PC Master Race

Powertoys makes using windows at work bearable for me. Having a search that doesn't just open edge if you press enter too fast and that lets me launch stuff as admin without a mouse is a godsent. So is the ability to paste as plain text.

Windows Caffeinated: Keeps your PC from sleeping.

Windows already keeps itself from sleeping in my experience, I'd rather have an app that makes it actually go to sleep and stay asleep without randomly waking up.

Keeps your PC from sleeping.

You can set this in the power plan settings, no need for an extra application.

I always install TouchMe Gesture Studio for touch gestures and Touch Mouse Pointer for an optional virtual track pad on my touch devices.

gsudo for command line makes it so you can run specific applications in admin mode without having to run the entire CMD window in admin mode

Edit: "Everything" search engine (voidtools), a local search engine that actually works, includes search parameters and is very fast. Even better than windows search was prior to windows 7 when they broke it.

OneClickFirewall is the shit. I love that thing so much. Right click and instantly add a rule to the windows firewall to keep something from calling home. https://winaero.com/oneclickfirewall/

I'm also a big of of File Converter which gives some right click conversion options for images and such. https://github.com/Tichau/FileConverter/?from=about

PowerToys adds some nice features StartAllBack to bring back the classic Windows 7 like Start Menu and Taskbar

I use MS Powertoys, mostly for window snapping on w10. On w11 I really like Nilesoft Shell

I use TwinkleTray on my gaming setup. It adds an icon to your tray that will popup with sliders for adjusting brightness on your monitors. The monitors respond very quickly! Eliminates having to go into the menus on the physical monitor to adjust brightness.

Back when I used windows still, I liked to use spybot anti-beacon and winaero tweaker to get rid of Microsoft key logging and microphone recording. Then I would use a lot of the tweaks in winaero.

Windows has a pretty great UI from the jump, so one of the best things to do is to learn all the keyboard shortcuts and some basic powershell commands.

DisplayFusion is a must have for multi monitor setups

I use Powertoys to switch keys and shortcuts. I swapped alt and ctrl because it’s more comfortable to click alt + t or alt + a etc. I made alt + F4 work with alt + Q.

I also used powertoy for its Run tool so pressing alt + spacebar lets me search for apps or folders.

I use Chocolately as a package manager to install calibre, krita, etc and I have set chocolately to update all installed packages on boot. This helps with krita, calibre, qbittorrent and any other program that requires you go to the website and manually download and install every update.

Yt-dlp to easily download youtube videos (or any video) and i set it up so it automatically downlaods mp4 instead of webm and so it automatically saves to my download folder

WSL. So I can get more done on my work computer.

Xoblite a shell enhancement based on Blackbox, makes your Windows desktop look like Linux (OpenBox/Fluxbox). Thousands of themes on boxshots.org, highly customisable shell.

• winaero tweaker is a great all round "hidden options" tool

• 7+ taskbar tweaker allows scroll on taskbar for volume, which once you're used to is hard to lose

~~i'll edit with more in a short while~~

• monitor profile switcher - absolutely invaluable if you use multiple monitor layouts

• iconviewer - somewhat niche, but an easy way of seeing all icons in multiple dll files

• pangobright - washes out the desktop so it's not a real replacement for brightness, but if you have a migraine or something and want your screen darker at any cost this is handy

• pasteintofile - does what it says on the tin; very handy

• rbtray - minimise any window to systray (i'm not linking this one as i only have the exe file, and i can't remember which of the multiple versions available it is)

• retrobar - i don't actually use this as it doesn't work with 7+tt, but it's a neat idea

• universal pause button - pause any game (or programme, i guess) from the systray

• touchcursor - doesn't quite fit the question, but it's so good i'm including it. basically dreymar's colemak extend layer, but without the need for ahk

• open-shell (was classic shell (was classic start)) - better start menu with a multitude of options, and some taskbar improvements

• cairoshell - never properly used it, and it doesn't quite answer the op question; but i want to draw attention to the almost complete shell replacement for windows

• powertoys - others have mentioned it, but i'm adding it here so it's a more comprehensive list

• wox - simple, fast launcher that integrates with everything

windows store apps:

• twinkletray - ddcutil monitor brightness tray app (non-uwp equivalent: clickmonitorddc)

• ear trumpet obviously - better volume slider(s)

• modern flyouts - better volume adjustment popup

Explorer Patcher is a must-have for a functional task bar.

Git bash for Windows

Scoop to install programs via CLI

I like to use lively wallpaper

It's not free, but I do find it amusing that StarDock -- the company that once brought us the MacOS dock for Windows -- has probably the best start menu replacement now that Microsoft are trying to make the task bar even more like the MacOS dock.

A windows10 update broke my start menu and taskbar. Literally can't even type to quick-search for an installed application in the start menu.

Finally I broke down and installed open-shell which gave me a custom start menu that actually works and I can customize it to my style preferences. It's also faster than the other start menu. And now that I hear Windows11 will have ads in their start menu, I'll simply install OpenShell if I'm ever forced to Windows11 (unlikely, I'm moving away from windoze).

Surprised nobody has mentioned Winhawk

there is also this small app to add cpu, memory, disk and network usage to the taskbar: taskbar-monitor (developer here)

IDK if this counts as shell, but I just discovered Alternative A2DP Driver which allows you to use LDAC with compatible Bluetooth headphones. Works BEAUTIFULLY for me.