Completely FREE Software - CFS Weekly Newsletter #478 issued June 20, 2008

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This electronic newsletter is registered – ISSN 1441-6840
Welcome to the CFS Weekly Newsletter.
The programs listed here are completely free for non-commercial use, even though some may be shareware or commercial products. None are time-limited and all are fully functional. If you know any that aren't exactly as specified, please let us know and they will be removed immediately.
If the link below does not work (does not take you directly to the program listing) it is probably because the site has been upgraded and the link is no longer valid. Please use the CFS Site Search facility (above) to locate the program.
COMPLETELY FREE SOFTWARE

Warning Forever v1.07 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
Warning Forever is a time-based vertically scrolling space shooter with one Boss per level which must be picked apart, piece by piece. It features excellent vector graphics, good sound effects, highly configurable, awesome gameplay & highly addictive, Japanese or English interface, and more. This is one of those games that actually achieves what it sets out to do – be lots of fun to play, be challenging enough to bring you back for more and more, and has great graphics. In this game you only get one enemy, a Boss, per level, but you must destroy that Boss piece by piece. Every new level gets a more complex, and harder to kill, Boss, with lots of firepower to thwart your attempts at destroying it – and you only have a limited amount of time in which to carry this out (default is 180 seconds). Controls are typically Japanese – the Z, X and D keys cover most of the firepower, with the arrow keys for movement, and the P key to pause the game. Fortunately, there is an English README file with the game so you know what everything does. We loved Warning Forever. While we couldn't say that any one aspect of the game was particularly outstanding, the whole package was so enjoyable that you really do want to go back for more, and more, and more... If we had any complaints about this game it was in the install – a small dialog box opens and you specify the address where you want the game, but when you OK the location there is no indication that anything has happened. In fact, it has created that folder and placed the files in it. There are no desktop icons, or even a listing in the Start/Programs folder, so you must use Explorer to open the file at the nominated location (the default is C:\wf). The author's site is in Japanese but the red "Download Now!" button is unmistakable. Grab a copy of Warning Forever now! Access this 717kB download from: Win95 General Games

SecurAble v1.0.2570.1 – WinXP/Vista
SecurAble is a small tool that determines the presence, absence and operational status of 3 processor features. These are 64-bit instruction extensions, hardware support for detecting & preventing the execution of code in program data areas (DEP), and hardware support for system resource "virtualization". This is a nifty little tool that tells you things about your CPU's security features that you possibly didn't know. Open the tiny program and you are faced with a screen indicating the state of three items being tested – if they are supported or not supported is indicated, as is their operational status. The first two items checked have some relevance, but the third item is something that may be added to operating systems in the future. Clicking on the results displayed in the program's window brings up a help page to tell you more about the function. The second of the tested items, Hardware DEP, is an important part of modern processors and the program's author says: "When hardware DEP support is teamed up with a properly configured operating system (and that part is crucial), computer security mistakes involving the deliberate overrunning of communications buffers can be automatically detected and prevented throughout the entire computer system. This makes data execution prevention, when available and active, the single most promising improvement for PC security ever." SecurAble is a great way of finding out about the security of your CPU. We liked. Note: we have been advised that this program is not suitable for Windows 95, 98 or ME. Access this 115kB download from: WinXP Desktop Utilities

Any Video Converter v2.6.0 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
Any Video Converter (Free Edition) is an all-in-one video converter that effortlessly converts video files between most formats while retaining the highest quality. It supports AVI, MOV, Customized WMV, DVD NTSC, DVD PAL, MPEG-I, MPEG-II, MPEG-4 (Customized & Mobile), Flash FLV video (YouTube, Google, etc), WAV audio, and more. This is an amazing video conversion tool that supports all the popular video formats. It can even handle batch conversions! There is little to say about this fabulous tool because it does what it does so well. One MOV file of 28 minutes took quite some time to convert, though other formats were much faster. Alas, this program is nagware and every time you use it you get asked if you want to update to the Professional version – annoying but the result is worth the nag. If you need to convert video formats then you need Any Video Converter. We loved! Access this 13.8MB download from: Win95 Multimedia Programs

Notepad3 v1.0 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
Notepad3 is a small, fast, Open Source text editor with syntax highlighting. It features unlimited filesize, unlimited undo/redo, recent open file history, supports syntax highlighting in over 20 programming types, find & replace, bookmarks, word wrap, line numbers, visual brace matching, minimizes to desktray (next to the clock), printing, and more. This is an excellent ASCII text editor that has been tweaked for programmers but is still a worthy Notepad replacement for non-programmers. It offers an excellent variety of options, including the ability to be able to minimize to the desktray so that it is available but not "in your face". One of the features of Notepad3 is its ability to open massive documents, very, very quickly. It opened our 10MB test file, with 470,000 lines of text, in less than 2 seconds. Unfortunately, Notepad3 does not include a spell checker or a tabbed interface, but these are the only areas which felt were deficient. Overall, this is a fabulous ASCII text editor that programmers should love. Grab a copy and see for yourself! Please note that this is not the only program listed with CFS that uses this name. Access this 715kB download from: Win95 Text Programs

