets you use this free viewer

Image Software:
Adobe Photoshop CS3 - the most popular, best image editor ever (expensive, uses lots of hard disk space, slow, and requires 1024x768 or higher resolution to run correctly... but the reason for all that is, all of the awesome features it has, obviously)
IrfanView 4.10 - popular free image viewer/editor/converter (get all the plugins too, for it to be the most useful)
GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) 2.4.2 - the wonderful image editor that comes with Linux, but it also works on Windows and Mac OS X (don't get GTK+ from this link unless you have Windows 98/98SE/ME)
GTK+ 2.12.3 & GTK+ Theme Selector - cross-platform graphics libraries required to run GIMP, gaim, and many other programs that I don't link to on this page, along with a program to set which theme to use in those programs and a large set of themes
Picasa 2 - Google's new program for organizing your photos
Advanced GIF Compressor 1.0 - program for reducing the file size of GIF images without reducing picture quality, works great but costs money unless you use free trial
PngUtils 1.2.5 - for converting image files to PNG and making PNG files smaller (PNG images are just like GIF except usually smaller file size) - this is for people who have webpages, and want smaller file sizes for their images
Repair image file type associations in Windows XP - preview images with the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, which is fast and can display animated GIFs and does very smooth resizing

Multimedia:
Windows Media Player 6.4 - for Windows 95/NT4.0
Windows Media Player 6.4 Netscape Plugin - for Netscape 4.xx, which nobody uses anymore, not sure if this works in newer Netscape/Mozilla browsers or Opera
Windows Media Player 7.1 - for Windows 98, or Windows 98SE/ME computers with less than 64 megs of RAM
Windows Media Player 7.1 - for Mac OS 8.1-9.x
Windows Media Player 9 series - for Windows 98SE/ME/2000; requires 64 megs of RAM
Windows Media Player 9 series - for Mac OS X (the inferior choice of 2 options for Mac OS X)
Windows Media Player Components for QuickTime 2.2.0.49 - for Mac OS X (the superior choice of 2 options for Mac OS X)
Windows Media Player 11 - for Windows XP/Server2003/Vista
Windows Media Codecs - the more codecs you have, the better
QuickTime 5.0.5 - Apple's multimedia suite, for Windows 95/NT4.0
QuickTime 6.0.3 - Apple's multimedia suite, for Mac OS 8.6 - 9.x
QuickTime 6.5.2 - Apple's multimedia suite, for Windows 98/98SE/ME
QuickTime 7.3.1 - Apple's multimedia suite, for Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista and Mac OS X
QuickTime Alternative 1.56 or 2.2.0 - an alternative to QuickTime for Windows (QT Alt 1.56 is based on QT 6.5.2 and is for Windows 98/98SE/ME, while QT Alt 2.2.0 is based on QT 7.3.1.70 and is for Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista; a program called Media Player Classic is included, and is used to play all QuickTime files)
iTunes 2.0.4 - Apple's music store/audio player, for use with iPods, for Mac OS 9.x
iTunes 7.5 - Apple's music store/audio player, for use with iPods, for Mac OS X or Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista; requires 128 megs of RAM
RealPlayer 8 - RealNetworks' multimedia suite, for Windows 95/98 or Mac OS 8/9 or any form of Unix, or if you have less than 64 megs of RAM
RealPlayer 11 - RealNetworks' multimedia suite, for computers with Windows 98SE/ME/NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista or Mac OS X and at least 64 megs of RAM
Real Alternative 1.75 - an alternative to RealPlayer 10.5 for Windows (a program called Media Player Classic is included, and is used to play all RealMedia files)
K-Lite Mega Codec Pack 3.6.5 - super-inclusive: installs Quicktime Alternative, Real Alternative, Media Player Classic, and a huge number of codecs, all in one package... this is what I use, because it includes every codec I need all together in one giant download
DivX 6.8 - a codec for watching movies/tv episodes you download from filesharing networks (now includes XviD codec support!)
FFDShow 2008-01-04 - a superior video codec that combines MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and MPEG-4 (skipping 3 for some reason); this one codec alone can play almost ANY video, including DivX, XviD, and DVDs (excluding RealVideo and QuickTime of course)
NVIDIA PureVideo Decoder 1.02-223 - a hardware-accelerated high-performance MPEG-2 codec, required for viewing DVDs or if you have Windows XP Media Center Edition (a 30-day trial, unfortunately)
Winamp 2.95 - Nullsoft's media player, for Windows 95/98/NT4.0, or Windows 98SE/ME computers with less than 64 megs of RAM
Winamp 5.51 - Nullsoft's media player, for Windows 98SE/ME/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista; requires 64 megs of RAM
Pacemaker 2.1 - Winamp 2.xx/5.xx plugin to change speed and/or pitch of music
foobar2000 0.9.5 - open-source alternative to Winamp that some people like better

