Techreccs- My Tech Recommendations.
- Affinity Photo -Photoshop alternative.
- Affinity Designer – Publisher alternative .
- Affinity Publisher– Illustrator alternative.
- Better Desktop Tool-Virtual desktops easy to use but powerful enough
- Backblaze– Backup your pc, Just do it.
- Brave-for a little more privacy then Chrome.
- Capture One– Better than Lightroom in almost every way.
- Chocolatey-A package manager for windows.The greatest thing since sliced bread.
- Curtains by Stardock- Theme windows with Windows’s own built in engine.
- Ditto– Clipboard manager
- EMCO Unlock-It– Do you ever have a pesky file that wont delete(locked by the system)? This will take care of it.
- Everything-Search for anything on your pc instantly.
- Fast Raw Viewer – Check out my Ultimate Culling Workflow here
- Fakin the Funk – Check your music tracks actual audio quality.
- Fences by Stardock-a desktop organization utility (Stardock has a bunch of useful utilities this is personally my favorite)
- Groupy – Browser like tabs for all programs (file explorer is now usable).
- H2WTest-Check memory cards health.
- Icon pack-Lumicons.
- IDM-I never thought I needed one until I started using it.
- Iobit Uninstaller-Powerful uninstaller watch out for added programs it will try to install (Also I highly recommend staying away from Advanced System Care)
- IrfanView – The VLC of Image viewers. Grab the plugins and themes.
- Kdenlive – Great mid tier video editor.
- Laragon– local WordPress development-easier than wamp very similar resource usage
- Mailbird – Performance has improved so I have moved back to it for Windows. Has built in tracking and looks nice.
- Mailspring-super fast, cross-platform, opensource and pretty mail client Using for linux only now read above Mailbird.
- Minitool Partition Wizard -my partition tool of choice)
- Playnite – all your game libraries in one launcher.
- Powertoys – A bunch of useful utilities from Microsoft.
- Puran utilities– a bunch of awesome utilities in a tiny package
- Quicklook– Brings the quick-look feature from OSX to Windows, it’s awesome.
- ShareX-A screenshot utility-I doubted it until I tried it. A must-have.
- Simplewall– A firewall that lets you block based on service, not just entire apps. Awesome app, take control of your computer’s internet usage.
- Syncback-File syncing utility-I finally purchased the pro and the versioning is amazing.
- Superf4-Alt f4 that always works (by stopping the foreground process)(may interfere with certain games performance)
- Taskbar X -centers your taskbar buttons.
- Teracopy – replaces windows file copier-its much faster.
- WinAeroTweaker -Tweak Windows easily.
- WinAuth-Two factor verification on your pc.Great for non-smarphone users.
- WizTree- WinDirStat: just way faster. A disk space visualizer.
- Xmeters-beautiful system monitoring taskbar widget
- Youtube DLG-If you never heard of Youtube-DL, its the best Youtube downloader no contest. This is a gui for Youtube-DL on Windows.
- Actiondash-Digital wellbeing for all devices
- Adobe Scan-a scanner that is like Google Photoscan just automatic.
- AM-Prelease – A tracker blocker- not sure if root only. Try it, its the best. Here is the download, here is Telegram
- App Cloner- Much better than using something like island which activates the work profile and ends up running more services in the background
- Arktube-youtube-dl for android.The best YouTube down-loader finally on android.
- Battery Guru-A good alternative to BBS and Accubattery. Ignore the doze features IMO.
- Buzzkill – Notification Manager
- Caffeinate-Pretty much the same as any other platform keeps the screen on for a set period of time.
- Darkinator-Change wallpaper based on Dark/Light mode
- Darq-Force dark mode on incompatible apps
- Disk usage-like Windirsat for Android,(A easy to use disk usage viewer/visualizer)
- Drastic – The best Nintendo DS emulator
- Droidcam(X)-Use your phone as a webcam-It does it perfectly seamlessly and has a ton of features.
- Ex Kernel Manager -My favorite kernel manager ROOT USERS ONLY!
- Feedly-a beautiful RSS style reader
- Fluid-NG-navigation gestures for all
- Flux Weather – My current favorite weather app.
- Firefox Preview -Still good just sticking with via -My current favorite browser, the fastest I found on android. Now using nightly but both are amazing.
- Foxy Droid– F-droid client( FOSS software)
- Fx file explorer -my favorite file explorer
- GPS Status-when google maps compass goes crazy just use this apps compass calibration.It works much faster and more accurately then googles terrible compass calibration.
