Instant messages: Pidgin
Of course, using a computer is not all about work — you'll want to chat online with your friends too with an instant messaging (IM) service. Windows comes pre-installed with Windows Messenger, but updated versions of it are available for download too. There are other IM services too, so the tough choice is to decide which one works for you. But why not try all of them from one program? With Pidgin, you only need to install one program, but you can chat with your friends on most of the popular IM services — including Facebook's built-in chat service! Some of them will require installing a plug-in, but that's a once-of task.

Viewing photos: XnView
Windows' built-in photo viewer is nice enough, but if you want to have a little more control over things, get XnView. It's pretty powerful, without frustrating you to death, and it has a very nice thumbnail browser.

Image editing: Gimp
For the more graphically experienced among us, a little editing of photos and creating of images is a necessity. Before forking out thousands of rands for Photoshop, however, try the free open-source alternative, Gimp. You will be pleasantly surprised.

PDF reader: Adobe Reader
Some documents that you might have to open — e.g. ABSA proof of payment documents — come in a .pdf-format. The best way to open and read these, is with the Adobe Reader.

System cleaner: EasyCleaner
After extensive use your computer will begin to look a bit like a teenager's room, with bits and pieces of files lying around all over the place. EasyCleaner lets you search for orphaned and temporary files and cleans them out. It also has a powerful registry cleaner, which will help to keep your computer's map book running smoothly.

Quick launch: Rocketdock
And finally, you'll need something that you can use to quickly and easily launch all your programs from, without having to clutter the desktop with lots of icons. Rocketdock is admittedly a Mac rip-off, but it does work very well. Initially you will have to play around with the settings to get it to work exactly the way you like it, but this customisability is actually a good thing. Once it's setup, you can add and removing icons to it from where you can quickly launch any program you want to.