Best software choices

[Steve Watford]

Im afriad my system is on its last legs and its time to reinstall XP (nlite'd) for clarity. Now before I do it, im going to need some help from you guys (who else!), so I need some advice, opinions etc on certain aspects of my reinstall.

So, the general thing would be install order;

Xp (x64)
MS Update, SP's etc
Drivers
Essencial Apps
Take a backup
Usual Apps


Now, I need some advice on the certain applications that I will be installing. Tell me what you guys think are the best (and hopefully x64, although if its good x32 its still good) and most useful (free also) apps to install.

So the list is like this so far

Java-x64
.Net x64
Nero
OpenOffice
Azureus
[Backup Program - recommendations?]
[Security Suite - Recommendations, x64 would be awesome (this doesn't need to be free, just good on x64 systems)]
MSN Messenger + msgplus
Codec Packs (is there any x64 optimised packs?)
Ccleaner
Spybot
Spyware Blaster
HOSTS file tweak
XP Antispy
[Any other security things I need?]
Firefox x64


Any other contributions are always welcome.

 

[Macabre]

A firewall
Adaware
Xfire

Your patches for games. I backed up the BF2 patch to a CD considering it was around 580MB.

 

[Steve Watford]

A firewall - Will hopefully be included in a security suite, but if im getting each component individually, then good one m8, thx

Adaware, i had some problems with this before and prefer to just use spybot, as it picks up everything adaware can and more.

Xfire - thx m8

 

[bledd]

7zip

 

[Steve Watford]

Bump, need x64 codec pack and security suite.