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| Welcome to the world of free software | | You can save on computing ? from operating system to anti-virus |
| Shivani Shinde & Priyanka Joshi / Mumbai May 28, 2010, 00:11 IST |
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A computer is now recognised as a necessity, not a luxury. With both local and international brands flooding the market with their products, the percentage of people using assembled computers (white-box) is slowly going down.
The drawback is that with numerous options available, a computer requires several software applications, often a pricey addition. You might never use many of these. For first-time buyers or those who want to use their computer (notebook or desktop computer) for basic tasks, these applications can take up precious hard-disk space and a massive chunk of your wallet, too.
Here are some free and easy-to-download applications one must have — operating system, office documents, photo editing and security tools.
Free operating system: Let’s start with the operating system (OS). A Microsoft OS is chosen by a majority of users as no retailer bothers to inform buyers about the free to load open source OSes like Red Hat, OpenSolaris or the most popular one, Ubuntu. A word of caution: If you are a newbie at open source, it might be advisable to get a technical expert to upload the OS.
Cost Saving: An entry-level Microsoft OS would cost you between Rs 4,000 and Rs 14,000.
Security software: Ideally, this is an area where one should invest. Especially, if you are transacting online or have kids at home who like playing games on the Internet. There are options here as well which provide basic security against virus attacks and spyware. Sites such as Bitdefender, AVG Anti-virus, Avira, ALWIL Software’s Avast Free Antivirus and others provide basic free security software.
Most of these free softwares are updated at regular intervals. These products are designed for average users who need protection for basic email and web surfing.
Cost Saving: Security software from vendors like McAfee, SymantEc, F-Secure and others start from Rs 350 and go up to 3,200.
Office documents: For those needing just basic office applications like word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation creator for your new laptop or home PC, there is a popular free office suite, OpenOffice, and it’s for free.
OpenOffice Basic is a freeware replica of Microsoft’s Office suite. If you have used standard office software — Word, Powerpoint, etc — you shouldn’t find it hard to use OpenOffice. But, more important, the latest version of OpenOffice is compatible with Microsoft Word. So, when you do send an attachment, it will not turn into gibberish. OpenOffice can be downloaded from download.openoffice.org. Simply follow the instructions.
Cost Saving: A Microsoft Office suite would start at Rs 2,190 and can go up to Rs 28,000.
Media editing tools: Picasa or HP’s SnapFish are well-know free photo editing tools. These allow users to not only upload pictures from mobile phones and digital cameras but also edit these.
Tools like Picasa and SnapFish will allow you to improve common problems in pictures like red-eye, colour and lighting. It also includes designing and printing photo collages. If you are one of those who like to be a bit more creative, then there are sites such as Photoscape or paint.net, among others.
The site www.photoscape.org has features like edit, which includes colour adjustment, backlight correction, frames, balloons, merge multiple photos, animated GIF, RAW converter and others. The advantage of these sites is that they have an active online community, which helps a user to get used to these applications.
Cost Saving: Adobe Photoshop would cost 1,200 to Rs 5,000, depending on the version.
Music players: Most of the OSes come bundled with a media player. Besides, if you are a user of Apple’s iPod, you don’t need any other media player. Add, Apple’s Quick Time player that is free to download.
For those who neither have an Apple nor are using a Microsoft OS, here are some options. VLC Media player is one of the most popular free open-source multimedia players and servers. The site boasts of 3.2 downloads per second. VLC supports most audio and video formats. It also converts media files, transcodes and acts as a streaming server.
Winamp is another one. The standard version of Winamp is for free and allows you to download music, find lyrics, and more. It supports 16 languages.
Cost Saving: NA.
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