Web Browsers:
Internet Explorer 5.1.7 - the last version of Internet Explorer that supports Mac OS 8.1-9.x
Internet Explorer 5.2.3 - the last version of Internet Explorer that supports Mac OS X
Internet Explorer 5.5 SP2 - the last version of Internet Explorer that supports Windows 95
Internet Explorer 6.0 SP1 - the last version of Internet Explorer that supports Windows 98/98SE/ME/NT4.0/2000 (not for Windows XP or Server 2003; for those, install the latest Windows Service Pack to get Internet Explorer 6.0 SP2, or download Internet Explorer 7.0 if you like that better)
Internet Explorer 7.0 - the new Internet Explorer, for Windows XP/Server2003 (it comes with Windows Vista)
Internet Explorer 7 stuff - from enhanceie.com, stuff to improve Internet Explorer 7.0
Netscape Communicator 4.8 - a classic; just like the good old days
Netscape 7.02 - the last version of Netscape that ran on Windows 95 and Mac OS 8/9 (based on Mozilla Suite 1.0.2)
Netscape 7.2 - the last version of Netscape that ran on Windows 98/NT4.0, Mac OS X, and Linux (based on Mozilla Suite 1.7.2)
Netscape 9.0.0.5 - the newest Netscape (based on Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.11 and Internet Explorer 6.0 or higher), only runs on Windows 98SE/ME/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista
Opera 9.25 or 9.50 beta 1 - the fastest web browser, period; it is now free with no banner ads, and still supports Windows 95, and their new goal is to get more market share than Firefox (the only Windows browser to pass the Acid2 test, plus it is cross-platform!)
Opera weekly builds - the newest beta versions of Opera... new features and (perhaps) new bugs, and you can find out more about how a certain build works by looking at the comments people posted about it
SeaMonkey 1.1.7 - the browser formerly known as Mozilla Suite which was the basis for Netscape 6-7; uses code from the old Mozilla Suite as well as updated code from Firefox, Thunderbird, and ChatZilla
Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.11 - the greatest web browser in the entire world, based on the Gecko rendering engine that has its origins in the Mozilla Project (think Manhattan Project) and the top-secret never-released Netscape 5
Thunderbird 2.0.0.9 - the companion e-mail program for Mozilla Firefox
Mozilla Firefox & Thunderbird unofficial builds - some are optimized builds, faster than the official versions!
Camino 1.5.4 - a special browser by the Mozilla Foundation, just for Mac OS X, designed to compete against Safari... at the same version level as Firefox 1.5.0.4
OmniWeb 5.6 - another high-quality browser for Mac OS X only, OmniWeb is made by a for-profit company, and costs money, but you can download a 30-day trial edition free... the rendering engine it uses is WebCore (the one Apple made for Safari, which in turn is based on the KHTML rendering engine used by the Konqueror web browser for Linux's KDE desktop environment)
iCab 3.0.5 or 4.0.0 - yet another Mac-only browser... iCab supports Mac OS version 7.5 and later, and it has been in continuous development since 1998, but it is still not quite stable enough for the general public
Flock 1.0 - a brand new cross-platform open-source browser that is based on Mozilla Firefox, and it integrates with certain websites that its creators like (such as del.icio.us, flickr.com, and the blogging services WordPress, Moveable Type, Typepad, and Blogger)... unlike some browsers that focus on privacy, Flock aims on helping its users make information publicly available, most notably the browser's bookmarks list
Konqueror 3.5.8 - the browser that Safari and OmniWeb are based on, Konqueror 3.5.8 is an integral part of the KDE desktop environment version 3.5.8 for Linux, and cannot be downloaded separately from KDE (first came the Navigator, then the Explorer, and now the Konqueror!)
Epiphany 2.20.2 or 2.21.4 - the browser that comes with the GNOME desktop environment for Linux, it is based on Firefox, SeaMonkey, and an earlier Mozilla-derived browser for GNOME called Galeon, which has been discontinued
K-Meleon 1.1.3 - a lightweight browser for Windows based on Firefox 2.0.0.10
Arachne v1.90;J1 - the best graphical web browser for DOS

Browser Plugins (for any browser):
Adobe Flash Player 9,0,115,0 - needed for viewing 90% of websites (mostly for annoying ads)
Adobe Shockwave Player 10.2.0.023 - not quite as widespread as Adobe Flash, but still something you should have
Java SE 6 Update 3 - Sun Microsystems' official Java, cross-platform, supports all major browsers (the JRE is if you just want to have Java support in your browser, and the JDK is for software developers to program in Java; the JDK includes the JRE, and the JRE is much smaller)
Adobe Acrobat Reader 5.0.5 or Adobe Reader 8.1.1 - for viewing .PDF files (do not get version 6.x under any circumstances, because it is extremely slow... get 8.1.1 if your computer supports it, otherwise get 5.0.5)
GPL GhostScript 8.61 and GSView 4.9 - to view .PS (PostScript) files, and convert them to .PDF (need both GhostScript and GSView)
Adobe Universal PostScript Windows Driver Installer 1.0.6 - if you "print to file", you can use this to make .PS files, from any program that can print, and then you can use GSview to convert them to .PDF
Adobe PostScript Printer Driver AdobePS 8.8 - the same thing, for Macs
Generic Colour PostScript Driver (defpscol.zip) - for use with Adobe Universal PostScript Windows Driver Installer (without this, you get grayscale .PS files instead of colour, leading to grayscale .PDF's after you convert)

Addons for MS Internet Explorer on Windows:
Google Toolbar - integrated Google search, Pop-up Blocker, News, AutoFill, and PageRank (now supports Firefox too!)
Yahoo! Toolbar - integrated Yahoo search, Pop-up Blocker, Anti-Spy, and RSS Feed support (now supports Firefox too!)
Yahoo! Internet Mail - make Yahoo! Mail your default email client (basically, opening up mailto: links in Internet Explorer at mail.yahoo.com's compose page, but it also integrates with MS Office and other cool stuff)
Clear Cache Feature for Internet Explorer - deletes Internet Explorer cache, cookies, and history, without even starting Internet Explorer, using an .MSI (Microsoft Installer) file

