Windows

The awesomeness of Quixey cannot be overstated. Need to find an application that will encrypt your Word documents? Ask Quixey. Need a program to help you lose weight? Quixey can find that for you, too. You can limit your search to just a specific platform (web, Android, iPhone, Windows, and more), and choose whether to see all applications or just the free ones. Outstanding!

(via Lifehacker)

What's so great about Google's Chrome browser? 15 Killer Google Chrome Features You Might Not Know About explains the excitement.

Microsoft exists to make a profit, of course, but the company does offer a lot of interesting freebies. TechRadar lists the 48 best free apps from Microsoft.

MakeUseOf.com lists the Top 10 Resources For Computer Troubleshooting Advice & Remote Help.

"Sahana is a Free and Open Source Disaster Management system. It is a web based collaboration tool that addresses the common coordination problems during a disaster from finding missing people, managing aid, managing volunteers, tracking camps effectively between Government groups, the civil society (NGOs) and the victims themselves."

Tech Toolkit 2.0 downloads and installs dozens of Windows troubleshooting utilities to a USB thumb drive. Better yet, it will keep all those utilities updated.

(via MakeUseOf)

"Old School Apps is an online community created in 2009 in efforts to help keep classic gaming alive.  Our site hosts over 500 DOS games from the early 1980s through the end of the millennium. The applications and games you find here are considered to be "abandonware"."

(via Red Ferret Journal)

Using Windows, and wish it would do a little bit more? You may find your answer in a list of Forty-Three of The Best Free Windows Enhancements That You Should Know About:

The common theme that brought these together was that they were all really cool Windows “enhancements”: i.e. apps that tweak or change the way we work with files, folders, applications, or the system environment itself (or, apps that brings functionality to the Windows environment that could or should have been a built-in option in Windows).

They're labelled for Windows 7, but these wallpapers will work with just about any operating system.

Good. Freakin'. Gawd.

Someone with waaaaay too much spare time has figured out how to install and boot 145 operating systems on a PC.

My head asplode.

Maximum PC has… "put together a list of what we think are the most essential PC apps… These are all free programs (except one) that should be immediately installed after a fresh build or reformat; 32 indispensable programs and utilities that we couldn't imagine computing without."

Welcome to the index for Classic Poetry Aloud, a podcast series for some of the greatest poetry in English… These free readings (over 200 poems, by over 80 poets) would fill two CDs, and many more are planned.

(via MetaFilter)

"[T]he Computer Repair Utility Kit is a combination of computer repair tools in one easy to use pack. The Computer Repair Utility Kit allows you to run all of the repair tools from your portable drive eg. USB Flash Drive, External Hard Drive, IPod etc. and comes with an easy to use, right-click menu."

"Drawing for Children is a free drawing program for children with many nice options. You can draw with many different pens, you can put stamps on your drawings, create all sort of text effects, and much more. The program is suitable for very young children and has a child mode especially for them. But it also provides lots of fun to older kids. It is used by hundreds of thousands of kids all over the world. The best way to see what is possible is to simply download it and install it. Remember, it is free."

Vector graphics editors don't start and end with Adobe Illustrator. Here's a list of 20 Vector Graphics Editors Reviewed.