Spring / Winter-Cleaning

I'm a minimalist sort of guy. At least, I am when it comes to my PC's.

I like the challenge of pushing them harder than they're supposed to go, and of stripping systems back so that they perform better than they normally would.

The new laptop has got me thinking about which applications I reallly need, and which ones I don't.
I hate clogging up my machines with unused stuff. That's what blank DVDs were invented for. I must have hundreds of the things scattered around my house, With everythign from Films I've never watched to Applications I've never used, and Porn I've never.... Well, you get the idea.

So, knowing that I'm going to wipe every hard drive I own very soon, I've been compiling all the apps and utilities that I'll be installing on to each system.
This will be for my daily-use Laptop, my server ex-laptop, and the Old Desktop PC that's being donated to family. Here's what I've come up with;

On all of them:

Windows 7 (Obvious really, I love the new OS)
Open Office (Does everything you need from an Office Suite, and it's free)
K-Lite Codecs (If you don't know what these are, you probably don't do much with videos)
Advanced System Care 3 (This is a system maintenance app. It's freeware, but it's great. Beats most paid-for ones hands down
ClamWin (It's an AntiVirus, and it works, and it doesn't eat half your system)
Firefox (Duh!)
Skype (I don't use it often, but I do need it, so does my son, and so will the sister-in-law)
7Zip (WinZip alternative, handles more file formats)
uTorrent (My .torrent handler of choice)
Infra Recorder (Freeware, but excellent, CD/ DVD Burning software)

That should just about cover everything the 3 systems need to run. But there'll be a few additions to my daily-use laptop too:

Adobe Premiere Pro (It's not the latest version, but I like it, and use it a few times a year at least)
Daemon Tools (Too complicated to explain, if you don;t knwo what this is already)
SpyBot S&D (ASC3 has one built in, but I've always liked SpyBot, in it's passive mode)
GameBooster (Another freeware app, from the team behind ASC3, does exactly what it says on the tin)
World of Warcraft (Not an App, but definitely essential)
Ventrillo (For the singing)

The list looks quite long overall, but it's not really. And most of the apps are either passive, or have a tiny footprint.
Hopefully I'll soon be experiencing the Ulduar raids with graphics that update faster than the GCD.