Cut Costs with Free Business Software

In these tough times we all need as many tips as we can get to save a few dollars.

The cost of buying a new desktop or laptop box is just the start. The price can double when you have to add in the software costs of Microsoft Office (Outlook, Excel, Word and PowerPoint), antivirus, and image editing software such as Adobe Acrobat.

Below are only a few free software options that are available to be downloaded from the Internet.

Office Applications

One of the most expensive pieces of software you will buy is Microsoft Office. Google has a dulled-down online version called Google Docs (www.docs.google.com) that provides word processing and spreadsheet programs. The advantages of Google are that you can share your files with anyone with an Internet connection, your files are securely backed up and you can set up a Gmail email account.

OpenOffice (www.openoffice.org) is more of a comprehensive version of Microsoft Office. It includes word processor, spreadsheet, presentation and drawing software. OpenOffice doesn't have all the fancy features that a power user would require and requires a bit of set up.

An excellent free utility is SyncBack (www.2brightsparks.com/syncback). This offers many back-up features you require like scheduling automatic back-ups, specifying the files you want to back- up and only backing up changes you make since the last one you ran.

And if you want to create a PDF document then you can't go past www.primopdf.com.

Protection

Every computer should have antivirus software. The best-known free antivirus program is AVG (www.free.avg.com).

However, in my opinion you can't go past the paid version of NOD32. It is updated quicker to counter new viruses and offers a more comprehensive protection package. Since AVG's free version doesn't come with an antispyware feature you should also install MalwareBytes (www.malwarebytes.org). Spyware secretly collects and distributes information about you while adware displays advertisements...