Extensions for Mozilla Firefox (mostly cross-platform):
Adblock Plus 0.7.5.3 - block ads from annoying you and using up your bandwidth, very nice (you need a filter subscription too; I recommend EasyElement+EasyList)
AJAX Yahoo! Mail [Viamatic WebMail++] 0.10 - adds features to Yahoo! Mail, it can work alongside eWebMail Plus! which also enhances Yahoo! Mail
Autohide 1.1.5 - autohide toolbars in fullscreen mode (which you get by pressing F11 just like in Internet Explorer) - lets you use 100% of your screen space for browsing (excluding the scrollbar on the right side)
BugMeNot 1.3 - lets you login to websites that you are not a member of
ChatZilla 0.9.79 - adds IRC (Internet Relay Chat) support to Firefox
Classic Menus for Winstripe 2.5.1 - fixes menus in default Firefox theme to look like other Windows applications
ColorZilla 1.0 - lets you zoom in and out of webpages, also has many other features which I don't use
CustomizeGoogle 0.68 - like Google? well you can make it even better with this
eWebMail Plus! 1.0 - this is a must if you use Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, GMail, or MyWay Mail (it enables more features on those webmail sites, when composing an email)
Fasterfox 2.0.0 - makes Firefox faster; duplicates all the features of the old Tweak Network Settings extension but also has more of its own
FirefoxView 1.0 - lets you open a webpage in Firefox, by right-clicking a link in Internet Explorer (in case you accidentally start the wrong browser)
fireFTP 0.97.1 - for FTP (File Transfer Protocol), much better than Firefox's built-in FTP capabilities
FlashGot 0.7.2 - lets you use a 3rd party download manager (such as Free Download Manager linked to above, as well as many others) from within Firefox
FLST 0.8.6 - Focus Last Selected Tab (much more intuitive and reasonable behavior than Firefox's default of focusing the rightmost tab whenever the active tab is closed)
FoxLingo 2.1.9 - translate webpages between different languages
Greasemonkey 0.7.20070607.0 - duplicates the functionality of Opera's User Javascripts (except I think Greasemonkey came up with this before Opera so it's actually the other way around)... anyway, scripts for Greasemonkey can be found at userscripts.org and they can do all sorts of things
IE Tab 1.3.3.20070528 - allows you to look at pages using Internet Explorer in a tab inside Firefox (just like Netscape 8, and it's Windows-only)
IE View 1.3.5 - lets you open a webpage in Internet Explorer, by right-clicking a link in Firefox (this is for stubborn webpages that only work in Internet Explorer, and this is a Windows-only extension)
Image Zoom 0.3 - lets you zoom in and out of images, to any percentage
Linkification 1.3.3 - turns text URLs into actual links you can click on
Nightly Tester Tools 1.3b3 - lets you force compatibility with older extensions, change titlebar text, and more, but not as many features as MR Tech Local Install (MR Tech Local Install causes problems for me because it changes too many things in Firefox)
Paste and Go 2 0.8 - if you have a URL in the clipboard and you right click the Address Bar and choose Paste and Go, you're already there (duplicates this same feature of the Opera browser)
Redirect Remover 2.5.3 - jump straight to the target with a redirect link (superior replacement to the old outdated extension Jump Link)
Resize Search Box 0.0.8 - lets you resize the search box
Restarter 1.0 - allows you to restart Firefox from the file menu (Restarter is for Firefox 2.0, the one for Firefox 1.5 is Restart Firefox 0.3.1)
Sage 1.3.10 - for looking at RSS feeds in Firefox (compatible with Firefox's Live Bookmarks feature for RSS)
SEOpen 0.8 - replace the old extensions for looking at the Google Cache with this new one that also does many other things too, and works in Firefox 2.0
Tiny Menu 1.4.4 - makes the menu more compact so it can fit in the same row as the toolbar, giving you more screen space (use this instead of the outdated Compact Menu 1.7.2)
Titlebar Tweaks 2.8.2 - lets you change the text in the titlebar
Update Channel Selector 1.0.2 - lets you select your update channel for Firefox (release, beta, nightly, or default)
User Agent Switcher 0.6.10 - trick intrusive websites that try to detect your browser into thinking you have a different browser than Firefox
Web Developer 1.1.4 - this extension adds many useful features for disabling various things in webpages or examining how they work

Mozilla Firefox 2.0 Theme by me (Rich McGrew):
Looks Familiar 1.2 - looks just like Internet Explorer 6.0 for Windows XP

Other Addons for Mozilla Firefox on Windows:
Firefox Preloader 1.0 build 366 - makes Firefox startup much faster on Windows by preloading it just like Internet Explorer (this one is for Windows only, and I don't really like it that much because it's kinda annoying having it run in the background all the time but that's just my preference)
Mozilla ActiveX Plugin - enables ActiveX support in Firefox but only for the Windows Media Player plugin, the upshot of which is that a lot more websites with Windows Media content are supported (for Windows only, and it causes problems if your plugin is for a different version of Firefox than the version you have)

Addons for Opera:
IE6XP Native skin for Opera - makes Opera look like Internet Explorer on Windows XP and use native widgets (like Luna theme for Firefox except not quite as nice)
MeadCo Neptune plugin - lets you use Internet Explorer to render content in Opera that is embedded in a webpage that was set up explicitly to use this plugin (you can use User JavaScripts or bookmarklets or custom buttons to use this sort of like Firefox's IETab extension)
User JavaScripts - they modify the behavior of Opera in various ways, sort of like Firefox extensions except not quite as nice

Instant Messaging:
AIM 5.9.6089 - the greatest instant messaging program ever: everyone uses it
AIM 5.x Ad removal patches - patches AIM 5.x to eliminate ads in the main window
AIM 6.5.7.20 - the newest version of AIM, rebuilt from the bottom up (meaning that a few old features are still missing, although overall there are more features than before)
ICQ 6 - another instant messaging program, it's been popular for many years and lots of foreigners use it
Yahoo Messenger 8.1 or 9.0 beta - not quite as popular as AIM or ICQ, but some people use it
Google Talk - Google's new instant messaging program
Windows Live Messenger 8.5.1302 - Microsoft's instant messenger (formerly known as MSN Messenger; this exists alongside the other Windows Messenger program which is built in to Windows XP, and is not an upgrade of that component)
Windows Messenger 5.1 - adds some security fixes and new features to Windows Messenger 4.7, which is an integral part of Windows XP with Service Pack 2
Trillian 3.1.9.0 - connects you to all the major instant messaging networks, from one program
Pidgin 2.3.1 - just like Trillian, except open-source, cross-platform, and aimed primarily at Linux users (this program was formerly called Gaim)

Filesharing Clients:
Shareaza 2.3.1.0 - best filesharing program for Windows (and maybe Linux!), connects to Gnutella, Gnutella2, eDonkey, and BitTorrent networks
MLdonkey 2.9.2 - cross-platform open-source filesharing program that connects to many networks, it's the best filesharing program for Linux but might be kind of hard to set up with a GUI
zeropaid.com

