Three of our top ten Cloudeight freeware picks

We are going to publish our ten freeware picks of all time (From our InfoAve Premium Issue #500). Here are three of the top ten for you. Remember these are not posted in order of preference, or how good we think they are.

Irfanview
The fastest image viewer on the planet

Always our top choice because it’s a fast, easy download (1.6 mb) and because it is the lightest, fastest, image viewer you can install on your computer. Works with all versions of Windows from Windows XP though Windows 8 including 64-bit versions of Windows.

We’ve used this program for over 12 years and we’ve seen it grow into a marvelous full-featured program that includes quite a few image editing options like resizing, cropping, converting one image type to another, TWAIN scanner support, support for some Photoshop filters and more. A great all-around program, and one we think should be everyone’s default image viewer.

Irfanview also offers dozens of free-plugins that allow you to expand its feature-set, so be sure to investigate those after you’ve installed Irfanview. If you’re only going to install one image viewer and you want some really great photo-editing options in a lightweight, fast little program, you can’t do better than Irfanview. It’s a five-star program in everyone’s book. We wouldn’t be without it.Get more information about Irfanview including plugins available from the Irfanview Web site. Irfanview is completely free for home and personal use.

We suggest you use this link to download Irfanview.

WinPatrol 2013
Startup control and much, much more

We highly recommend WinPatrol. It’s one of the first programs we install on any new PC or laptop we buy. We allow it to start with Windows because it is always on patrol. Its start up manager is second-to-none. It’s easy to use, and allows you to easily take control of your startup programs.

WinPatrol also lets you see tasks that are running and if one of them is “frozen” you can kill the task from within WinPatrol. You can see any super hidden files on your computer (like BOOT.INI). You can manage Internet Explorer add-ons with WinPatrol, add file types, change the program associated with a certain file type, control scheduled tasks, review, disable, or activate Windows services and much more.

WinPatrol is unlike any other program. It’s a wonderful addition to any Windows computer. It’s like a Swiss Army Knife – it has a myriad of different uses. Best of all, WinPatrol offers a free version which is wonderfully capable. And while the Pro Version offers even more details about your system and the programs and services running on it and more features, the free version is one of the best, if not THE best freeware program of them all.

For more information, visit WinPatrol’s home page right now.

Jarte
A simple word processor

Jarte is a Windows word processor that can read and save your word processing gems in Word format which is .doc or .docx depending on the version of MS Office you spent $400 to buy. I would have said $400 for, but that would have been ending a sentence with a preposition and Word doesn’t like that – plus “$400 for” sounds kind of clumsy.

So what does Jarte do? Duh! It’s a word processor. If you don’t know what a word processor is, you don’t need one. Trust me on that. Here’s a short list of features.

Fully compatible with Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Tabbed interface to provide easy access to open documents
Opens files with file extension RTF, file extension DOC, and file extension DOCX (new default format in Word 2007)
Fast start up
Compact screen size
Hot Connect lets you use Jarte with other programs
Optional “Clickless Operation” feature greatly reduces clicking
Can be run directly from a pluggable USB flash drive
High quality spell checker with custom user dictionary
Included spelling dictionaries: English (American, British, & Canadian), Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Dutch
Link to, or import, your existing custom Word spelling dictionaries
Support for templates
Export to HTML or PDF
Single click bookmarking and bookmark navigation
Send documents via e-mail
Full drag and drop file support
Instant access to recently opened documents and folders
Instant access to documents and folders designated as favorites
Adjustable document zoom
Detailed Help documentation
And even more!

If you want a word processor that does what a word processor should, then you’ll love Jarte. It’s about a 3 mb download. You can read more about and or download Jarte by visitingwww.jarte.com , right now.