A Must Have Basic Applications for Windows XP user

Reformatting a Windows Installation is necessary if you think that your system is too slow or behaving badly unlike before. Reformatting will result to a fresh and fast Windows system. But reformatting will also remove all the programs you've installed and this what the real work starts, reinstalling back all the useful and programs you need.

Computer users need different programs installed on their system, for example, a user who frequently accessing media files (like MP3) needs software specifically for MP3's. Due to different purposes of computers to individuals, users have different software needs an software that must be installed on their system.

So what are the programs that must be installed first on a newly reformatted Windows Installation? The answers depend on the user that will use the computer.

Personally, i have few apps installed on my PC because i don't like my PC to be cluttered by many useless (for me) programs, and also don't like to pay for softwares that i need if i can find a free one than can do the features that i need from a shareware programs . So here's the list of the programs that i installed to my PC immediately after i reinstalled Windows (with no particular order).

• AVG Antivirus - I prefer to use this free antivirus to catch viruses that tries to invade my system because of its low memory consumptions and i still don't encountered problems yet on using this program.
• Zonelab ZoneAlarm Firewall - I use this software to control the incoming and outgoing traffic from my PC. Specially useful to prevent spywares to report back-in to its author.
• Spybot Search & Destroy - I use it to find and removes spywares on my systems.
• Lavasoft Ad-Aware (free) - This program will catch spywares that Spybot don't catch.
  
• Adobe Flash Player - This little program from adobe is your way to watch video streaming websites (like Youtube, Metacafe). Flash is commonly used by website and a must have to every PC connected on Internet.
• Foxit Reader - I use this program instead of Adobe Acrobat Reader to view PDF files because of its speed.
• IrfanView - I also install this program to my PC to view different files like images and media files.
• Firefox - Sure, that IE7 is also a great browser to use, buy i also use Firefox because i can customize it to what i like.
• Opera - Opera is another Internet browser on my PC. Besides fast browsing this offers, i also like some original features of this browser.
• OpenOffice - Instead of getting a very expensive Microsoft's Office, i just use the free OpenOffice. Which is also compatible with Microsoft's Office.
• VLC Media Player - I install this program to open almost any media files format and it also consume less system memory.
• MusikCube - Faster to load than Windows Media Player, this program handles my MP3 library.
• Riva FLV Encoder - This program will do the encoding of videos that i downloaded from video streaming websites from FLV to MPG.
• 7-Zip - A free compression utility that works like the shareware Winzip.
• Gimp - If i need work on an image, i use this free and opensource program. (Photoshop Alternative)
• Limewire - A P2P program.
  
• TrueCrypt - A program that will encrypt my private folders or drives.
• InfraRecorder - I use this program when burning files to CD's or DVDs. This program loads fast and have an easy to use interface.
  

This list of programs is useless for other computer users or won't work from others, but for me, this programs are enough to have a PC that loaded with all the programs that i need.
Links courtesy of Herzom M..