Games:
Arcanum 1.0.7.4 - really awesome and complicated RPG, but kinda slow unless your computer is a supercomputer with a great graphics card
Diablo II 1.11b - used to play this awesome game back in freshman and sophomore year of college, with the expansion pack, Lord of Destruction - a great game for going around and killing lots of monsters and looking for weapons and armor, where it takes months to get up to level 99
Dink Smallwood 1.08 - freeware Zelda-like isometric RPG, which supports more adventures than the ones that come with it (called DMODs); it only takes a day to beat this game cuz it's so easy, which is why you need DMODs if you like it and want to keep playing
Mario Twins - actually this is a stupid flash animation about the game Super Mario Brothers, using music from the band Group X
Microsoft Match-Up! - the card game "memory", with pictures from around the world
Microsoft Carioca Rummy - a traditional South American card game, played in Argentina and Chile
Myst - back when it came out, in the dark ages, this was the greatest game ever made, ever... but if you play it now, it is way too short and some of the puzzles are just annoying
Sandlot Games Dragon Maze - puzzle game, part of Microsoft Partner Pack for Windows XP
Sandlot Games Super Slyder - puzzle game, part of Microsoft Partner Pack for Windows XP
The Sims - every manipulative person's favorite game, where you get to create people, customize their personality and appearance, make houses for them and buy furniture, and control everything they do; there are SEVEN expansion packs, and if you get them all, the game gets really huge on the hard disk
Snood 3.5W - requires no thinking, just practice... good for relaxing
StarCraft 1.151 - like Warcraft 2 or 3 but in space, and with technology instead of magic
Virtual Intelligence Matrix 1.0 - fun artificially intelligent screensavers to watch
Warcraft 3 1.21 - a RTS (real time strategy) / RPG (role playing game) war game in a fantasy world of elves and orcs and undead, with a very interesting story
gamecopyworld.com | gamefaqs.com | gamespy.com | gamewinners.com | ign.com | the-underdogs.org | ugo.com

Emulators:
Nestopia 1.37 - the world's best 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System / Famicom emulator, one of a few being actively developed at this time (the others being FakeNES, FCE Ultra, Jnes, the Nintendulator, RockNES, and the multi-system-capable Mednafen)... Nestopia has loads of options to configure, and has wonderful compatibility with almost all games
ZSNES 1.51 - the best Super Nintendo emulator in the universe... basically, ZSNES is the greatest emulator for anything that has ever been made, ever, and it is the awesomest program ever written... although the Super NES was much more complicated than the original 8-bit NES, ZSNES manages to run faster and work on slower computers than ANY 8-bit NES emulator for MS Windows, even though it has a huge number of great features that one might think could slow it down (since usually, the more features are added to a program, the slower it gets)
ZSNES Work In Progress site - the newest Work In Progress (WIP) versions of ZSNES... they used to come out with a new WIP version every month or so, and you have to bear in mind that these WIP versions have gone through practically zero bugtesting, and the only reason they work so well is that the developers are the smartest people who ever lived in the history of the universe
Kega Fusion 3.51 - Kega Fusion is not only the best emulator for Sega Genesis, Sega MegaDrive, Sega CD, and Sega 32X, it is also the best emulator for Sega Master System, Sega Game Gear, Sega SG-1000, and Sega SG-3000... in short, it emulates ALL Sega systems except Sega Saturn and Sega Dreamcast, and does it better than ANY other emulator... you have to download render plugins separately (2xSAI and HQ2x are on the bottom of the main Kega Fusion page, listed as "Sample Render Plugins", and 2xPM can be found if you use the Search box on the left of the page and type in "2xPM")
ePSXe 1.5.2 - the best Sony Playstation emulator... you need to install sound, video, & cd-rom plugins separately, and there are several different ones to choose from (by the way, although 1.6.0 is the latest version, it has bugs and is less compatible, and the best version is 1.5.2)
Pete's PSX Plugins - the best plugins to use with ePSXe: Pete makes sound, video, and cd-rom plugins (although some other people make sound and cd-rom plugins of the same caliber, such as the Eternal SPU sound plugin, nobody makes better video plugins than Pete)
Project64 1.6 - the best Nintendo 64 emulator... it requires audio, video, and input plugins, but luckily it comes with Jabo's plugins, which are pretty much the best (you can replace them if you like other 3rd party plugins better)
Visual Boy Advance 1.8.0 beta 3 - the best Game Boy Advance emulator... can also play games for original Game Boy and Game Boy Color... it has a vast array of graphics filters and other neat stuff
AdvanceMAME 0.106.0 - the best arcade machine emulator out there, based on MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator)... if you download it, also get AdvanceMENU, the GUI (Graphical User Interface), from the same website
emulation64.com | emulator-zone.com | ngemu.com | zophar.net

