Both the iPhone and iPod Touch are great tools to have your favorite music and videos always with you, but what if you also want to carry files or documents?

The solution is then DiskAid, a simple tool that lets you manage the contents of your Apple device as if it was just another removable drive plugged into your computer. DiskAid doesn't require any special drives or difficult configuration at all; just connect the iPhone or iPod Touch to the PC and you're good to go.

DiskAid lets you browse the contents of the device in a neatly organized folder structure, drag and drop these contents to and from the PC and also perform some file management tasks like creating new folders or renaming others.

On the downside, you'll find that the folder structure is not easy to recognize, that is, folders' and files' names do not always correspond to the apps and files you have in your device. For example, while checking my music collection, I saw that all the MP3 files were renamed to strange character sets instead of their regular names.

With DiskAid you can easily use your iPhone or iPod Touch as a storage unit for files and documents, and also transfer them to and from the PC. You'll have to guess what their real names are though.

Download DiskAid 1.2 in Softonic

If you're bored of Windows Explorer or would like to experiment with something a little different, then NexusFile may be your answer.

NexusFile is a powerful and fast file manager that allows you to browse through the contents of your hard drive with great ease. The vast majority of its functions can be controlled by keyboard shortcuts, which makes it quicker and more convenient than other programs especially Explorer. The program also includes integrated utilities that let you go beyond just file browsing and exploring such as a file extractor for compressed files in ZIP, RAR and ACE and it also allows you to create ZIP files, rename multiple files and directories simultaneously, add a description to your personal files and directories, and much more. The program features a very intuitive interface also can be customized completely, using colour coding to better distinguish the various elements, changing fonts and so on.

This is a neat little alternative to Explorer although it takes some getting used to but if you invest the time, you might find yourself sticking with it.

Download NexusFile 5 in Softonic

Power users often find the standard Windows File Explorer too limited and need a more complete file manager to suit their needs. If you're among them look no further because we've got the right app for you.

Q-Dir is a multi-pane file manager for Windows that makes file management more convenient and above all, far more comfortable for you. Having several windows pointing to different locations on your hard drive makes it much easier to move or copy data from one folder to another, and also makes browsing faster. Q-Dir supports different layouts with 2, 3 o 4 panes and each one of them can be configured separately.

The program doesn't really add any extra function to the ones already featured in Windows Explorer, but there's one special feature I did like: the possibility to show files in different colors according to the file type, such as blue for images, red for music and so on. Plus, this color code is totally customizable.

Q-Dir doesn't require installation and can even been run from a USB stick.

Though it doesn't feature any special tool, Q-Dir is still a more complete file manager with multiple panes and customizable color codes for file types.

Download Q-Dir 3.16 in Softonic

Back up software has gone through something of a boom of late. With the huge increases in storage, more and more of us are on the look out for reliable, stable file protection. GoodSync is such a program - it offers fast, automated back up, synchronisation and restore between multiple devices - all in a relatively simple and easy-to-use environment.

Upon first launching GoodSync, you're immediately prompted to select source and destination folders (essentially, your original file folder and the new one you'd like to use as a backup location). The destination folder could be on the same computer, on an iPod, a network drive or any other external storage device. We tested GoodSync with a network drive and found it exceptionally fast.

Additionally, GoodSync's automation feature does exactly what you'd hope for: automatic synchronisation and backup with a raft of configuration options. If, like me, you're backing up important work documents to a network drive, you can easily pick how often this job should be done, to do it just on shutdown, or to allow the task scheduler to handle the job.

You can choose either to back up an entire folder (or folder system) or just specific files. This, along with GoodSync's effective duplicate controls, means that for a simple tool, this program offers you a highly customisable back up and sync solution, enough to offer any user true peace of mind.

A reliable and effective back up solution. Highly recommended.

Download GoodSync 7.2.8 in Softonic

Instant File Name Search is an effective search tool that helps you find any type of file on your PC or local network almost instantly. It does an initial index of all your drives which later on allows it to perform much faster searches. This index list must be maintained so that it is up to date and you can set the program to refresh each time it starts up.

