17 Free Tools to Get More Out of Windows 7

Windows 7 may be one of the best OS Microsoft has released, but that doesn't mean you can't find free or cheap tools to tweak its settings, supplement its features, or add more power to default applications. We've compiled a list of 17 valuable software tools--all of them free--that can make your Win 7 experience a lot more rewarding.

A 'Super' Taskbar

Windows 7 taskbar or 'Superbar' (as is popularly known) offers some nice amenities: Jump Lists, program pinning, rich thumbnail previews, and so forth. Of course, it's "your" Windows, so you should be able to make the taskbar work exactly the way you want it. Here are five tools that will add more power to the already powerful 'Superbar'.

7 Taskbar Tweaker - This little utility offers six taskbar adjustments, including one that replaces the Jump List with the old-fashioned window menu when you right-click a running program. Other options include disabling thumbnail previews, turning off window grouping, opening (rather than pinning) a file that you've dragged to a taskbar program, and cycling through windows when you left-click a grouped button. Our favorite 7 Taskbar Tweaker feature reassigns the middle mouse button to close or focus a window instead of opening a new instance of the program.

Windows 7 Taskbar Thumbnail Customizer - Much as we love Windows 7's window-preview thumbnails, which pop up when you mouse over any running program in the taskbar, we find them almost useless. Why? Because the thumbnails themselves are too small. This is especially true on systems with large, high-resolution monitors. Fortunately, this awesome free utility lets you make thumbnails just about any size you want. There's nothing to install: Just run the program, then drag the Maximum Size slider somewhere north of its default.

7Stacks - The concept of "stacks" is familiar to any Mac user, and you can add this functionality to Windows 7 Superbar with 7Stacks. 7Stacks allows you to combine a group of related icons into a single icon and also lets you create shortcuts for the contents of any folder on your system for direct access from the taskbar itself. Such a function usually requires a desktop dock program, but this download gets you straight to the good stuff.

Jumplist launcher - One of Windows 7's niftier features is Jumplists, which offer a variety of pre-determined actions that can be taken when you right-click an icon in the new, redesigned Taskbar. Jumplist-Launcher attempts to power up that feature. With Jumplist-Launcher, you will be able to create a custom Jumplist on the Taskbar. You'll be able to launch any application from it and open folders and files that you specify. You can also organize the Jumplist any way you want, and create a Jumplist of up to 60 items, which normally isn't possible under Windows 7. If you're willing to spend some time with it, you'll be able to create a Jumplist that you normally can't create in Windows 7.

Taskbar Meters - This tool may not be as useful as the other mentioned utilities, but if you are someone who likes to keep an eye on the the various system resources usage, this tiny utility just might be for you. It adds resource monitors right on your Windows 7 Taskbar. It comes with three tools - One that shows CPU utilization, another that shows memory and the third shows disk Input-Output activities.

Windows 7 Turbo Boosters

Windows 7 may be easier to use than Vista or XP, but diagnostic and maintenance chores remain tricky. If you want to keep Windows 7 running smoothly, tweak Windows' performance and appearance, optimize memory, clean up the hard drive, cover your tracks by shredding files, and so on, you can do it the hard way by digging around the OS. But an easy way is to install useful tools that will do the jobs for you. Here are three free utilities that cam make Windows 7 a super performer.

Ultimate Windows Tweaker - This free customization tool detects whether you're running Windows 7 or Vista, and offers only the tweaks relevant to your OS. "Ultimate" is a fitting description for this mega-tweaker, which provides dozens of configuration options for UI, network, security, and system settings. If you're all about personalizing Windows 7, this app is for you. It gives you control over more than 130 Vista settings, all of them conviently grouped into seven categories. If you are confused about a particular tool, you can get a description of any given setting just by mousing over it.

EnhanceMySe7en Free - If you are looking for a more advanced and system optimizer for Windows 7, this fully-loaded app might be the one you are looking for. It has a plethora of tools for tweaking Windows 7, ranging from diagnostic tools to customiazations and optimizations, it has almost everything you can think of.

7plus - This program is a bit different from the other tweaking tools in the sense that it basically helps you in doing common tasks faster in Windows 7 with the help of shortcuts. It allows you to store favorite folders and recall them instantly, create new folders and textfiles by pressing F8/F7, paste text or image from clipboard as file, show favorite folders in the explorer folder band bar like Web Browser favorite bars, show free space and selected file size in status bar, activate Aero Flip 3D by moving the mouse to the top left corner of the screen, change the desktop wallpaper by middle clicking on the desktop, cycle through windows by clicking on a task group button, and much, much more.