Obscure free programs from Microsoft:
Microsoft Reader 2.1.1 - for reading eBooks, also installs the fonts Berling Antiqua and Frutiger Linotype
Full set of original PowerToys - for Windows 95 only
Full set of original KernelToys - for Windows 95 only
Newer versions of selected PowerToys - all of them are just for Windows 95 or NT, except for Tweak UI 1.33, which is for 95, 98, 98SE, ME, NT4.0, and 2000
Newest versions of PowerToys - for Windows XP only - these are completely different from the earlier PowerToys
Windows XP Creativity Fun Pack "PowerToys" - not really as powerful as earlier PowerToys, these are just for fun
Windows Media Bonus Pack for Windows XP - all sorts of stuff for Windows Media Player
Get the Plus! tab in Display Properties - enables font smoothing, viewing icons in all colors, seeing window contents while dragging, and other fun stuff... only download it if you lack these capabilities and still have Windows 95
Font Properties Extension 2.1 - so that when you go to "properties" for any font in c:\windows\fonts you find out all sorts of stuff about the font
Smart Client Applications for Windows XP - a bunch of free downloads that used to be called the "Partner Pack for Windows XP", they include both games and more useful programs
3D Windows XP Screensaver - free Microsoft screensaver for Windows XP; it should come with Windows XP
Bliss Screensaver - another free Microsoft screensaver for Windows XP; this was only available from microsoft.com for a while before they took it off, but you can still get it
3D American Flag Screensaver - another free Microsoft screensaver for Windows XP (this was Microsoft's response to September 11)
European Union Flags Screensaver - after the Europeans got pissed that the USA got a screensaver and they didn't, Microsoft gave them this
Valentine's Day Screensaver - isn't Microsoft romantic? This screensaver is the perfect gift for that special someone who has such low self-esteem they don't get mad at you if this is all you get them for Valentine's Day!
Video Screensaver (International Edition) - screensaver with video from all over the world (Windows XP only)
Winter Fun Screensavers - more free Microsoft screensavers for Windows XP - Holiday Snowflakes and Amazing Windows XP
Royale Theme for Windows XP - the Royale Theme (originally called "Energy Blue") is a new visual style that works in all versions of Windows XP, and comes with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 and Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005... it is called Royale to celebrate the Queen of England's birthday or something stupid like that, but anyway, it looks nice (it originally came with New Zealand desktop backgrounds, and was "accidentally" leaked to the public by Microsoft's renegade New Zealand subsidiary)
Royale Noir Theme for Windows XP - the Royale Noir Theme is a modified version of the Royale Theme which is mostly black and dark colors; it was developed by Microsoft but never officially released to the public because they did not really get everything to look as nice as they wanted, plus this theme overwrites the Royale Theme and you can't have both installed at the same time (Royale Noir is thought to be an early beta verzion of the Zune Theme)
Zune Theme for Windows XP - the Zune Theme, based on the Royale Noir Theme, was developed to promote Microsoft's Zune portable MP3 player device, and this one actually has been released to the public for free; the main change from Royale Noir is an orange start button
Calculator Plus - a calculator for exchange rates and currencies, which is exactly like the calculator that comes with Windows except it has more features, including a really stupid looking visual style that you can luckily disable (Windows XP only)
Microsoft Time Zone - keep track of what time it is in other parts of the world (Windows XP only)
Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 trial versions - a page to download trial versions of Visual Studio 2005 (an Integrated Development Enviroment for programming) and SQL Server 2005 (a database web server program)
SQL Server 2005 Express Edition - the free version of Microsoft SQL Server, to compete with MySQL
Virtual CD 2.1 - a virtual CD-ROM drive for mounting ISO files, in Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista
Autoplay Repair Wizard - fixes broken Autoplay settings in Windows XP/Server2003/Vista
Windows XP Video Decoder Checkup Utility - checks to make sure you have an MPEG-2 video decoder compatible with Windows XP Media Center Edition and Windows Media Player 10+, and lets you pick which MPEG-2 video decoder to use if you have more than one (Windows XP only)... if it doesn't find one, try the NVIDIA PureVideo decoder
Photo Story 3 - make slideshows from pictures and add sound and captions (Windows XP only)
User Profile Hive Cleanup Service - cleans up after a user logs off (Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista only)
Shared Computer Toolkit for Windows XP - makes Windows XP more secure as a computer for public use, by limiting user privileges and undoing changes (requires User Profile Hive Cleanup Service)
Internet Information Services (IIS) Lockdown Tool 2.1 - improve security for Internet Information Services (IIS) version 4.0, 5.0, or 5.1 (Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista only)
UrlScan 2.5 - another tool to improve security for IIS (Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista only)
DLC Protocol for Windows XP - a network protocol you probably don't need
Sector Inspector - lets you look directly at the hard drive, something that you would only be able to do from DOS if you didn't have this tool
SafeDisc Fix for Windows XP - fixes a bug in Windows XP that prevents some games that use SafeDisc copy protection from working
Application Compatibility Toolkit 4.1 - helps make programs compatible with Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, gives you a lot more compatibility options than Windows does by itself
Windows XP SP2 Support Tools - a motherload of diagnostic utilities for Windows XP SP2
PortQry 2.0 - tells you status of TCP and UDP ports, for troubleshooting
PortQryUI 1.0 - graphical user interface (GUI) for PortQry 2.0 (which doesn't come with one)
Promqry 1.0 - tests if you have network interfaces in promiscuous mode (which is very bad, it means your computer has an STD)
PromqryUI 1.0 - graphical user interface (GUI) for Promqry 1.0 (which doesn't come with one)
Port Reporter 1.01 - logs TCP and UDP port activity, as an NT service
Office Sounds Add-in - adds sounds to Microsoft Office 2000/XP/2003
Scriptomatic 2.0 - writes WMI scripts for you, whatever that means
Tweakomatic 1.0 - also writes WMI scripts, like Scriptomatic, except Tweakomatic is newer and has different uses
USB Flash Drive Manager 1.0 - manage USB flash memory drives (Windows XP only)
Windows Journal Viewer 1.5 - for viewing Windows Journal from Windows XP Tablet PC Edition
ActiveSync 3.8 - synchronize your computer with a handheld device (for Windows 98/98SE/ME/NT4.0)
ActiveSync 4.2 - synchronize your computer with a handheld device (for Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista)
TrueType Core Fonts for the Web - Andale Mono, Arial, Arial Black, Comic Sans MS, Courier New, Georgia, Impact, Times New Roman, Trebuchet MS, Verdana, and Webdings, all available for free from Microsoft (guess why they are all included in Mac OS X? Because Microsoft made them free...)
Euro Enabled Fonts - Calisto MT, Century Schoolbook, Elephant Engravers MT, Eras ITC, Felix Titling, Franklin Gothic, French Script MT, Gill Sans MT, Haettenschweiler, Lucida Sans, Lucida Sans Typewriter, Maiandra GD, OCR A Extended, Palace Script MT, Perpetua, Rage Italic, Rockwell, Script MT Bold, and Tw Cen MT
Windows Vista / Office 12 fonts - Calibri, Cambia, Candara, Consolas, Constantia, and Corbel (this download has older versions of the fonts, not the newer ones that look better)
Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats - make older versions of Microsoft Office compatible with Office 2007; this download also installs the latest versions of the Vista/Office 12 fonts (Calibri, Cambia, Candara, Consolas, Constantia, and Corbel)
Codename Max - top secret preview of new technology for Windows Vista (Windows XP only)
Windows Memory Diagnostic - in-depth testing of your computer's RAM hardware
MS Word 5.5 for DOS - Microsoft probably made this available for free as a mistake, but it's been available to download from their site for years
Windows PowerShell RC2 - also called "MSH" or the "Monad" shell, it is Microsoft's attempt to make a command shell for Windows that appeals to Unix users
"Tools" tab for msconfig.exe in Windows XP - lets you launch other utilities from msconfig.exe in Windows XP
Windows NT IPConfig Utility - instead of running ipconfig.exe in the command prompt in Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, you can run wntipcfg.exe, which is the same as winipcfg.exe in Windows 9x except you have to download it first
DirectX 9.0c Control Panel Applet - adds DirectX to your Control Panel
wBeta.com - Microsoft betas