It supports complete or incomplete names, wildcards and boolean operators. You can also set the program to exclude certain types of file or directories resulting in speedier results.

Download Instant File Name Search 1.7.5 in Softonic

One of the worst moments you can live as a computer user is realizing you just deleted your most precious photos from the hard drive by accident. Don't worry, it has happened to all of us at some point.

In any case, before you start banging your head against your desk, try using UndeleteMyFiles and see if you can recover your important files. This tool analyzes your hard drive and finds any file that's suitable for recovering, even if you've already emptied the Recycle Bin.

Bear in mind though that this suitability depends on many factors, such as how much time has passed since you deleted the files and how much you've been using the computer, but as long there's a chance, there's hope.

UndeleteMyFiles is very easy to use and works not only with hard drives, but also with removable drives. Plus, it includes some file management extra features such as a file wiper, a disk imaging tool and an email recovery tool, among others.

With UndeleteMyFiles there's still a chance to recover those mistakenly deleted files, either from your hard drive or from any other removable media.

Download UndeleteMyFiles 2.5 in Softonic

If you're anything like me then you're probably installing and uninstalling apps on a daily basis, which usually messes up all file associations in the system.

In that case, you can either repair them manually or run a program like Types. This simple tool lists all the file types available in your system and helps you view and edit their associations with certain apps. This means that, for instance, if you've always opened JPG images with XnView but this association has been taken over by another graphic editor, you can easily restore it with Types. Plus, it doesn't even require installation.

Besides file associations, Types also lets you edit icons, context menu, properties and other features of all file types shown in Windows Explorer. On the downside, the program is not very easy to use and doesn't include any documentation either, so you better know what you're doing before editing anything.

Types can help you restore broken file associations in your system, though it may not be easy to use for a beginner.

Download Types 1.0.2 in Softonic

Bulk Rename Utility is a utility which allows you to easily rename files and directories, based upon extemely flexible criteria. Add date-stamps, replace numbers, insert strings, convert case, add auto-numbers, process folders and subfolders....plus lots more.

Bulk Rename Utility is easy to use and has a small memory “footprint” so can be left running all the time without consuming all your memory. It started life as a Visual Basic application, but as its popularity has grown it has been completely rewritten in C++ (MFC) to be robust and lightweight - and very, very fast! It casn easily handle folders/discs containing well over 100,000 entries, and it can rename 1,000's of entries in seconds.

Download Bulk Rename Utility 2.7.0.3 in Softonic

DataRecovery could be the key that lets you undelete files that have been deleted by accident. This application is able to analyze your hard-drive (supports FAT12, FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS) and locate files that have been deleted, offering you the option to undelete them.

How is this possible? Simple: because Windows doesn't actually delete files without overwriting the part of the physical disk where the file was located. With this program, retrieving deleted files will not always be possible, but it may just be enough to get what you want.

Download DataRecovery 2.4.3 in Softonic

Because people are on the move more and more, synchronisation is an increasingly important part of the mobile life.

If you're constantly looking for ways to make your life easier in this regard then you may well like Allway Sync. The program synchronises data between laptops, mobile devices and just about anything else that runs Windows.

It's completely free although if you're going to use it for business purposes, you have to request a licence from the developers. The program can perform as many synchronisations as you need in one go and it features on-screen hints to help you on your way so it's very useful for beginners.

One of the problems with synching is monitoring what happened to your files since the last synch. The program takes care of this by monitoring all changes in its database. Whats more, the developers have also released a USB version which you can take everywhere and install on all of your separate devices.

This also means that you can synchronize removable devices (USB key, flash drive, CDRW) with a local drive which is life saving if you ever experience a hard disk crash. Both the interface and logarhythms have been updated in this latest version so that the synchronisations are fatser and the program is generally much better presented and easier to use.

For any Windows device, this is a very quick and light synchroniser which does the hard work automatically so you don't have to worry about it.

Download Allway Sync 7.1.2 in Softonic

CloneSpy is a very efficient program that finds duplicate files on your PC, allowing you to free space on your hard disk. This ensures your operating system to run better and even faster, depending on the type of duplicate files you had.

