5 Must Have Free Applications For Mac Users

This post is specifically aimed at first time Mac users and at others who have been looking for some free and open source softwares to make their daily tasks easier. Not only do the softwares listed here come free of cost, they also do their work as well as their paid counterparts.

Adium – for IM/Chat

A free instant messaging App, Adium will let you connect to AIM, MSN, Jabber, Yahoo, Gtalk among various others. This is the best IM client I have ever used on any platform. Adium sets a great example of how good open source products can get.

Cyberduck – for FTP/SFTP

cyberduck 5 Must Have Free Applications For Mac Users

Cyberduck is the perfect tool for all your FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, Cloud Files, Google Docs, Amazon S3 file browsing needs. In fact I even use it for SSHing into the iPhone when I need access to its file system. It supports Bonjour service and makes tasks easier. And the magical OS X integration doesn’t stop just there. It extends to Spotlight and Keychain as well.

Handbrake – for Video Conversion

Handbrake is the must have tool for all video converting needs. This is one tool which provides for both first time users as well as custom settings for advanced users. It makes use of your Mac’s resources pretty well and provides for very fast and good quality videos. I use it very frequently for converting Videos for the iPhone and the iPod Touch.

Transmission – Torrent Downloader

Who can live without a torrent downloader. Before I came across this, I had very bad experiences with the other applications. uTorrent on Mac, as most of you know, isn’t up to the mark yet. So, here’s the very simple yet powerful torrent downloader, Transmission for you. It has a scheduler which actually works to keep a control over bandwidth consumed during peak hours. Lastly, its very lightweight and comes free.

Colloquy – Best IRC client

Here’s a very advanced IRC, SILC & ILB client for Mac OS X. It is very intuitive and provides for all the necessary features one would ask from an IRC client. The interface is clean and along with the iPhone app you can stay connected on the go by setting bouncers for yourself. Download Colloquy here.

If you are a mac user you might like to read:

11 reasons why I love mac and why you should too

For the five needs specified above, these are not only the free solutions but also one of the best available. If you like them do leave us word and subscribe to our feeds. Also, if you wanted to know about other applications for a specific purpose you can ask us via comments.