Eight essential netbook utilities you never knew you needed

They might be small and are often cheaper, but netbooks are no less capable than much larger laptops when it comes to running Windows applications. That’s not to say you should just install them, of course – 10in screens (at best) and often limited storage space mean that the Asus Eee PC, Samsung NC10 and other such netbooks are best treated a little differently to their bigger brethren.

Some applications are obviously essential and most people install a web browser, word processor, anti-virus utility and instant messaging client as a matter of course. But if you’re going to be squinting at a 1024 x 600 screen and prodding away at a Shrinky Dink touchpad, there are a handful of other utilities that will make life an awful lot easier – and we bet you haven’t heard of most of them.

The eight applications and utilities listed below are (almost) all designed to help you make the best of a netbook’s comparatively limited specifications. Some replace bloated big-name programs that gobble up disk space and hog the processor; others make the most of a netbook’s shrunken screen. All, however, are completely free and once you’ve installed on your netbook, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without them.

1. Startup Inspector for Windows

Unfortunately, netbooks aren’t exempt from the megabytes of useless crap that most manufacturers like to pre-install just to annoy new owners. Getting rid of it is usually simple and will transform a sluggish, memory-starved netbook into a lean, mean processing machine.

But what to remove? Cryptic names and esoteric functions can make messing with Add/Remove Programs and MSConfig a risky business, and you could end up uninstalling something that’s essential for a netbook’s smooth operation. Which is where Startup Inspector for Windows comes in.

Not only does this free utility let you browse and selectively disable every program that automatically starts with Windows, it will even look them up in its online database and explain their purpose. So, if you can’t tell your CTFMON.EXE from your PHIME2002A, you need Startup Inspector for Windows installed on your netbook.

2. Launchy

Even if you’re obsessive about keeping your Start menu organised, trying to launch a program by clicking though a series of nested folders using a tiny touchpad is no fun. The solution is to forget the touchpad altogether and switch to keyboard control and for that you need Launchy.

Essentially a Windows version of the excellent Mac OS QuickSilver application, Launchy lets you start any installed program simply by hitting a keyboard shortcut (Alt + Space works well) and typing the first few letters of its name. Launchy can also open web browser bookmarks, search Google and act as a calculator – all without lifting your fingers off the keyboard.

3. Firefox (netbook-optimised)

Yes, yes, we know Firefox is hardly an undiscovered gem, but if all you’ve done is install it and your usual extensions on your netbook, you’re missing a trick. Few web pages are designed with 1024 x 600 screens in mind, which means web browsing on a netbook can be a frustrating experience. With a few tweaks here and a few extensions there though, it’s possible to streamline Firefox’s interface so that it exploits every inch of screen space without sacrificing your favourite features.

While far from complicated, the process is too lengthy to go into detail here, so instead we’ll just point you at our step-by-step guide that tells you everything you need to know. Just don’t forget to come back when you’ve read it – there are still five more essential netbook utilities to go.

4. Foxit Reader

Adobe Reader has long been a bloated monstrosity that occupies inexplicably vast amounts of hard disk space and takes forever to open, but if you need to open PDF files, what’s the alternative? Well, the good news is that there is one – Foxit Reader.

The latest free version of Foxit Reader is just a 3.7Mb download, opens PDF files in seconds and supports the same basic functions (plus a few more besides) as Adobe Reader 9 (a 33.5Mb download!). Essential.

5. Real Alternative & QuickTime Alternative

Unless you listen to BBC Radio online or watch a lot of movie trailers, you can probably do without these two multimedia alternatives – but miss out on the net’s entertainment options just because you’re using a netbook?

Both Real Alternative and QuickTime Alternative are, obviously, replacements for RealPlayer and Apple QuickTime. Why use them? Well, Real Alternative lets you play RealAudio and RealVideo streams, but dispenses with the glut of unwanted extras that the Real thing insists on infecting your system with. Oh and it installs in a couple of seconds and doesn’t strong-arm you into supplying personal information before you can use it, either.

Apple QuickTime is less insidious (as long as you opt out of Apple Update), but it’s still a bit of a bloater and QuickTime Alternative is a much leaner affair. It plays downloaded .mov files perfectly, but can be a bit hit and miss with QuickTime movies embedded in web pages (and Internet Explorer will keep pestering you install QuickTime, but you don’t use that browser, right..?). We get the most success with 480p HD videos on the Apple Movie Trailers site, incidentally.

6. Media Player Classic

Both Real Alternative and QuickTime Alternative come with the open source Media Player Classic as part of their installation bundle, but if you use your netbook for watching video or listening to audio files, it’s worth grabbing even if you don’t install either of those multimedia utilities.

As you can probably guess, Media Player Classic is a media player from the good old days – when applications just did what they were supposed to and were free from countless extra megabytes of useless extra features and ridiculously overblown interfaces. But while it may look just like something from Windows 95, Media Player Classic still stands toe to toe with today’s multimedia monsters, which makes it perfect for netbook use.

7. Xplorer2 Lite

Strictly speaking, Xplorer2 Lite should be on the must-install list for any computer, but it works particularly well on the small screen of a netbook. It’s essentially an update of Windows File Manager, if anyone remembers that relic from Windows 3.1, but that makes it no less indispensable.

Xplorer2 Lite’s multi-tabbed, dual-pane interface manages to provide a comprehensively effective way of working with files without being unnecessarily complicated, and its extensive range of keyboard shortcuts make it quick to use once you’ve learned the ones you need the most.

8. VirtuaWin

Working with more than one window on a small netbook screen is a chore even if you haven’t set the Windows Taskbar to auto-hide, but a virtual Desktop manager makes things an awful lot easier.

Alt+Tab works well enough, but it’s easy to lose track of what each window is for, particularly if you have several windows open for one application. VirtuaWin, on the other hand, lets you separate your windows onto different virtual Desktops, all accessible with a keyboard shortcut. So, could create one Desktop for your word processor, another for your web browser, another – well, you get the idea.

The trick is that the layout of each Desktop, tiles windows and all, is preserved when you switch back and forth, so you can create bespoke Desktop layouts for every task. It’s the next best thing to using multiple monitors – something that anyone using a 1024 x 600 display should appreciate.

So, there you have it – our eight essential netbook applications. Here's a recap:

1. Startup Inspector for Windows
2. Launchy
3. Firefox (netbook optimised version)
4. Foxit Reader
5. Real Alternative & QuickTime Alternative
6. Media Player Classic
7. Xplorer2 Lite
8. VirtualWin

Have we missed any out, or do you know of better alternatives than the ones we suggested? Let us know in the comments.