this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2024
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Windows 11

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Welcome to the community for Windows 11, Microsoft's latest computer operating system.

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My Ulitimate Windows Utility List (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Winget (Better than Ninite)

Terminal application manager for windows. If you don't want to bother too much with the terminal

  1. Go to winstall.app and add as many apps as you want.
  2. Click generate script, select powershell, copy the code.
  3. Open powershell and copy paste.

I have my script saved on a notepad incase I have to reset windows or set up a new PC, turns something that takes hours into something that takes minutes.

Winstall App

Filelight (Better than WinDirStat)

It is open source (Made by KDE Devs), faster and better looking.

Filelight You can hover over each subsection to get more details

Flow Launcher (Better than windows search)

Open source, looks better, searches your apps, settings, control panel AND google instead of bing, gives better results and allows blacklisting and alot more.

Flowlauncher

KDE Connect (Better than Phone Link)

Well better for Non Samsung users. Gives you

  • Notifications
  • Air Drop
  • Clipboard Sync
  • Remote Shutdown/Any Command and more.

KDE Connect

ShareX (Better Than Clipping Tool)

Has more options, has the ability to only copy to clipboard and not save. Is what I'm using to write this right now.

ShareX

Playnite (Better than Steam/Gog Galaxy IMO)

  • open-source,
  • supports theming,
  • automatic metadata serach,
  • supports multiple stores,
  • has emulation support out of the box
  • and huge plugin library for extra functionality.

Playnite Switch, GBA, NES, PC, DS it is all here.

Mica For Everyone (Better Than Windows)

Adds Black/White Titlebars based on your theme choice or manual choice.

Edit: Using Mica used to cause artifacts it is fixed now.

Mica For Everyone

This is what KDE connect looks like without MFE :C

ModernFlyouts (Better Than Windows)

Better Volume/Key Notification. IT ALSO TELLS YOU IF YOUR NUM LOCK IS ON. Underrated.

Modern Flyouts

Will My PC Burn Keeping So Many Things in the Background?

I can't close Firefox or I'll lose my post sorry :(. Also ShareX for SS (Takes about 1%)

Disclaimer: I have 16 GB DDR4 Memory and I have only closed the utilities mentioned in this post.

On Everything On

Off Everything Off

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Can I offer an honorable mention for "Everything" by voidtools?

It indexes every file name on a drive for search and instantly updates as you type.

Can't live without it!

https://www.voidtools.com/downloads/

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Yep everything is amazing and it integrates with flow launcher using a plugin as well!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

One that you could add, unless there's something better

LocalSend was very smooth for file sharing cross platform

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

KDE Connect that I mentioned already has file sharing so I don't use LocalSend on my PC. But definitely great for when I need files from my iOS friends and my Android TV.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

Reposting my best stuff from Reddit here

[–] BrundleFly2077 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for this. I’d never heard of some of these and I’m gonna try them out today.

Legend.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Yeah I'd heard of KDE but had never looked into it. Now I have a Pixel and KDE is MASSIVELY superior to Windows connect or whatever it's called

Thanks OP

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago (4 children)

Thanks for sharing! Any opinion on WinGet vs Chocolatey or Scoop?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I have not used anything other than winget ... So I can't tell you about the differences but since winget is official and backed by Microsoft ... Most software should be there

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I've been recommending people try UniGetUI, which combines all three in a nice gui! It also notifies you if you need updates on any packages.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I had the same question. I've heard chocolatey recommended for the open source aspect but it won't matter if it doesn't work as well.

I only tried it recently, and it seemed to do ok

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Thanks for the list, found a couple I didn't know of that look helpful! Couple more suggestions:

  • WizTree is another good disk usage tool, as an alternative to Filelight. I think it's visually closer to windirstat, but so much faster I can't honestly remember.
  • EarTrumpet is a better volume control app for the systray. I hide the default sound icon and set this to always show.
  • ExplorerPatcher lets you revert some annoying Windows 11 behaviors, like disallowing vertical taskbars
[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

The thing I love about ShareX is that you can configure it to take a screen shot, upload it to your favorite image host, then copy the resulting URL to the clipboard with just a click or two.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

qView for viewing any type of images, supports animated and static Webp is lightweight and very fast

Notepad++ is a must (alternative to Notepad)

Everything by voidtols as a better, faster and more poweful alternative to Windows Files search, you search as you type.

MPC-HC by clsid2, continuation of MPC as alternative to Windows Media Player and VLC. it's still being updated and it currently supports Youtube Streaming as VLC still hasn't updated their Youtube script for a year.

K-Lite codecs.

Axiom FFmpeg GUI Interface for Windows

NanaZip, 7zip but with a Windows 11 Interface.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (2 children)

This list looks fantastic. It makes me wish I wasn't planning to switch to Linux in a few months.

I genuinely loved Windows and I'm really gonna miss it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Why switch out of curiosity? I switched myself to a user-friendly distro, but I find myself curious as to why others choose to!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (2 children)

Windows is just wayyyy too bloated now, and privacy is also an attractor.

I understand data collection is part of the present and foreseeable future, and I don't do a whole lot to avoid it, but it's getting to points of absurdity over here.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Windows is very bloated, like a corpse lost at sea for days. Also, the insecurity which is introduced by Windows Copilot doesn't help matters in my opinion. I honestly think that Microsoft is harvesting data rather than collecting it; Canonical, they actually collect just the bare minimum in terms of data, just enough to keep their Ubuntu distro rock solid! While you can do a little to prevent getting your data harvested on Windows, it's easier to dodge that shit on a Linux Distro. There are several distros custom designed for privacy, as nobody likes a snoop!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I'm just...not finding it very bloated at all; it's not too hard to find guides online about how to debloat during the installation

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I have been using fedora on kde since the past year ... I really do miss these tools but I have found great tools on linux too

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

For a launcher, also consider Powertoys Run, which I've found to be fantastic.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Powertoys is great too but flow launcher has an unbeatable plugin library with integrations for all the popular apps and other nifty tools. If you don't use plugins power toys is great.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

UnigetGUI gives you ... well, a GUI for winget (and other repos too if you want)

[–] UncleStewart 1 points 3 months ago

Flameshot for screenshots. Can also upload to Imgur. And it's opensource

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I love playnite so much, and it can run scripts before/after you launch games. I basically made my own cloud saves.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I am assuming you're using ludusavi? It is definitely the best way to backup your saves

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I didn't know this was a thing! I was manually adding the paths to an rclone script for each game 🙃

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Oof ... Definitely check out ludusavi, there's a plugin in playnite that allows you to auto backup a game everytime you exit it.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago

Arch, btw.