Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger :: Part 1

No matter how powerful your computer may be, its performance is bound to suffer when it is cluttered with non-efficient applications that drain its resources. It will start freezing, loading slowly and crashing. My suggestion is to replace these applications with more efficient alternatives. And you do not have to sacrifice performance or utility, the following two replacement applications I am suggesting provide the same features while demanding substantially less resources. To make the deal sweeter, these are totally freeware applications, so you do not have to feel guilty about using cracked software.

• Adobe Reader is the dominant application used for reading PDF documents; it is also one of the most resource hungry ones. I suggest you replace it with Foxit Reader instead. Foxit Reader is incredibly small (only 2.1 MB download size) and absolutely fast and feature-rich. I read PDF documents regularly because of my research, and I attest that I do not miss a thing about Adobe. You can download the Foxit Reader here.

• Photoshop is an incredible application, but it requires considerable horsepower. Paint.Net offers a powerful lightweight alternative. Unless you require really complex processing, if you perform basic/intermediate image editing and processing, then this is for you. You can download the latest version of Paint.Net here (it is only 1.6MB!!!). It ranked #19 on PC World Top 100 products of 2007. Paint.Net requires the installation of .Net 2.0 Framework. You can get it here if it is not already installed on your system.

I hope you find this information useful, and that these applications help you improve the performance of your machine. Expect more 'Harder Better Faster Stronger' posts in the future.

--

Finally, I have to mention the amazing French band Daft Punk whose song Harder Better Faster Stronger is the inspiration of this post title. It is also the inspiration for the recent Billboard #1 hit song Stronger by Kanye West.

Watch the awesome video for the song taken from their incredible movie Interstella 5555 on their official YouTube channel.

Here is the song performed live (with bits of Around The World, and Television Rules The Nation), taken from my favorite 2007 album ALIVE.

Daft Punk - Alive - Harder Better, Faster, Stronger Live