The only free/shareware I find useful has to do with security on my laptop. But I do find that Revo Uninstaller is a handy little tool for fully uninstalling a program. Windows uninstaller is craptastic.
For security I think Sand Boxie is a great program for that *downside* it dosen't let you play games on the internet using it's browser. But it is great for seeing what goes on when you load a program in it so you can know if it's tryin to hack you or not. If you like Zelda then Zquest is always fun.
