After the Christmas season, the month of September represents the biggest computer buying of the year.

And even though you've shot most of your budget on the PC, monitor, sound card and speakers, don't forget there are other low cost - make that free - options that can help your system.

For example, a great web site for you to start at is http://computingcentral.msn.com/. Then, select the Top Ten Downloads, and jump to a column/page written by Paul Mayer. You will find his list of the best shareware programs that are available today.

For you novices, "Shareware," by definition, is free for the downloading.

Most of the time, the product has a 30 day expiry limit, and its owners encourage you to pay for it to help support the programming staff that created it. In some cases, you can use a version of the program, but there are several advertisements that accompany the package. However, the final cost is minimal and generally ranges from $10 to $50. As a person who owns and operates a software development company, I encourage you to support these guys.

One of Mayer's top selections comes from a Victoria, BC based company who make the "viewing" program called ACDSee http://www.acdsystems.com/. Over 30 image formats can be seen with this image management tool that sports an Explorer-like tree to view the graphic and multimedia files on your system.

The latest revision, Version 3.1, lets users generate web pages from photos and generate and print thumbnail contact sheets. ACDSee's single best feature is how you can quickly scroll through several photos and graphic files and have a look at the image in a preview window. It is racecar fast, and the images show up clearly. If there is a better image handling program around, I've yet to see it. A Mac version is also available.

Another good shareware program is called FTP Voyager, and is available at http://www.ftpvoyager.com/. FTP Voyager lets you perform FTP (File Transfer Protocol) tasks as fast as if you are working locally in Windows Explorer. You can connect to any FTP site, drag-n-drop files, synchronize files and perform simultaneous transfers. I like the auto-resume feature, which lets you resume interrupted downloads.

But setting an FTP arrangement to your corporate file server is quite ordinary and unexciting. FTP Voyager ships with several FTP locations that you've never heard of and are quite easy to get into. They contain all kinds of information and files that can be quickly transferred to your computer. For example, connect to the Games FTP site and download to your heart's content. Or, visit the Linux, Unix or Windows sites in the Operating System folder. This is a program you have to have.

Now, it is reported that over 46 percent of Canadians are "on the Internet." While I'm not sure what "on the Internet" means, it seems that most people have, at the very least, some type of Web access.

Secruity

Naturally, Internet use will continue to grow, and it won't be long until it will be normal to be connected to the Web 24 hours a day, 7 days a week through high speed DSL or cable modems. With that, comes a security problem. And to prevent this, McAfee has a couple of good solutions with its Internet Guard Dog and McAfee Firewall products. Both work well and Guard Dog comes with a version of McAfee Antivirus.

Symantec, on the other hand, ships Norton Desktop Firewall 2.0. All three tools are designed to prevent hackers from attacking your Internet-connected PC. For example, consider Napster, where users from all over the world can download an MP3 file located on your basement PC. If they can download an MP3 file, they can download others, too.

Personal use only

While demo downloads of these products are free but real versions cost money, ZoneAlarm http://www.zonelabs.com/ is free for personal use - for the time being, anyway.

ZoneAlarm provides security for any computer connected to the Internet, especially those with always-on DSL or cable modem connections.

In a nutshell, ZoneAlarm allows you to control your computer's Internet traffic and determines how your local applications access the Internet. Some programs, like Spyware, allow others to see the contents of your computer. Undoubtedly other innovative and similar "spy" programs will be created in the near future, so be prepared.

The best part of ZoneAlarm is that it is easy to use. You choose whether it is loaded upon startup and are able to configure the firewall, without requiring a degree in computing science. When an application on your computer tries to access the Internet, ZoneAlarm makes sure it has your permission first. This ensures that a rogue program will not sneak your important data out onto the Internet. Smart.