Megan Geuss

Illustration: I Love DustYou’re on a budget, but you need reliable programs that will make your 9-to-5 run more smoothly.

One free application that belongs on every tech-savvy businessperson’s list is LogMeIn, which lets you access a computer remotely to fix it or to find files. LogMeIn has been around, but the company recently released a free version of its iOS app, so you can have remote access to your Windows or Mac desktop from your iPad or iPhone. Although the screen gets a bit cramped, it’s still a terrific no-cost tool.

Illustration: I Love DustDeals are to be had online--but before you put any money down, consider using some tools to snag even better bargains.

At the Woot.com website you can find daily deals on an item chosen from several different categories, from tech to toys. WootWatch for iOS and WootWatcher for Android bring Woot’s deals of the day to your phone, so you can peruse on the go. Or, if you’re more of a brick-and-mortar shopper, consult Scoutmob for daily deals of 50 percent off or more from businesses in your area; it’s like Groupon, but you don’t have to pay in advance for the deals.

The Internet is like a fancy Hollywood party with lots of swag: You can get tons of stuff for free, but not all of it is good. Still, some of the Web services, apps, and downloads out there are great, and don’t require you to pay a cent. Our 17th annual roundup of free stuff includes dozens of no-cost services, apps, and programs that are worth your time. To help you find the most valuable freebies, we’ve categorized them based on which types of people they’ll help most. Enjoy the free life!

(To read the related story about each category of free stuff, click the appropriate heading below, or use the contents box to the right. You can also consult our alphabetical list of all of the downloads, apps, and Web services described in our Best Free Stuff package.)

Illustration: I Love DustStay on top of your social media with a few communication tools.

HootSuite is a Web app that helps you manage your Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter accounts in the same spot. The ad-supported free version lets you add up to five social media accounts and two RSS feeds.

Illustration: I Love DustMany of us spend hours getting from one place to another every day. Your smartphone can help you cut down on your travel time, or at least make the most of it.

For example, Waze is a popular tool that aims to help you spend less time in traffic. The app automatically reads the GPS location and speed of every person using Waze, and reports that data back to other users who might be traveling in the same direction. Users can also report accidents, heavy traffic, and police speed traps, and you can ping users on Waze to get real-time updates. You can find the app for iOS and Android phones, and a beta version is available for BlackBerry handsets.

Illustration: I Love DustYou need a vacation, and trips are sometimes expensive. Fortunately, you can find lots of services to plan your vacation that won’t cost you a dime.

For starters, as you’re deciding how to reach your destination, use the BeFrugal Fly or Drive Calculator to estimate the cost and time required to complete your trip by airplane or by car, so you can determine which mode of transportation is better.

For more information about all of the items in our 2012 Best Free Stuff list, read our package of articles.

The Best Free Software, Mobile Apps, and Web Services of 2012

Any.DO Website | Download (Android) | Review

Illustration: I Love DustStaying in shape is a constant struggle, but a slew of apps out there can help you track your fitness.

If you’ve always regarded counting calories as too challenging, try a new app called The Eatery (available on iOS only), which lets you snap pictures of your food and rate the general healthfulness of the meal. You can post images, and ask friends who use The Eatery to comment on them. From your self-reported information, The Eatery gives you insight into where the traps are in your eating habits, and how healthy your diet was for the past week. Looking for a more-specific diet tracker? Calorific for iOS and Android gives you a food library to record your calories, and assigns foods a red, yellow, or green light depending on whether they’re likely to help or harm your health.

Illustration: I Love DustWhether you consume it or create it, entertainment is likely a huge part of the reason you love tech. You probably already have a subscription to big names such as Amazon Instant Video, Hulu Plus, or Netflix, and those are all good services, but they’re not free.

Crackle, on the other hand, is totally free, and you can stream its offerings from just about every desktop computer, phone, tablet, Internet video streaming box, or modern game console. Crackle doesn’t have a huge selection of films and TV shows, but it does have some heavy-hitting movies and series such as Talladega Nights, The Professional, and Seinfeld. Not sure what you want to watch? Sign up for MovieLens, an ad-free recommendation service set up by the University of Minnesota that uses your own ratings of flicks to predict new movies that you’ll enjoy. Although Netflix also predicts movies you’ll like based on ratings, it can do so only with movies the company has the rights to, whereas MovieLens has no obligations to any film studios.

At PCWorld we don’t often recommend bargain-hunting sites with a membership fee. But if you’re a fairly frequent traveler, a new deal aggregator called Travel Hacking Cartel is one of those rare cases where paying a monthly subscription fee could save you hundreds of dollars.

The travel site draws on the knowledge of its founder Chris Guillebeau, who claims that he visits 25 countries a year. Once you sign up for membership (THC makes you pay a $1 first-month fee and then automatically charges you $15 to $39 a month based on whether you choose the “Economy Class,” “Business Class,” or “First Class” membership), you get access to tutorial videos that break down travel-related “hacks,” such as how to score deals on airline miles and rewards points, or how to respond if an airline tells you that you can’t use points on a certain flight.

Rockmelt was built on Google's Chromium browser framework (so the browser looks and acts a lot like Chrome), but it's designed to appeal to social media fanatics. You have to sign in through Facebook to use most of its features. But fear not-- while RockMelt collects data on your browsing habits, developers say they won't share that data with any third parties -including Google and Facebook. And there are benefits to the Facebook sign-in too: RockMelt also uses your Facebook account to automatically sync settings and bookmarks among computers and any devices running the RockMelt iOS app (there's no RockMelt app for Android yet).

What fans love about RockMelt will undoubtedly drive some people crazy. On the right side of the browser window, you'll see a thin strip with your Facebook friends' icons and notifications about whether they're available to chat. By clicking your friend's icon, you can chat in the browser window without having to switch back and forth between Facebook and your other tabs. On the left side of the browser window, you can choose "apps" for different Web sites that show notifications when new content has been posted. Sometimes, though, the information at the edges of the browser window can get distracting. When that happens, you can hide the information by clicking on the bell icon in the top right corner to silence the visual noise.

Chrome's minimalist design isn't eye-catching, but its lean toolbar leaves more room for viewing Web pages. And what Chrome lacks in flashiness, it more than makes up for in performance. Google's browser really shone in our JavaScript test, leaving its competitors in the dust. JavaScript is used in many popular websites--Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Reddit, etc.--because it makes those sites more immediately responsive and those JavaScript heavy pages will perform better in Chrome. The browser also performed admirably in our speed test, fully loading an image-heavy page in just over five seconds.

Along with impressive performance, Google's browser has some other useful tricks up its sleeve. For starters, tabs are run as separate processes so that if one crashes, it doesn't take the entire browser down with it. If your wanderings take you to a foreign language Web site, Chrome will recognize the language and offer to translate it for you in a matter of seconds. The translations, which are powered by Google Translate, are not always completely accurate--but they can be helpful in giving you a basic idea on what the page is about. Chrome is one of the most secure browsers on this list because it is sandboxed: The plug-ins Chrome uses are limited to accessing information only within the browser itself and cannot read information from other areas on your computer. Sandboxing allows Chrome to prevent malware that uses plug-in exploits from spreading through your PC.