You almost surely have doubled music files which occupy useless space on your HDD. This happens when, for example, you borrow a music CD from a friend and you copy it all without realizing you might already have some of the songs included in your friend’s CD.

Before you can start scanning your system though, add a folder in the ‘pool1’ section. When you browse the directory you want to analyze, bear in mind you need to press the ‘add selected folder’ or the ‘add all sibling folders’ button, otherwise the process will not work, and you will be left with a feeling of not knowing what happened. If you don’t change settings, the program will ask you every time before deleting a file, always showing you the two supposedly duplicate files.

Although ConeSpy’s GUI is surely not so user friendly, the program is so useful that we can close an eye on that. It helps you find all duplicate files on your computer to free space on your hard disk and make your PC work better.

Download CloneSpy 2.32 in Softonic

There are many applications that you can use to delete files permanently, but
DeleteOnClick is probably the easiest one of them all.

This program has no interface or configuration options. Instead, it comes in the shape of an extra command that's added to the Windows context menu. This means that you can safely delete files simply by right-clicking on them.

The only drawback to DeleteOnClick is that it has no rolling-back option. That is, you'd better be sure that you want to delete that file before clicking on "Yes", because there's no way to recover it. Well, that's what the program is supposed to do, isn't it?

With DeleteOnClick you can erase files permanently from the file's context menu. Easy and quick!

Download DeleteOnClick 2.2.0.14 in Softonic

Did you know that when you delete a file in your computer, you're not actually deleting it? What your system does is marking the spot as free again, so that it can be used again. Of course, this means that those supposedly deleted files could be recovered if you use the appropriate software.

In order to prevent that, you can use a tool like Free Wipe Wizard. This application provides a quick, safer way to delete sensitive information from your computer, making sure they can't be restored by any means.

The program features a very basic interface with your systems's directory structure on the left side, while showing the content of the selected folder on the right pane. Simply select the file you want to get rid of and click on "Delete file". Just one thing: in case you want to delete multiple files, you'll have to do it one by one, as you can't select more than one file simultaneously.

Another drawback, in my opinion, is the total absence of configuration options to tweak the way the program works. You don't even know what algorithms or protocols the program uses.

Free Wipe Wizard lets you erase sensitive files securely in a quick, easy way, but with no configuration options.

Download Free Wipe Wizard in Softonic

PFrank is simple but convenient way to change and alter multiple files in one go without having to go through them one by one.

The developer claims to have been motivated by the lack of a decent renaming program as most have to be run with multiple passes using different sets of renaming sequences until finally getting the required names. PFrank allows you to rename everything you want to in one go using a Windows Explorer style interface. However, it does have a lot of options for deciding how and what type of files you want to rename which can be a bit tricky. For this reason, the developer has started a forum which deals with most of the main problems. Particularly with the new features that have been added, you may experience problems. These include the new plugin for insertion of meta data from raw image files (e.g. cr2, nef, sr2) and a much improved undo facility, new filters, new positioning controls and the ability for users to plug in their own renaming commands. There's also a recently added custom list manager for managing any number of custom lists for repeat file changing.

For those that do a lot of file changing and renaming, PFrank is an excellent mass file name changer that will ensure you save time.

Download PFrank 2.19 in Softonic

Index.dat Suite is a rather unique program that allows you not only to delete the index.dat files, temporary internet files, temp files, cookies and history, but it also allows you to view the index.dat files on your system.

Features:

• View and delete index.dat files
• View and delete Temporary Internet Files (TIF)
• View and delete Cookies
• View and delete History
• View and delete Temp files
• View and delete Recent Documents
• Delete Typed URL's
• Delete Prefetch folder contents
• Auto-generation of batch file to assist in deleting the index.dat files in DOS.
• Optional add to RunOnce registry key
• Optional deletion of swap file (9x users only)
• Optional defrag after file deletion
• Full application logging

Download Index.dat Suite 2.10.1 in Softonic

Swiss File Knife - SFK makes daily tasks with Windows Command line easy. It covers such a huge range of tasks that it's hard to list them all here.

