Special's favorites (89)

AutoHotkey is a powerful automation and scripting tool with an option to export to a self-contained executable. Possible uses include assigning the hotkey "Ctrl-Alt-F" to launch Firefox, making abbreviations expand to their full definition as you type them, or saving time by setting the computer to auto-click a confirmation screen.

The program can create entire applications and has been used to create many hosted here on PortableFreeware including 7plus, WallPaper Randomizer, Gridy and many more.

Note: Though it's bit outdated (from 2021), Pulover's Macro Creator can be used as a macro recorder and includes an "Export to AHK" function.

AppReadWriteCounter analyzes disk read/write operations of every application running on your system. The program displays the current file and number of bytes, operations, and speed. Details about the application are also available, including product name, version, etc. making the file read/write operations.

Useful for testing, benchmarks, and seeing which programs use your disk most often.

Process Explorer is an advanced task manager. It is an indispensable tool for both beginners and power users. I use it all the time to kill tasks that refuse to be killed, or find what which processes are still holding on to a particular file or DLL so it refuses to be deleted.

Alternatively, Process Explorer Portable is also available, which is stealth.

7-Zip is an archive manager that can view and create a wide variety of formats. The program includes folder favorites, optional two-pane view, checksum calculator, file split/combine capability and more. Individual archives can be created with high speed or high compression settings, update options (including update, add/replace, synchronize), split volumes and more. Archives can be secured with standard zip or more secure AES encryption.

Although the official archiver for the open, high-compression "7z" format, the program also supports the creation of multiple formats including ZIP, XZ, BZIP2, GZIP, TAR and WIM. It will extract a long list of other formats, among them RAR, CAB, ISO, ARJ, RPM, VHD, VMDK etc. Even more formats are supported through third-party plugins. Supports many world languages.

Additionally, to use alternative toolbar and file icons, 7-Zip Theme Manager is available.

7-Zip Portable is a wrapper from PortableApps.com, auto-detecting 32 or 64-bit automatically. Alternatively, X-7zip is also available.

There is also a 7-Zip standalone console version.