Approved by Jerry Cantu

Skill Level - Description

https://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/AMDSystemMonitor.aspx

AMD System Monitor, Processor (CPU), Graphic card (GPU) & Memory

A Processor (CPU), Graphic card (GPU) & Memory utilization tool that illustrates the different workloads of the CPU and GPU.

https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html

System Component Details

Gathers information on some of the main devices of your system.

http://m.majorgeeks.com/files/details/nero_infotool.html

Provides information about the most important features of installed drives, inserted discs, installed software, and much more.

http://www.igorware.com/64bit-checker

Windows version checker

Is a tool that will show you what version of Windows is installed on your computer, is it 64bit or 32bit version of Windows, and is your processor capable of running 64bit operating systems.

https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/app_compatibility_view.html

List of all programs that run with different compatibility settings.

Displays the list of all programs that run with different compatibility settings, stored in the Registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers keys. It also allows you to easily modify or delete the compatibility settings of multiple applications at once.

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/computer_activity_view.html

Current System Running Information

Collects information from various sources on a running system, and displays a log of actions made by the user and events occurred on this computer. The activity displayed by LastActivityView includes: Running .exe file, Opening open/save dialog-box, Opening file/folder from Explorer or other software, software installation, system shutdown/start, application or system crash, network connection/disconnection and more... You can easily export this information into csv/tab-delimited/xml/html file or copy it to the clipboard and then paste into Excel or other software.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/iometer/?source=typ_redirect

I/O performance Analysis Tool

Tool for performing IOs. NOTE: To RUN, Prior to initial start of Iometer, Set WFC Rules for "Outbounds and inbounds", whereas, four entries may need to edit Iometer within WFC Rules Panel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Input/output

GNU Free Software

Enter the name or type of file you are having problems opening, it will show you programs that can open it!

https://www.jam-software.com/heavyload/

PC Stress Tester, HDD Scanner

Stress Test Tool for Your PC

https://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/

https://sourceforge.net/speedtest/?source=sfnet_header

Internet Speed Test

http://systemexplorer.net/index.php

4/5 (SystemExplorer.log was found as large as 2GB, after exit was able to delete it))

Exploration and management of System Internals - Keep Your System Under Control

http://www.softsea.com/download/GPU-Temp.html

Graphics Card (GPU) Temperature Monitor

It will display all temperature data in the system tray, and real-time update, you can know the current graphics card temperature at a glance. It can also start with the Windows system.

Basic Use is Free

http://www.filebuzz.com/fileinfo/40401/Ariolic_Disk_Scanner.html

Checks hard drive for read errors, will show you the files with read errors, so you can try to restore them with file recovery software.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/gsmartcontrol/

Storage, Hardware

Hard disk drive and SSD health inspection tool

https://gsmartcontrol.sourceforge.io/home/index.php/Screenshots

https://gsmartcontrol.sourceforge.io/home/index.php

Open Source (Free)

https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/shman.html

Broken shortcuts (shortcuts that point to file that doesn't exist) are automatically painted with pink color. You select one or more shortcuts, and then delete them, resolve them or save the shortcut's details to HTML/Text/XML file.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/godmodetool/?source=directory

Windows Control Panel Plus ++++

One of the secrets of Windows 7 that is undocumented by Microsoft is the secret option known as God Mode. GodMode is simply a hidden control panel that contains everything about windows 7 configuration options and settings, all located in one place plus additional features that are not easily found in the ordinary Control Panel. This utility will either enable or disable this functionality. When enabled, it will create a shortcut to the God Mode window on a users desktop. When disabled, this shortcut will obviously be removed.

Open Source (Free)

https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?p=3

Diagnostics, Internal and External Drives

It will test WD internal and external drives. I see results also from other than WD drives.

https://www.techpowerup.com/download/techpowerup-real-temp/

Temperature Monitoring

Designed for all Intel single Core, dual Core and quad Core processors, not AMD processors.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/processhacker/

Security, Software Development, Systems Administration

Is a process viewer. This multi-purpose tool will assist you with debugging, malware detection and system monitoring. It includes powerful process termination, memory viewing/editing and other unique and specialized features

Open Source (Free)

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/aida32_personal_system_information.html

4/5 (Good for older systems)

System Component Details

On Win32 platforms. Learn more about your computer and its components.

