Stop Using 'FREE SOFTWARE'

Annoyed your programs are not as described? Will Stapley exposes the hidden limitations of popular freebie software and recommends their genuinely free alternatives

With polished websites, a glut of positive reviews and promises to resolve all your PC problems, it’s no wonder free software is so darn tempting. You download it to your hard drive and maybe even make it your default program for a particular file type or task. But just when you need it the most, the software suddenly demands payment for the simplest of tasks. In some instances, you’ll only realise just how ‘unfree’ the software is after you’ve spent several hours downloading, installing and getting used to it.

We’d prefer developers were more transparent, but this is unlikely to happen any time soon. Instead they promise their software will answer all your prayers, while hoping that having invested all that time, you’ll simply pay for those ‘advanced’ features you thought you were getting in the first place.

In this feature we highlight a selection of popular ‘free’ software that has one or more nasty surprises lurking in wait. For example, you’ll find a duplicate-file finder that locates doubled-up files but refuses to delete them; an iphone data-transfer tool that severely limits what you can transfer; and a Youtube downloader that, if you’re not careful, covers your videos with adverts.

We’ve also included some tools that were previously free, but have now smuggled in annoying restrictions in the hope of persuading you to upgrade to the premium version. For each culprit, we suggest a better alternative that actually gets the job done for free.

We’d be interested to hear about your experiences of ‘free’ software nightmares – email the worst offenders to letters@