Essential Freeware

I have been doing an audit to see what free software I use on my computer. I was staggered at how vast the list is. All the following are programs I use regularly, in many cases could not do without. Often there is no commercial equivalent or the paid-for version costs way too much. In every case, these programs do an excellent job and come well within the "essential" category. Some of them just run in the background, like Java and Taskbar Shuffle, but are great add-ons nonetheless (in fact, much of what we now consider normal on the internet would be impossible without Java).
Security: Microsoft Security Essentials,
Threatfire, WinPatrol, Ad-Aware, CCleaner, Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware, Spybot.
System helps: Glary Undelete, PasswordFox, 7-Zip File Manager,Moffsoft Free Calc, Copernic Desktop Search, Taskbar Shuffle, TweakUI, Java.
Browser: Firefox. Firefox extensions/add-ons: Xmarks, Table2Clipboard, Firebug, FireFTP, DownloadHelper, Adblock Plus.
RSS feeds: RSS Bandit.
Word processing: Editpad lite, OpenOffice.org, Simple OCR.
PDF: Foxit Reader, Koolwire.com
Media players: GOM player, Media Jukebox, VLC Media Player.
Image editing: Irfanview, Pos Panorama Pro, MW Snap,
Photoscape, SmillaEnlarger.
Video: Free Video Converter, Photo Story 3, MovieMaker.
Audio: Audacity, free-midi-converter.com, Goldwave, mp3 workshop, Free Mp3 Wma Converter, CDex.
Design: Scribus, Fontview, PDF Fill – Writer and Tools.
Photo management: XnView.

Entertainment: Google Earth.