http://www.bustrace.com/products/cd-dvd.htm

Utility - CD/DVD ROM Disk Drive

Details information about your CD/DVD device.

http://www.bustrace.com/downloads/free_utilities.php

http://www.bustrace.com/products/imapi.htm

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html

Personal PC Audit

Builds a detailed profile of your PC

https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/registry_changes_view.html

Allows you to take a snapshot of Windows Registry and later compare it with another Registry snapshots, with the current Registry or with Registry files stored in a shadow copy created by Windows. When comparing 2 Registry snapshots, you can see the exact changes made in the Registry between the 2 snapshots, and optionally export the Registry changes into a standard .reg file of RegEdit.

https://filehippo.com/download_process_explorer/

Task Manager, Tool

Ever wondered which program has a particular file or directory open? Now you can find out. Process Explorer shows you information about which handles and DLLs processes have opened or loaded. A lightweight and portable advanced process management utility that picks up where Task Manager leaves off.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer

http://www.hdtune.com/index.html

Hard disk / SSD utility

Has many functions. It can be used to measure the drive's performance, scan for errors, check the health status (S.M.A.R.T.), securely erase all data and much more

Basic Use is Free

http://mitec.cz/wfa.html

Forensic file analysis

Tool for forensic file analysis

http://mitec.cz/Data/XML/data_downloads.xml

http://mitec.cz/index.html

https://www.pci-z.com/

System Component Details, System Utility

A lightweight system utility designed to provide information about (unknown) PCI (PCI-E, PCI-X...) devices and helps you find appropriate device drivers. Is designed for detecting unknown hardware on your Windows based PC. It will help you determine vendor, device and certain details about device even if you don't have drivers installed.

https://www.grigsoft.com/download-windiff.htm

WinDiff can be found in Options Packs for most Windows versions. Still a lot of people are searching the internet, trying to get WinDiff without downloading huge Option Pack. Due to multiple requests, we have decided to make WinDiff available for download directly from our site.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinDiff

https://sourceforge.net/projects/dftt/

Filesystems, Security, Software Development

Creates test images for digital forensic acquisition and analysis tools. These images can be used by a tool developers and owners to test their software.

Open Source (Free)

http://hddscan.com/

HDD Scanner, Hard Drive Testing Tool

Useful for performing the regular "fitness test" for your drive and predicting its degradation

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/hddscan_for_windows.html

https://www.lifewire.com/hddscan-review-2624562

https://sourceforge.net/projects/droid/?source=directory

File format identification tool, Data Formats, Archiving, Digital preservation

Is an automatic file format identification tool. It is the first in a planned series of tools developed by The National Archives under the umbrella of its PRONOM technical registry service.

https://github.com/digital-preservation/droid

Open Source (Free)

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon

an advanced monitoring tool for Windows that shows real-time file system, Registry and process/thread activity. It combines the features of two legacy Sysinternals utilities, Filemon and Regmon, and adds an extensive list of enhancements including rich and non-destructive filtering, comprehensive event properties such session IDs and user names, reliable process information, full thread stacks with integrated symbol support for each operation, simultaneous logging to a file, and much more. Its uniquely powerful features will make Process Monitor a core utility in your system troubleshooting and malware hunting toolkit.

http://www.tweaking.com/content/page/tweaking_com_hardware_identify.html

Will help identify unknown hardware on your system. This program does not help you download drivers but helps let you know what the hardware is so you know what drivers to find.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/absolution/

An e-Discovery and computer forensics investigation tool that collects, analyzes and reports on digital evidence.

Open Source (Free)

https://sourceforge.net/projects/patchcleaner/

5/5 Run PatchCleaner after windows updates to find newly orphaned files. I recommend you use the Move action, and move the orphaned patches to external storage, just to be safe.

Installation/Setup, Filesystems

Cleans your windows Installer directory of orphaned and redundant installation (.msi) and patch (.msp) files.

http://superuser.com/questions/707767/how-can-i-free-up-drive-space-from-the-windows-installer-folder-without-killing

Open Source (Free)

http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/features.html

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/pc-wizard.html

advanced system information, utility

Designed especially for detection of hardware, but also some more analysis. It's able to identify a large scale of system components and supports the latest technologies and standards

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html

https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

Hardware Monitoring

PC systems main health sensors : voltages, temperatures, fans speed.