Saper 3D v1.1.1 – Win98/ME/XP/Vista
Saper 3D is a 3D Minesweeper clone. It features variable sized minefields, good graphics (dynamic lights, transparency, explosions), handy interface (free camera movement, hiding parts of the gamefield), no install required, and more. This is an interesting version of the popular Minesweeper game where you must guess the locations of the mines on a grid. In this version you can change the size of the grid, and the number of mines. The timer starts once you click on the main field. The graphics are good, but the numbers weren't always clear as they rotate and move around over a cell. Saper 3D really needs to be played at fullscreen resolution because the information displayed is quite small. You can move the center grid around with the mouse cursor as it sits on a transparent panel, though other elements on the screen can block it. While Saper 3D is a good game, with a little work it could become a great game. We look forward to seeing version 2... Note: we have been advised that this program is not suitable for Windows 95. Access this 303kB download from: Win98 General Games

Virtual ImagePrinter v1.4.1 – WinXP/Vista
Virtual ImagePrinter is a printer driver that creates an image of any document which can be printed. It supports the most popular image formats (PDF, BMP, PNG, JPG & TIF), optionally saves a large document to a single image (normally broken into smaller images), you can vary the quality of JPG & PDF images, you can select the compression format in TIF, and more. This is a fabulous add-on to the printer section of your computer. Simply select the Virtual ImagePrinter driver from the list of printers in your computer, ensure that the settings are to your liking (location where you want the image saved, the type of image, etc), and then when you "print" the document it will create an image of it for you. Not only does it support the four most popular bitmapped image formats, it supports the popular Adobe Acrobat PDF format too. This means you can share a document as an image, or as a PDF file. We were a little disappointed that you could not specify the final image size, and the test images we made were quite often huge (many times larger than the original). We loved Virtual ImagePrinter and are happy to continue using it on the CFS test computer. Note: we have been advised that this program is not suitable for Windows 95, 98 or ME. Access this 882kB download from: WinXP Graphic Programs

ImgBurn v2.4.1.0 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
ImgBurn is a lightweight CD/DVD/HD DVD/Blu-ray burning application. It supports a wide range of image file formats (BIN, DI, DVD, GI, IMG, ISO, MDS, NRG, PDI, etc), supports audio CD creation (accepts APE, FLAC, OGG, MP3, WAV, WMA, etc file formats), is highly configurable, and more. This is an excellent CD/DVD burning program that is capable of doing so much – if you know how to drive it. The Settings dialog box offers an enormous number of configuration options but most should not be touched unless you know exactly what you are doing. While it can create audio CDs, the process is somewhat convoluted and could be much more streamlined. However, the power at your fingertips is immense and there is little that ImgBurn cannot do if you know what you're doing. There are plenty of on-line manuals, FAQ sheets and forums to steer you in the right direction but it lacks the simplicity of a unified interface found in most of the commercial programs. ImgBurn is the ultimate geeks tool and we are sure that there would be some bragging at computer club meetings from people who have found some esoteric function. Probably more for advanced PC users, ImgBurn is an excellent burning tool that just keeps on getting better and better. We liked! Access this 1.84MB download from: Win95 General Programs

Error Messages for Windows v2.9 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
Error Messages for Windows is a small utility that will allows the user to look up Windows' error code numbers and displays a descriptive message explaining what the numeric code actually means. It also provides a facility to display and print all of the error codes and messages defined for the user's version of Windows. Error Messages for Windows is a simple little tool that provides what might be some very important information if you constantly get confronted with an error message with a specific program. Knowing what the error means can help solve the conflict and get the computer running correctly again. We never could work out why Microsoft opted for error codes instead of a more descriptive error message – like those displayed in Error Messages for Windows. One of the features of this program is the uncomplicated, yet appealing, GUI (graphical user interface). A "must have" tool for anyone working with Windows. Access this 150kB download from: Win95 Windows Enhancements

Smart Cars v2.1 – Win9x/ME/XP/Vista
Smart Cars is a top-down 2D arcade-style car racing game where you try to be the first to get to the finish. It features a choice of 6 cars, 4 powerups to collect (gun, rocket projector, nitro & an extra life), lots of obstacles to avoid, HUD, time-based gameplay, and more. This is yet another top-down, 2D car racing game – it isn't the best we've seen and it isn't the worst. The initial graphics are excellent – the opening screen and the car selection screen – but the graphics of the actual game are "average" and lack the finesse or polish of the better games. However, the gameplay is quite good as you use your arrow keys to manoeuvre your vehicle (up arrow for acceleration, left and right for steering, etc) and try and keep on the road while avoiding the myriad of obstacles that try to distract you and slow you down. Speed is everything in this game. There are lots of powerups to collect along the way and these should be sought whenever possible (sometimes they are on the other side of the road). For all its hokey, 2D, top-down graphics, Smart Cars is still worthwhile grabbing if you are a rev head and love cars. Try it for yourself. Access this 3.28MB download from: Win95 General Games
UPDATE
FotoTagger – a tool that adds tags and captions to JPG images – has been updated to version 2.11 with a new download size of 2.74MB. The author advises that changes in this version includes being able to organize images into user-defined albums. The author says that "advanced users will find nested albums feature really helpful". Grab this latest update from: WinXP Graphic Programs
COMMENTS
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