Even if I try to dabble the least possible in Windows, we all need to use it one day or another, be it for gaming, security training or to troubleshoot a friend. As such, I’m keeping records here of good software and tips for an easy experience with Bill’s Monster.

Troubleshooting, cleaning and security

• Malwarebytes : System scan and malware detection.
• ESET Antivirus : Usually, a combination of Windows Defender and common sense is way enough to protect your machine. If you’re willing to shell out money for peace of mind though, it’s one of the best around.
• Glasswire : Free firewall and bandwidth monitoring tool.
• Sysinternals : Portable system information and diagnostic tool.
• Adwcleaner : Fast and portable junkware removal tool.
• Bleachbit : Clean system and free disk space.

Current setup

Here’s what I usually go with for a fresh install :

• OpenShell : Replace the new hideous start menu with a Windows-7-like one (more customizations possibles) + some utils for file explorer.
• 7zip for zips and archives
• VLC Media Player for video
• FastStone Image viewer for image browsing and manipulation
• Shotcut for video editing
• Visual Studio Code as an IDE
• VirtualBox for managing virtual machines
• Screen2Gif and OBS Studio for screen recording
• Firefox developer edition as browser
• PuTTY for SSH
• Git Bash for Git
• TeamViewer for remote access

WSL is usually disabled because of Hyper-V conflicts with VirtualBox (as per this issue) but it’s also a really cool tool.