- Joey for Reddit– I kinda just grok this app and its fully-featured and customizable.Not as nice as infinity for Reddit listed in archives.
- Media Volume Only– Replacing rocker locker due to rocker lockers major hit on battery this app locks your volume keys to media volume through a more battery-friendly method
- Memoria Photo Gallery-Simple pretty and fast.
- Niagra Launcher– absolutely incredible I recommend pro.Full review coming soon.
- Owly for Twitter– The current replacement a mix of smoothness from Talon and pretty from Harpy.
- PocketCasts – Simple Powerful, Inexpensive.
- Poweramp-My music offline player of choice.
- Poweramp EQ– Finally a good non-root EQ – I highly recommend using the ADB command for enhanced player tracking- So good I stopped using Viper.
- Screenshot-Go– Sort and search screenshot text.
- Snapdrop -open source local network file sharing just use it.
- Snapseed-a awesome simple but powerful photo editor with raw support and great highlight recovery.
- Spark-My current favorite email client.
- Stremio-Stream Torrents with a legit play store app
- Textra-A super customizable text messenger the fastest I have used in terms of switching between conversations and searching
- Tick Tick – My to do list of choice has browser and windows apps as well.
- Timezone Quick- Settings -Put a second time zone in your quick-settings. No need for a giant widget.
- Via browser– Best chromium browser.Also did i mention it has freaking find (ctrl-f) functionality.Chrome has become a bloated mess on android so use this.
- Youtube Vanced -Youtube with awesome extra features like dark mode force VP-9 video codec for better quality with less data ad-block and background playback
Root Only
- Ad-Away– use system-less mode via Magisk- turn off reboot after every update
- Ex Kernel Manager-My favorite kernel manager (non-Franco kernels)
- NL-Sound – Use with viper on Xiaomi Phones for an incredible audio quality boost.
- SD Maid-per the title
- Swift Backup-Backup your apps on a schedule-Like titanium backup just a nice intuitive UI and SAPK support.
- TeMeFi-Disable apps (youtube-vanced) from being updated via the play store as well as many other tools.
- Trimmer-Run trim on your phones memory.
- Alternative To -Find alternatives to any piece of software.
- Bobble Tech-a cool small tech blog- has a techreccs as well as the ultimate Thinkpad buyers guide.
- Camera Memory Speed -A site dedicated to testing memory cards.
- Colorise-an AI to color your black and white Images.
- Decent Security-Computer security explained well for everyone
- Fiverr– get random stuff done for a few bucks.
- Kill the Newsletter – Convert a email newsletter to RSS.
- Lightroom Dashboard – A cool way to see stats about your Lightroom library.
- LMGTFY the site for all those people who find it more convenient to bother you with their question, rather than google it for themselves. Another one is Just Fucking Google It.
- Old Versions Of – As it sounds-old versions of different software.
- Snapdrop – Local network file sharing.
- Soundizz– convert any playlist to your music service of choice. Or move all your music to another service quickly.
- spa.mnesty.com – Meet the bot that stops scammers by wasting their time.
- Specs Dictionary– A dictionary of all the most pertinent GPU / video card terminology
- Switching.Software As it sounds. Some gems that alternative to doesn’t have.
- Tweakhound-The ultimate windows tweak site. No crap.
- UUPDump- Create the latest Windows 11 ISO’s
- Bitwarden – Replaces Lastpass, fully open source with multiple device support.
- Captcha Buster-Bypass captchas.
- Fika-An amazing reader mode with anchor links to paragraphs
- Grammarly-Spell check on steroids
- Honey– Automatically finds the best coupons.
- I dont care about cookies-As the name Implies.
- Momentum-I love this homepage replacement stunning images and lots of integrations.
- Session Buddy -A beautiful lightweight session manager
- UblockOrigin-A lightweight customizable ad blocker (not Ublock.org)
- Url-Render -A web browsing game changer.Preview web pages from results of your favorite search engine
- All In One Wp Migration – I use this with the Google Drive Plugin to move from Local or Laragon to live sites.
- AntiSpam Bee – Lighter and seems to have the same or better hitrate than Akismet.
- Blog2Social– Send your posts straight to social media.
- LuckyWP Table of Contents -Automatic Table of contents.
- Rank Math SEO -Free Version is more full featured than Yoast.
- Updraft Plus – Easy Backups ( just make sure to use a subfolder.)
- Veerotech+Litespeed Cache – Server level caching from my host of choice.