Operating System Interoperability:
Cygwin 1.5.21-1 - this is a program for compiling Unix programs to run in Windows
Windows Services for UNIX 3.5 - (also known as Interix) adds a complete UNIX subsystem to Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista (requires you to have NTFS, not FAT32, for your hard disk)
UNIX Tools ported to Interix - username: bugger password: bugme (from Firefox's BugMeNot extension)
Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 - emulates a PC from within Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, allowing you to run other x86-compatible operating systems from within Windows
Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 - emulates a PC from within MS Windows Server 2003, allowing you to run other x86-compatible operating systems from within Windows
Microsoft Virtual PC 7 for Mac - emulates a PC running Windows 2000/XP from within Mac OS X 10.2.8 or higher
VMware Workstation 5 - emulates a PC from within MS Windows 2000/XP/Server2003 or Linux, allowing you to run other x86-compatible operating systems from within Windows or Linux
DOSBox 0.65 - emulates a PC running a primitive version of DOS (mainly for running old DOS games), runs within 32-bit Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, FreeBSD, or BeOS... on Windows use the D-Fend frontend on the same page as a user friendly DOSBox launcher
DOSBox 0.65 CVS (11/20/2006) - unofficial new unstable version of DOSBox that has various patches applied to it
Bochs 2.3 - emulates an x86 PC, allowing you to run another OS within a virtual machine, can be run on virtually any OS (including Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, BeOS, ...)
QEMU 0.8.2 - about the same thing as Bochs, except newer, much much faster, and more bugs
PearPC 0.4.0 - emulates a Mac (a.k.a. the PowerPC architecture), can be run on Windows and Linux (now you can run Mac OS X on a PC!)
Wine 0.9.24 - emulates Microsoft Windows (pretty well in fact), and runs on Linux, FreeBSD, and Solaris (but you need an x86 or compatible CPU)
Mac-on-Linux 0.9.70 - lets you run Mac OS within Linux in a virtual machine, on a computer with a PowerPC processor (basically, if you have a Mac and install Linux as your OS, you can still run Mac OS from within Linux and it's almost as fast)
SoundFX 2000 2.04 - gives you sound for old DOS games run from within Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista... unfortunately this is not the full version, which costs money; it only lets you play a game for 3 minutes before exiting, which is a rather annoying, but you can fix it by paying them $$
VDMSound 2.0.4 - gives you sound for old DOS games run from within Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista... the free alternative to SoundFX 2000
VDMSound 2.1.0 beta - a beta of the newest VDMSound, which no longer supports Windows NT 4.0 (now it's just Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista)
Direct I/O 4.4.271 - lets programs have direct access to hardware in Windows Windows NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista, providing better compatibility with programs written for Windows 95/98/98SE/ME
NTFS4DOS - gives you full read-write access to NTFS partitions not only in DOS, but also Windows 95/98/ME
Ext2 Installable File System for Windows 1.10b - lets Windows NT/2K/XP have full read-write access to the Ext2 (and Ext3) file system used by Linux
HPFS File System for Windows or DOS - gives you full read-write access to the HPFS file system used by OS/2 (for Windows NT/2K/XP: you need to download hpfsnt.zip first, and then hpfs_w2k.zip) (for DOS or Windows 9x: download hpfsa102.zip)
FFS File System Driver for Windows 0.5 - gives you read-only access to the FFS file system used by FreeBSD, NetBSD, & OpenBSD if you have Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista
MacDrive 6 - gives you full read-write access to the HFS and HFS+ file systems used by Mac OS, for Windows 98/98SE/ME/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista (unlike the other file system drivers, this one is not free)