Desktop Enhancements

There's no denying that Windows 7 has some cool desktop features that everybody seems to love, like the various Aero features, enhanced start menu, and more. But it can always be better, right? Yes, there are a number of freebies that can add more power to the already present features and also for adding more features. Here are four apps that will certainly amp up your desktop experience in Windows 7.

VistaSwitcher - VistaSwitcher is an enhancement/replacement for the hoary, ancient, alt-tab program switcher. As well as providing a much more aesthetically pleasing task switching window, VistaSwitcher provides a lot more functionality--especially if you have many instances of the same application, such as multiple Word or Excel documents. VistaSwitcher shows you a larger preview window, making it easier to pick the document you like. VistaSwitcher adds a new feature, alt-` (that's the backtick, located just above the tab on most keyboards), which shows you just the windows associated with the current application. VistaSwitcher also allows for keyboardless application switching. You can set it to use the right mouse button and mouse wheel to switch--hold down the right mouse button and scroll through the app list with the wheel. For further customizability, you can make the task window 'sticky'--it won't go away when you release the summoning keys, but will wait for you to hit enter or otherwise confirm your selection.

Start Menu 7 - Do you want more options from the Windows Start menu? If so, install Start Menu 7 which replaces your start menu with a new one that gives you faster access to files, programs, and folders. It displays a large, semi-transparent flyaway menu sorted by category, and then within each category by subcategories. In this way, you can get to the program, document, or resource you want quickly. There's more as well, including fast access to power management, and the ability to resize the menu.

Aqua Snap - The awesome Aero features - Aero Snap, Aero Shake, and Aero Glass - can be further enhanced with this nifty utilty. How awesome is that? It allows you to even resize windows to quarter-screen sizes when you use the Aero Snap feature apart from maximizing or resizing it to half the screen. It also lets you cahnge the default behavior of Aero Shake of minimizing other windows when you shake a window to making that particular window always stay on top and the other windows transparent. It also makes windows transparent when you drag them around.

Applications Boosters

Windows 7 have some useful applications that comes with it but as is evident with all Windows product, there are always scope of improvement for most of the built-in applications. Here are five apps that can add more zing to taking screenshots, enhance the already superb Library tool, viewer for any kind of files, instant image resizing, and Windows 7 centric application launcher .

Win7 Library tool - This tool provides a centralized location for tweaking your Library settings. It lets you change the icons for various Libraries. You can even save a set of libraries for later restoration, like after you've done an OS reinstall or migrated to a new PC. A main drawback in Windows 7 Libraries is that it don't support network locations. That's a pretty huge hassle for anyone who has multiple PCs, as sometimes the files you want are sitting on another hard drive. Win7 Library Tool makes it easy to add network folders to your Libraries.

7APL - This is an application launcher with easy Windows 7 integration. You can launch single applications or group of applications with a single hot key or by using JumpLists and interactive thumbnails which are well-integrated into the application. You can create a group of application or profiles and access it by right-clicking on the icons on the taskbar and via the Jumplists.

Universal Viewer - The one thing that is still plaguing Windows 7 is that you can't open and view every kinds of file formats, you will need to install specific applications to view a particular file. If you don't want to avoid that hassles, install Universal Viewer which lets you view the contents of just about any file. This free utility lets you peek inside a variety of common file types (graphics, PDF, HTML, and many more) just by right-clicking and choosing the Universal Viewer command.

Image Resizer Powertoy Clone - Do you miss Windows XP's Image Resizer PowerToy? This free utility makes it easy to get the popular XP PowerToy as a Windows 7 program. First right-click one or more image files in Windows Explorer, and then select one of four sizes: small (640 by 480); medium (800 by 600); large (1024 by 768); or handheld PC (240 by 320). You can create your own custom sizes, too.

ZScreen - Not happy with Windows 7 built-in Snipping tool for taking screenshots and looking for an alternative that will utilize the power of Windows 7? Use ZScreen an advanced screen capturing tool with tons of features. On top of that, it comes with Windows 7 superbar integration. You can get quick access to a couple of tasks available in ZScreen by hovering over the ZScreen icon in the taskbar. It even comes with support for Windows 7 Jumplists.