Save Money by Using Open Source Software
Software can be expensive. When buying a computer, the operating system is usually included in the base price, along with a number of marginally useful applications for doing day-to-day tasks. Anti-Virus and security products often include only 90 day versions before you have to pay for the full version.
With the quality of many Open Source products, it is often worth looking at free software alternatives to the software that many of us are used to. For Anti-Virus, try the open source ClamWin instead spending $27.99 of McAffee. Instead of forking over $139.99 for Microsoft Office, you can try OpenOffice.
WHDB recently posted a list of 50 open-source alternatives to proprietary programs. I found the list to be pretty complete, and there are a few things I’d like to try. I’ve used many of these products, and have had generally good experiences with the open-source versions. A couple of notes though:
- There still isn’t a viable alternative to a Windows OS. Ubuntu is about as good as it gets, and I’ve installed it on two laptops and still had headaches getting video drivers, wireless cards, and various things working. I’m a linux-geek in my full time job, and would love to see it as a viable desktop and laptop OS, but it will still be another year or two in my opinion before it is really ready for ‘normal’ users.
- TurboCash and GnuCash still aren’t viable alternatives to Quicken or Microsoft Money. These two products are still pretty much in their infancy and provide only pretty basic features.
- I’ve had very good experience with OpenOffice. It’s done everything that I’ve needed for basic word processing and spreadsheet features. I rarely use many of the ‘power’ features in the Microsoft products and don’t see any reason why I would need to use them again.
