I have been raised on Norton Commander so I could never really get too comfortable with the plain Explorer.
What is your favourite explorer tool and did you completely replace Windows Explorer with it?
You must love Total Commander [1].
It has similar key mappings with Norton Commander, a lot of useful features, it's fast, and has plenty of addons.
[1] http://www.ghisler.com/I just use Windows Explorer. I see no reason to replace it on Vista and 7. It would be like switching from /bin/bash to /bin/zsh on Linux/Unix. Sure, something else may be better, but its available everywhere, and I don't see any reason to devote cycles to learning subtle nuances of something new that only may increase my productivity.
QTTabBar [1] - an addon for Windows Explorer which enables tabs and a lot of other useful options.
I don't like using anything but Windows Explorer, because when I use another machine, it is all different. It's better to customize a little - less of a shock that way.
For my own machine, this works beautifully and speeds up things a lot.
[1] http://qttabbar.sourceforge.net/If you liked Norton Commander, you should have a look at Far Manager [1], from the creators of WinRAR. It's free, open source, and it has x86 and x64 versions.
[1] http://farmanager.com/?l=enA great file manager made to replace Windows Explorer. The reason why I like it so much is that:
I quite like xyplorer [1].
Pros:
Cons:
heheh I use the command line. It's pretty good.
cd C:\someplace;
copy file target
erase file
rename filename
In UNIX/Linux gets even better :)
When I used to use Windows I was quite a fan of xplorer2 [1].
There is a lite version [2] that's free for non-commercial use, and the pro version adds powerful search feature (Omni-Finder)
[1] http://www.zabkat.com/Teracopy [1] is a great filecopy utility that integrates with windows explorer and supports pausing / continue functionality. When making multiple copy sessions to the same destination, it queues up instead of starting multiple copies, thus maintaining the speed. Integrates seamlessly into Windows Explorer-shell. It's also fast.
Also supports integration with Total Commander [2] and Directory Opus [3]
[1] http://www.codesector.com/teracopy.phpI've just started using Q-Dir [1]. Very flexible layout and quick to load too. Don't be put off by the web site (which looks a bit crazy!).
[1] http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=freeware/Q-DirI've used CubicExplorer [1] quite often. It's free, tabbed, and very customizable.
[1] http://www.cubicreality.com/ce/download/Not free but very mature! SpeedCommander [1]
[1] http://www.speedproject.de/enu/speedcommander/index.htmlThis one is very poorly known but for me it's the best: Altap Salamander [1]
[1] http://www.altap.cz/Without a doubt it is Xplorer2 [1].
Xplorer² allows you to browse more than one folder at a time, using tabs and dual panes. Sorting out and copying files becomes a breeze. You can navigate your shell namespace quickly using favorites, clickable paths (breadcrumbs), easy access to root folders, a tree and a bookmark pane (drop box) etc. You can even save and restore folder groups whenever your workflow deems necessary.
[1] http://zabkat.com/muCommander is a lightweight, cross-platform file manager featuring a Norton Commander style interface and running on any operating system with Java support (Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, *BSD, Solaris...).
I'm not huge into the Nortan Commander paradigm, but this program is useful enough that I keep it my machines for file transfers, viewing hidden files that I don't want to show in explorer/finder. Did I mention you can use it on Windows and Mac?
It is also open source [2] (GPL).
[1] http://www.mucommander.com/Explorer++ [1] is a free multi-tab file manager.
[1] http://www.explorerplusplus.com/Features:
- With the option to save to the registry or a configuration file, Explorer++ is portable.
- Tabbed browsing for easy management of multiple folders.
- Display window shows previews of files as they are selected.
- Easy-to-remember keyboard shortcuts for quick navigation.
- Customizable user interface.
- Full drag-and-drop support with other applications, including Windows Explorer.
- Advanced file operations such as merging and splitting supported.
Total Commander all the way. I've been using this software since the good old days of Windows 3.x (it was known as Windows Commander back then).
If you're looking for a conventional Explorer replacement, then I recommend UltraExplorer [1].
[1] http://download.cnet.com/UltraExplorer/3000-2248_4-10702384.htmlWindow's command line, with Cygwin's \bin in my PATH, and a few batch files and c++ programs is my preferred method. I'll never be slower than clicking if I know my filesystem, and 90% of the time, I know what I'm going to find.
The old Windows file manager ported to 2000/XP/2003/Vista/2008/7 for old schoolers that refuse to give it up.
http://www.mdgx.com/bin.htm#FM
Dired [1] is a "directory editor" that comes with GNU Emacs [2] which is available for Windows [3].
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dired