- Wordfence – Security
- Accidental Tech Podcast -My current favorite tech podcast news, listener input, and some good old-fashioned banter.
- Darknet Diaries-“True stories from the dark side of the Internet.” Love this so much.
- Hackable– big company podcast usually suck McAfee’s software sucks. But for some reason, this podcast is just pure awesome. Currently my favorite podcast.
- Reset-A weekly podcast that covers a lot of different things but mostly home networking, storage, and automation.
- SGGQA Podcast -The Some gadget guy podcast.
- Tech Vets -Carey Holzman and Mike Smith go through the week’s news and hardcore in the field info.
- The Mike Tech Show -Mike Smith goes through topics that happened in his It work of that week. Super useful real-world info.
- Twit network-Leo Laporte and crew. The president of the internet and pioneer in podcast/videocasts.
- What The Tech -Paul Thurrot is in this (cohost Andrew Zarian ) nuff said. Make sure you follow Paul on twitter @Thurrot.
- Advanced Sound Model 3 (Mobile edition) – Love these maybe even more then the KZ Es4. They are durable and sound great with a bit of a bass heavy Vshape. They eq really nicely though to a mid focused with sub bass boost.
- Amazon Kindle– I have a really old one that works great. Highly recommended since its a single purpose distraction-free device.Highly recommend you get one of these to go with it.
- Anker AUX Cable -this is in my opinion ankers best cable period. I have never felt such a good audio cable. Pliable thick no kinks super reinforced, just perfect.
- Anker powerline and Powerline+ I would recommend getting the + over the standard use they are a little more flexible/pliable
- I have these two Anker power banks they are both 10,000 Mah one is metal so more durable, one is plastic so it’s way lighter and smaller. Metal , Plastic
- And these “Wall Warts” (anyone have a better name, shoot me an email). Single , Double .
- Anker Soundcore Nano – I use this as a shower speaker and hang it from within the shower. Not officially waterproof but I have soaked it. Battery life on full blast metal and rock is only about 30 min, But listening to podcasts in an average size bedroom at 70 percent volume is room-filling and will last 3 hrs or so. This speaker’s audio quality is incredible for its size and gets louder than most speakers 3x its size. I can’t recommend it enough.
- Anker Soundcore Space-my review here
- Datacolor Spyder X – Color calibration quick and fast. Can use Displaycal for more options.
- Glorious extended mousepad-Got it as a present but can reccomend as a budget full legnth mouse pad.
- Huion H610 Pro V2 – A bit to big for me but a much improved software and a battery-less pen . Can highly recommend all Huion Products.
- Speakers I have the JBL Jembe which you can usually get for super inexpensive over here. They are good for MSRP but they are incredible for the price you can usually get them for($20-30).
- KZ ES4-Just wow, chi-fi at its best.Needs new tips and cables though.Review coming soon.
- Lenovo Thinkpad x230-Pop_OS! +SSD + extended-battery = bliss
- LG V20-Full review here – Currently my Dap- See Redmi Note 9 Pro
- Nad Viso HP-50 -relatively light closed back headphones, impressive isolation, warm and smooth yet still detailed.
- OONTZ angle 3- The best rated BT speaker on Amazon. And for one time the masses are correct.
- Philips SHP 9500 headphones – Lightweight super comfortable open-back incredible imaging flat frequency response but a lack of bass under 100 Hz(eq helps a bit) (review coming soon)
- Philips SHP 9600 – A refinement of the 9500’s love them as well.
- Popsocket– Don’t knock it till you try it. Put it slightly off-center to have two kickstand variations.
- Razer Viper Mini -Love this thing. Perfect size for my grip and hand size as well as a much improved sensor.Also dirt cheap.
- Spinfit Tips-If your IEM (earbud) doesn’t fit properly it won’t isolate or provide its best sound quality. After using foams for years i tried these and I don’t see myself going back.I have these ones for my Advanced sound model 3 and these for the 1 More Dual Driver ANC.
- TP-Link T9UH-an incredible Wi-Fi adapter highly recommended.
- Xiaomi Mi Band 3-still loving it As a backup with the app Notify and Fitness.
- Xiaomi Mi Band 6 – Blood oxygen monitor was why I got it. Love it, the Notify and Fitness app.
- Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 Pro– my current daily driver. Mod Guide here.
- Aeropress-A great method for making coffee, though I wish they made a bigger version.
- CoffeeGator French Press-A massive inexpensive super high-quality metal french press.
- Ed Charly Classic Wallet- A slim wallet with a coin pouch.