Amongst many other things, it can find and extract text in binary files, list dir tree sizes, filter and replace text, run an instant ftp server, find duplicate files, join many text files into one, create and verify md5 checksum lists and of course, run a command on all files. It can also detab text, create hexdumps from files, trace contents of a tcp connection, find dependencies between files, print colored text to terminals, locate commands in path, print last lines of a file, hex to binary, binary to source code, convert CR/LF, split and join large files. So how does this help you in your daily life. Well, if you want to transfer files from one PC to another for example, Swiss File Knife allows you to simply type "sfk ftpserv", and you have an ftp server running within one second. The same goes for many other functions: "sfk find" finds text within files - without long and boring index creations. "sfk run" runs your self-defined command on all files, but you get a preview of what would be done before the stuff is really executed.

No installation, registry modifications or DLL dependencies - SFK simply runs instantly, anywhere and is a great command line tool.

Download Swiss File Knife 1.5.0 in Softonic

Fancy 2GB of free storage space accessible from everywhere? Read on and discover Diino. This service allows you to store everything you need to backup your computer’s files automatically at regular intervals. You will have access to your documents everywhere where an internet connection is available, thanks to a dedicated webpage with the url yourusername.diino.com.

Set a password for all your folders, when you access them online, or share content with co-workers or friends. Diino comes with a useful client where you can manage file and folders you want to save online. Unfortunately, the desktop application doesn’t support the drag and drop function which is really a pity.

The service is similar to the Wuala one we saw some time ago, but in this case in order to have more than 2GB of space available you have to pay, whereas with Wuala you have to share your hard disk space as in peer-to-peer network.

Have access to automatically backed-up folders anywhere you are , with a dedicated web page where you can share documents or set passwords to protect the access of your files.

Download Diino 4.2 in Softonic

If you own a digital camera you probably have tons of photos stored in your hard drive and, among them, there must be a few duplicates which only take up disk space.

Duplicate Images Finder can help you recover that wasted space by analyzing your photo folders and finding any duplicate images that are stored on them. The program features a quite basic interface and is really easy to use: simply select the directories you want to scan and let Duplicate Images Finder do the rest.

If there are any duplicate images, the program will display them in a separate window where you can compare them head to head and decide which one to erase and which one to keep.

Duplicate Images Finder bases its work not only on file name's similarity or file's size, but also in visual appearance. This makes the program very efficient, though it may also be the reason why the analysis sometimes takes quite a long time, as all the photos must be analyzed and compared one by one.

Duplicate Images Finder is a very effective tool when it comes to finding duplicate photos on your hard drive, though it takes a while to do its job.

Download Duplicate Images Finder 1.0 in Softonic

Do you know that after you have completely deleted information from your hard drive, it is still there? There are a lot of ways to restore deleted data. Just imagine what could happen if your personal information were used by ill-intentioned people. Yet it is a frequent case that users themselves disclose their private information allowing other people to use their computer, selling or giving their PC as present. After a file has been deleted, the information about it is not erased completely, which allows to restore this file later.

Smart Data Scrubber allows you to wipe completely all the information about the file you were working with, ensuring total confidentiality of your work. You can be sure that after using Smart Data Scrubber no any other software will be able to undelete the files you were working with. Make a present to yourself - 100% of security and confidentiality of your personal data!

Download Smart Data Scrubber 3.4 in Softonic

WildRename is a file renaming tool that enables you to rename multiple files at the same time, therefore saving you loads of time and typing.

The program features a nicely designed interface, something I really appreciated as this kind of programs usually feature quite confusing menus. There are several renaming options, including the most basic ones (adding or removing characters) and also some advanced options such as changing case or replacing text strings by some completely new words.

I specially liked the possibility to simulate changes, so that you get a preview of how the new file names are going to look like before applying any definitive change to them. However this previewing option would be much more useful and effective if you could see it in real time and didn't have to actually process files.

Other interesting features in WildRename are the possibility to perform several renaming task on a row, save those tasks as a renaming job that you can use later on and also embed WildRename as a new command in the SendTo menu in Windows Explorer's context menu.

WildRename is a full-featured file renaming tool that will help you rename tons of files in just a few clicks.

Download WildRename 2.00 in Softonic