What's the best shareware (not freeware)?

July 1, 2009 12:52 PM

I'm interested in a random sampling of opinions regarding software. What titles do you swear by shareware over freeware alternatives?

I don't want this to be a debate about freeware or open-source vs. commercial or shareware. I'm just curious what titles people think it's worth their $5 to $50 to pay for an app vs trying to use a freeware version of the same.

Here's what I pay for (among others):

Reqall Pro
Ultramon
WifiHopper

Considering:

Evernote Premium


Extra credit for smaller software developers( I don't want 100 people telling me Photoshop is better than GIMP). No iphone apps please...they're so cheap as it is.

Why this post? There appears to be a zeal for always finding the freeware equivalent of a mega-commercial app [PS vs. GIMP]; the moderately priced download-only software seems to get left out.

posted by teg4rvn to Computers & Internet (18 answers total)

Just a reminder: open-source and freeware are not the same thing. For many of us, it is the openness and not the free-ness that's important, and it's so important that teams of software developers will do a great deal of work to implement an open work-alike of something that has important functionality. The lines also blur somewhat between "shareware" and OSS, because nothing is stopping me from, say, adding some super functionality to an OSS app and selling it to you in a nice box, so long as I release the source to it under the same license.
posted by Maximian at 12:59 PM on July 1, 2009

There are pieces of commercial software that I like, and there are pieces of open-source software that I like, but there is no piece of shareware that I find preferable to the commercial or GPL alternatives.
posted by box at 1:09 PM on July 1, 2009

Before Chatzilla and 7-Zip came along, I might've put MIRC and Winzip/Winrar in your category.
posted by box at 1:18 PM on July 1, 2009

I've been using TextPad as my go-to text editor for years, well worth the $20 or so.
posted by waxboy at 1:21 PM on July 1, 2009

I would be delighted to be proved wrong by a counterexample, but I have never found a decent, free WYSIWYG Java Swing designer. There are some which you can pay for (random example), but I've never actually shelled out for one.
posted by mjg123 at 1:34 PM on July 1, 2009

Oh, I did pay (iirc) $20 for PathAway GPS software for my Palm|TX. I thought it was excellent, but eventually upgraded to a Garmin.
posted by mjg123 at 1:38 PM on July 1, 2009

The primary app that pops into my head: MediaMonkey for managing my music library.
posted by crenquis at 1:51 PM on July 1, 2009

WS_FTP is nice because you can do scheduling with it as well as command line, which Filezilla doesnt have. I think they have student pricing. Normally its $50 or so.

I'll second TextPad, but Notepad++ is free and seems to be just as good, but if you are used to TP, its worth it to buy it.

Paying for VMWare is worth it, the free alternatives like VirtualBox really dont compare. Of course VMWare is now free for non-business use too.

7-zip has really killed any Winzip installs for me, but it has some proprietary stuff like create self-extracting .exes and scripting which is worth it for people who dont want to fuss with writing their own extactors/installers.

Also, its not Photoshop vs Gimp anymore, its Gimp vs Paint.NET on windows.

IBM Lotus Symphony beats Open Office, but I think thats free now too.

NOD32 and Kapersky beat AVG.

Acronis True Image beats DriveImageXML or using dd.

MalwareBytes beats Spybot or Windows Defender.
posted by damn dirty ape at 2:11 PM on July 1, 2009

Two pieces of such software on my computer: Trillian Astra and WinEdt (for LaTeX editing, so much better than the free TeXnic Center).
posted by Jacen Solo at 2:48 PM on July 1, 2009

dbPoweramp was worth the money for me after trying several different and headache-inducing CD rippers. The "secure ripper" feature saved several scratched to hell discs from my collection.
posted by Iosephus at 3:55 PM on July 1, 2009

I used to pay for Pocomail - which is a shareware email client for Windows, and maybe Mac too. That was before I discovered Ubuntu though.
posted by COD at 4:09 PM on July 1, 2009

I think it comes down to Family Tree Maker (for Genealogy, natch) and Basic4PPC (for personal Windows Mobile apps I knock together).
posted by blue_wardrobe at 5:14 PM on July 1, 2009

Maybe FTM doesn't qualify. Sorry.
posted by blue_wardrobe at 5:15 PM on July 1, 2009

I'm a real cheapskate, but Beyond Compare (file/folder sync) is cheap enough and great enough that I haven't bothered looking for free alternatives.
posted by paulash at 5:36 PM on July 1, 2009

microspell has the best damned interface for a spellchecker ever. It even works well on source code. The great thing is that it groups the same misspellings, so you can correct (or ignore) them all at once. I only wish there were a version for Linux. But you can try it on the web.
posted by orthogonality at 7:50 PM on July 1, 2009

Response by poster: Thought I'd add (to my own list) Mediamonkey, ConvertXDVD, and Qimage printing software
posted by teg4rvn at 8:49 AM on July 2, 2009

I use TextMate to program in. It's much better than the alternatives for the Mac. I think it is better than BBEdit as well, which is actually much more expensive.

Transmit for SFTP. I like it a lot.

I pay for Flickr Pro. I think it's the best online photo site.

I paid for Fever, which is a crazy feed reader you host on your own web space.
posted by chunking express at 11:34 AM on July 2, 2009

Beyond Compare, xplorer2, SecureCRT, MediaMonkey and iMatch are all well worth the license price—I use the first three every day. Oh yeah, and VideoRedo.
posted by Lazlo at 11:58 PM on July 2, 2009