- Huion 680s tablet-An off-brand Wacom been awesome for 5+ years. Not sure what the closest replacement one is but people seem to love the brand in general.Cable Broke- Replaced with H610 V2
- Talon for Twitter– a super smooth material designed twitter client with constant updates.Replaced By Harpy.
- EZ-Gallery-from the devs of fstop photo gallery this.Replaced by Memoria Gallery
- Energy Bar-a battery bar that’s always on top of the screen super-useful.Kills battery life.
- Steelseries QCK Mousepad-Moved back to a full size glorious pad nothing wrong with this one though.
- Razer Taipan Been replaced and i didnt realize how bad it was sensor wise lol .
- Spotifeed-Convert spotify podcasts to a standard RSS feed. In other words get the Joe Rogan Show withought using Spotify. Spotify broke it on the backend.
- Slimfold Micro-Tyvek Wallet-My current wallet of choice. Super thin so i can fit all the other gadgets in my pocket. Replaced By Ed Charly Wallet with coin poutch.
- NoMacs Image Viewer- The best image viewer for windows.Replaced by IrfanView
- Dingless-No longer needed on current rom -keeps notifications sound off as long as your screen is on. (seems to be broken on Android 8+ use MacroDroid instead)
- Lenovo ThinkPad W530-full review coming soon. (i7-3740qm, 24gb ram, crucial 525gb SATA SSD, 750 GB HDD, Quadro k2000m,Egpu being worked on)-No longer have it but still recommended.
- Lux Auto Brightness-No longer needed on new phone/rom -auto brightness that’s customizable i can’t live without it-non root only
- Local by Flywheel -Wamp just easy to use(Laragon is more resource efficient and basically as easy to use.
- Microsoft Outlook– I never thought I would say this.The best looking and functioning email client in my opinion. On a separate note Microsofts Android apps recently have been best in class.
- Infinity for Reddit – as I get into Reddit more it’s not fully functional yet in a lot of areas will probably switch back in the future.
- OH Browser–Waiting for Lastpass integration and first tab open to foreground tab open tab.(OH Browser (one-handed)-I cant tell you how much I love this browser. One-handed,gestures,fluid UI,frequent updates,overview mode.Just get it. )
- MixPlorer-currently using fx
- MacroDroid– to much battery drain
- Shadow Weather-Using built-in Niagra weather no use for it anymore -too some time but finally landed on a weather app that I love all aspects of. Stunning design enough info but not too much. And great weather sources.
- Wox (needs Everything plugin)-A finder like search tool for Windows-Listary has replaced both Wox and everything
- Still recommended just at my parent’s house and not currently in use. The Velocifire keyboard I use in my desktop setup It’s a well built inexpensive mechanical keyboard backlighting is nice, the overall tactile response is very good worth the 10-15 bucks more than a stock keyboard.
- Noozxoide Wired Pro-a really solid non-root eq- Wavelet is also nice.-Poweramp Eq just ate it
- Viper4Android-non LG quad Dac phone equalizer – See Poweramp Eq
- Plenary-My new rss reader of choice to get rid of Feedly. Still testing. Doesn’t do what I need it to.
LastPass-My password manager of choice (Mobile and Desktop apps also Available) Lastpass changed their free tier to only one device. Moved to Bitwarden which is open source.
- James-DSP -LG quad Dac phone equalizer -Replaced by non root Poweramp EQ
- Listary– Search and launcher in one.Replaces Wox and Everything but has in folder search functionality.-Went back to everything ui was to annoying
- Irfanveiw-A great fast free image viewer.Grab the extensions for tiff while you’re at it.-Has been replace by NoMacs
- Waterfox – A Firefox fork- I’m trying to de-Google a bit and i like it so far. -Moved to brave for chrome hotkeys.
- Daywise-a notification manager. Using Buzzkill
- IME-My telegram client of choice. Built in translation and pretty. Origins are to sketchy
- Migrate – Move your apps between Roms: USE SWIFT BACKUP
- Airfrex Bt Adapter– A rebrand of the Maceton M4u (without Aptx unfortunately). My favorite sub $50 adapter. .Sound quality is just meh once compared to APTX-HD devices.
- Harpy for Twitter. The prettiest app i have found on android period- laggy scrolling moved to owly
I recommend: Directory Report. It looks just like the MS-Explorer but always shows the folder size. This lets you drill down to directories which are using all your space
I tried it even though you are affiliated with it. The program said the trial expired. Also, any app that tries replacing explorer just breaks things. I will continue recommending Wiztree.