Operating Systems:
Microsoft Windows (various versions) - you are probably running some version of it; this isn't really a download link, by the way (the newest version is Windows Vista)
ReactOS 0.3.0-REL - an attempt to make a free, open-source clone of Win32 (Windows 95/98/98SE/ME/NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003/Vista)
MS-DOS 7.10 - the greatest MS-DOS ever, supports FAT32, Long File Names (LFNs), and the Windows 3.1, 95, and 98 GUIs
Enhanced DR-DOS 7.01.07 - an enhanced free version of Caldera OpenDOS 7.01 (Caldera OpenDOS = same thing as DR-DOS and Novell DOS, just at different times in DR-DOS's corporate ownership history)
PhysTechSoft PTS-DOS 32 - a small, fast DOS clone from our comrades in Mother Russia, certified by the Russian Defence Ministry and used on Russian space satellites as the operating system (their older OS, PTS-DOS 2000, aimed at MS-DOS 6.22 compatibility, whereas PTS-DOS 32 aims for MS-DOS 7.10 compatibility)
Paragon PTS-DOS 2000 Pro - in 1995, several dissatisfied programmers from PhysTechSoft stole copies of PTS-DOS 2000's source code, escaped from Russia to Germany, and set up a successful software company called Paragon, which, among other things, is selling its own version of PTS-DOS 2000, in violation of Russian law (good thing they are in Germany!)
Datalight ROM-DOS 6.22 or 7.10 - Datalight ROM-DOS was first introduced in 1989, and it has a very small disk space and memory footprint and very low system requirements, yet is the most advanced DOS on the market today, with Internet connectivity, designed for embedded x86-compatible systems
FreeDOS 1.0 - an attempt to make a free, open-source clone of Microsoft's now defunct operating system MS-DOS (supports FAT32, LFNs, and pretty much everything else)
eComStation 1.2R - the next evolution of IBM's now defunct operating system OS/2, under active development by Serenity Systems International in cooperation with the original developer, IBM
SCO UnixWare 7.1.4 or OpenServer 6.0 - the official Unix that everything else is a clone of, for x86 only; SCO claims that its proprietary Unix is the only real Unix, and all other Unix-based operating systems are doing copyright infringement, and SCO wants to make all other Unix-based operating systems illegal, especially Linux
Linux 2.6.18 - the most popular open-source Unix-based OS; there isn't any one official version of Linux, there are many distributions, and this link is a jumping off point to finding out how to get Linux; nowadays everyone's favorite distribution is Ubuntu Linux, but there are hundreds of others
Ubuntu 6.10 "Edgy Eft" - the most popular Linux distribution, created and managed by South African entrepreneur and former space tourist Mark Shuttleworth, it is based on Debian GNU/Linux
Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard" or 10.4 "Tiger" - you can't really download it, but you can buy it here, and find out more about how it is based on FreeBSD and stuff like that (only runs on Macs, by the way)
FreeBSD 6.1 - the BSD Unix-based operating system upon which Mac OS X was partially based, FreeBSD is super awesome, especially now that the company Apple is helping to improve it
NetBSD 3.0.1 - another BSD Unix-based operating system, runs on more hardware than any other OS (except maybe Linux)
OpenBSD 3.9 - another BSD Unix-based operating system, said to have better security than any other Unix-based OS
OpenDarwin 7.2.1 - another BSD Unix-based operating system, based on Mac OS X's open source Darwin core OS, basically an open-source variant of Mac OS X (except it can run on x86-compatible PCs!)
Solaris 10 6/06 - Sun Microsystems' advanced Unix-based operating system, now 100% free! (formerly called SunOS) - runs on any x86, as well as Sun's SPARC-based computers
IRIS 6.5.29 - SGI's 64-bit advanced Unix-based operating system for SGI's MIPS systems (MIPS is very RISCy)
HP-UX 11i v2 - Hewlett Packard's Unix-based server operating system for HP's line of servers
IBM AIX 5L V5.3 - IBM's Unix-based server operating system for IBM's line of servers
QNX Neutrino RTOS - the greatest Real Time Operating System (RTOS) in the entire world, runs on x86 as well as several other platforms (PPC, MIPS, ARM, SH4)
Novell Netware 6.5 - not a download link, it costs money... anyway, this used to be the OS of choice for network servers, but not anymore; Novell is going to make Netware an optional add-on to its SUSE Linux, calling the combination (SUSE Linux + Netware) Open Enterprise Server
Plan 9 from Bell Labs Fourth Edition - an experimental new operating system from Bell Labs (a.k.a. Lucent Technologies) that runs on x86 PCs and is kind of like Unix OSes; although it is an experimental research OS, you can download and run it if you want
Inferno Fourth Edition - a free operating system based on Plan 9 from Bell Labs that can run from within other operating systems; kind of like Java, it is a system for cross-platform applications to run under, and it has its own programming language called Limbo
BeOS 5 Personal Edition - the last official free release version of BeOS; kind of outdated and might not run on newer hardware until you apply the patches, plus you'd need to patch up to 5.03, so probably go for Max Edition instead
BeOS 5 PE Max Edition 3.0 - an unofficial modified version of the highly innovative but now defunct operating system BeOS 5.03 Personal Edition, which supports more hardware than the unmodified official version
BeOS 5 PE Max Edition 3.1 beta 1 - a beta of the newest unofficial Max Edition of BeOS, which will support even more hardware and have more bugfixes (hopefully)
yellowTAB Zeta 1.21 - yellowTAB got the rights to BeOS after Be, Inc. went bankrupt, and now they are developing it to support more hardware and be more innovative and have more features and stuff, but you can't download it, it costs money (yellowTAB Zeta is basically a modified and updated version of BeOS 5)
Haiku Project - an attempt to make a free, open-source clone of Be, Inc.'s now defunct operating system BeOS
SSS-PC 1.0 - crazy new Japanese experimental research operating system, which has a scheduling algorithm (FMM or Free Market Mechanism) based on the economics of supply and demand (it even has the equivalent of antitrust laws, to keep greedy processes from monopolizing system resources), and lots of other weird unprecedented features (it is a successor to another Japanese research OS called SSS-CORE) - its main feature is it combines the power of many computers into a single supercomputer, using a proprietary new network protocol called Memory Based Communications Facilities (MBCF) to turn a network of computers into a single monolithic supercomputer
SkyOS Beta Build 6179 - just like BeOS, SkyOS is conceived as a new alternative desktop operating system to replace Windows, written from scratch, except SkyOS is still in the pre-release stage and is not yet finished
Bluebottle Build of 3/12/2004 or 8/18/2006 - the next generation of an OS known as ETH Native Oberon, written in a programming language called Active Oberon (it was all developed by crazy people in Switzerland)
ETH Native Oberon 2.3.6 - the crazy Swiss operating system Bluebottle is based upon, Oberon is also a programming language, and Native Oberon just makes that language into the OS itself
Syllable OS 0.6.1 - a continuation of the now defunct AtheOS operating system, which was a Unix-based desktop OS
AmigaOS 4.0 - the newest AmigaOS, only runs on Amiga computers
MorphOS 0.4 - a variant of AmigaOS that only runs on PegasosPPC hardware (kinda rare)
AROS 2006-02-07 - Amiga Research Operating System - a modernized version of the AmigaOS 3.1 that ran on Amiga computers, which runs on x86 PCs instead
eCos 2.0 - a new embedded operating system being developed by Red Hat, Inc.
FSD Amoeba 2002B - very high performance distributed operating system, for combining many computers into one supercomputer
TRON - the most popular operating system in the entire world, developed in 1984 by Professor Ken Sakamura at the University of Tokyo (here is a list of companies that use TRON in their products)
Palm OS Cobalt 6.1 - the most popular operating system for mobile phones and handhelds
Symbian OS v9.3 - an operating system developed entirely for use on mobile phones

Programming Tools:
GW-BASIC 3.23 - über old school, written by Bill Gates himself, this is Microsoft's original BASIC, and it still works (but you need to read documentation to know how to use it, since it has no built-in help functions) - same as IBM BASICA, except GW-BASIC actually works on computers that aren't ancient IBM ones
QBASIC 1.1 - way more advanced than GW-BASIC, also by Microsoft, this one has a user-friendly GUI instead of a confusing console mode, and it has a very good built-in help system - it's a dumbed-down version of Microsoft QuickBASIC, which eventually became Microsoft Visual Basic
WinCvs 2.1.1 - a content versioning system, to keep track of different versions of a set of files
Python 2.5.1 - Python is a newer programming language, cross-platform and faster than Java
Standard ML of New Jersey 110.67 - also called SML, it is a functional programming language, meaning instead of writing step-by-step procedures with loops, everything is done with functions calling each other and recursion
SML-mode 4.0 for Emacs - this is for editing and running SML programs in GNU Emacs or XEmacs (this is made by Lucent Technologies a.k.a. Bell Labs)
Objective Caml 3.10.10 - also called OCaml, it is another functional programming language that is closely related to Standard ML but more advanced and faster (basically its main claim to fame is most programs can be written with fewer lines of source code in OCaml than any other language and they run just as fast as if they were written in assembly language)
GNU Emacs 22.1 - Richard Stallman's version of the most common Unix text-editor, but also works in Windows (is also an Integrated Development Environment and a primitive web browser)
XEmacs 21.4.21 - Ben Wing's version of the most common Unix text-editor, but also works in Windows (is also an Integrated Development Environment and a primitive web browser)
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 - lets you run programs written for the .NET Framework 1.x
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 Service Pack 1 - improved security for .NET Framework 1.1 (which you need to have installed first)
Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 - lets you run programs written for the .NET Framework 2.x
Microsoft Java Language Conversion Assistant 3.0 (beta) - automatically converts Java programs into Microsoft Visual C# programs (evil!)

