Executive Summary:
You can make your Windows computers less resource-hungry by installing lite programs. Some recommended free lite programs include Foxit Reader 2.0, PDFCreator, 7-Zip, Media Player Classic, Real Alternative, and Microsoft Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel. You can use Group Policy to deploy many of these lite programs.
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One of my favorite activities is finding ways
to "lighten" my computer—that is, make it
less resource-hungry. One way I do this is
by replacing applications that I use regularly
with "lite" programs that perform the same
tasks or at least the most commonly used
tasks. It's even better when these programs
are free and have more capabilities than the
original applications. Here are some free lite
programs that I've found useful:
• Foxit Software's Foxit Reader 2.0 (http://www.foxitsoftware.com): This PDF reader
is 1.67MB, needs about 5MB of RAM, and
starts up almost instantly. An .msi file is
available for download, so you can deploy
this program through Group Policy.
See Associated Figure
• PDFCreator (http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator): PDFCreator provides
an easy way to create PDF files from any
application. It creates a virtual printer named PDF creator. Whenever you want to create
a PDF file from a document, you just send
the document to this virtual printer. You can
deploy this program through Group Policy.
• 7-Zip (http://www.7-zip.org): This program
opens all popular compressed files (e.g.,
.zip, .iso, .rar, .arj). Plus, it provides a new
compression format (7z) that, according
to the Web site, provides a compression
ratio that's up to 10 percent better than the ratio provided by PKWARE's PKZip and
WinZip Computing's WinZip. One of my
favorite features is that you can compress
and decompress files in the background.
You can deploy this multilingual program
through Group Policy.
• Media Player Classic (http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_
id=82303&package_id=84358): Although
Media Player Classic looks like Microsoft's
Windows Media Player (WMP), Media Play
Classic is faster and requires less memory
than WMP. Media Player Classic is highly
extensible.
See Associated Figure
• Real Alternative (http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Real_Alternative.htm):
Real Alternative plays RealMedia files (e.g.,
.rm, .ram, .rpx, .smi). It provides the same
capabilities as Real Player but without all
the annoying registration forms and advertisements. Plus, Real Alternative consumes
fewer resources than Real Player.
• Microsoft Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel (http://download.microsoft.com/download/7/b/6/7b6abd84-7841-497896f5-bd58df02efa2/winxpvirtualcdcontrolpanel_21.exe): This unsupported Microsoft
program lets you mount ISO images to
your computer. It loads a Virtual CD-ROM
device driver, which you can start and stop
as desired.
One free lite program I don't recommend
is QuickTime Alternative player (http://www.free-codecs.com/download/QuickTime_
Alternative.htm), which plays QuickTime
files (e.g., .mov, .qt, .3gp). My experience with
QuickTime Alternative has been less than
optimal.
End of Article