Downloads for Cornellians* only:
Symantec/Norton Antivirus 10.1 MR 6 - every Cornellian can download and use it for free
Kerberos SideCar - for network authentication at Cornell
Bear Access - Cornell's Internet application suite
Cornell Log - monitors how much Internet bandwidth you use, so you can keep under the 2 gigs per month limit
* How to tell if you qualify: You have to currently be a student, faculty, administrator, or staff at Cornell University, with a NetID and password set up to access Cornell's network. Alumni like me do not have access to the downloads, unfortunately, but I could still pretend I have access, by linking to the downloads and not explicitly stating that I am no longer capable of accessing any of them. However, since I just did explicitly state that, I have defeated the entire purpose of this meaningless footnote, which will end now.

Updates:
Microsoft Update - keeps MS Windows and other Microsoft programs up to date, very important to visit often, and always download all the updates except the driver updates, which are dangerous because they override manufacturers' drivers with Microsoft drivers that ruin everything, especially for newer video cards and sound cards and even modems... but all the updates that aren't in the drivers section, you should download and install, definitely
Windows Update - the predecessor to Microsoft Update, introduced back in the Windows 95 era, use it if your computer is not good enough for Microsoft Update
Office Update - keeps MS Office up to date, you might need your Office CD to do certain updates... just like with Windows Update, you should download and install everything
Windows 95 Service Pack 1 - install if you have the original release version of Windows 95 (original version = 4.00.950, WITHOUT any letters after it, if you right-click My Computer and choose Properties)
Windows 98 Service Pack 1 - install if you have the original release version of Windows 98 (original version = 4.10.1998, if you right-click My Computer and choose Properties; in 1999 Windows 98SE came out, version 4.10.2222A, and it is much better than previous versions of Windows 9x as well as the later version Windows ME)
Windows 98SE Unofficial Service Pack 2.1a - install if you have Windows 98SE (4.10.2222A)
Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 6a - install if you have Windows NT 4.0 without this latest service pack
Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 - install if you have Windows 2000 without this latest service pack
Windows XP Service Pack 2 - install if you have Windows XP without this latest service pack
Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 - install if you have Windows Server 2003 without this latest service pack
Windows Installer 2.0 for Windows 95/98/98SE/ME - newest Windows Installer for Windows 95/98/98SE/ME, needed for installing certain programs
Windows Installer 2.0 for Windows NT 4.0 - newest Windows Installer for Windows NT 4.0, needed for installing certain programs
Windows Installer 3.1 for Windows 2000/XP/Server2003 - newest Windows Installer for Windows 2000/XP/Server2003, needed for installing certain programs
DirectX 8.0a - newest DirectX for Windows 95, needed for certain screensavers and games
DirectX 9.0c November 2007 Update - newest DirectX for Windows 98/98SE/ME/2000/XP/Server2003, needed for certain screensavers and most games
Winsock 2.0 Update for Windows 95 - very important update for Windows 95 only, required by lots of programs
Dial-Up Networking 1.4 Update for Windows 95 - another networking update for Windows 95 only
GDI+ Redistributable for Windows 98/98SE/ME/NT/2000 - GDI+ is a feature introduced in Windows XP and if a program requires this feature and you don't have Windows XP, this download makes it work
Unicode for Windows 95/98/98SE/ME - adds Unicode support to Windows 9x, a feature required by some programs
HTML Help support for Windows 95/98/98SE/ME/NT4.0/2000/XP/Server2003 - adds HTML Help support, which you probably only need if you have Windows 95 or NT and an old version of Internet Explorer
Common Controls update for Windows 95/98/NT - get it if you have Windows 95/98/NT, needed to run some programs
Visual Basic 6 runtime SP6 for all 32-bit Windows - this update is needed to run some programs
Visual Basic 6 Common Controls update for all 32-bit Windows - this update is needed to run some programs
Microsoft Data Access Components for Windows 95 - this update is needed to run some programs
Microsoft Data Access Components for Windows 98/98SE/ME/NT/2000 - this update is needed to run some programs
MSXML 3.0 SP7 - if the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer tells you to get this, here is the link to download it, but run the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer first to make sure you need it (this should be on Windows Update but it's not for some reason)
MSXML 4.0 SP2 - if the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer tells you to get this, here is the link to download it, but run the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer first to make sure you need it (this should be on Windows Update but it's not for some reason)
Windows 95 Y2K update - fixes the Y2K bug in Windows 95, needed for some programs
Mac OS 9 Updates - update anything in the range from Mac OS 9.0 thru 9.2.1 to the newest, Mac OS 9.2.2
Mozilla Update - extensions, themes, & plugins for Mozilla products... this includes Firefox, Thunderbird, and the Mozilla suite, and possibly newer versions of Netscape, although support for Netscape is doubtful

3rd party Windows XP hacks:
UXTHEME.DLL Multi-patcher 5.5 - allows Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 to use 3rd party visual styles, just like the program Styles XP, except free
TCPIP.SYS Patcher 2.23d - makes the Internet faster in Windows XP Service Pack 2, by undoing a change that limits you to 10 outgoing incomplete TCP/IP connections per port at a time - if you use a filesharing program and have Windows XP Service Pack 2 installed, you NEED this

Windows XP Themes (usable if you have a hacked UXTHEME.DLL, Style XP, or one of various other programs):
AppleBlossomArt.com | Belchfire.net | BoomGames.com | LightStar1.com | ThemeXP.org | WinCustomize.com | XPTheme.info | XPThemes.com

Other Download Sites:
9down.com | Download.com | MajorGeeks.com | Tucows.com | Wugnet.com

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Copyright © 2010 Rich McGrew. All rights reserved.