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Free Download Manager

Free Download Manager is a free open-source application designed to ease the process of downloading files and whole websites from remote servers. It supports HTTP, HTTPS, FTP and BitTorrent protocols.

FDM accelerates the downloading process by splitting files into sections. Besides, it allows for downloads in several takings.

That is, you can resume a broken download if the site you are working with supports resumption. You save traffic and a sudden connection loss won't fail the whole process.

The program has a simple interface and a sleek-looking toolbar. Under this toolbar, there are several tabs, each changing the toolbar a bit, adjusting to its purpose. Generally, the toolbar is divided into several sections (4 to 5), and three of them always stay the same and include: traffic use (from 'light' to 'heavy'), download controls (start, stop or pause all downloads), quick access to settings, establish a dial-up connection, as well as Help and About FDM menus.

Mind the traffic use mode; by default it is set to heavy, which implies that FDM is downloading at the maximum possible speed. You can change it into medium if you intend to browse the Internet while the download is in progress. Set it to light traffic use, and the program will be downloading things slowly but surely, using up very little of your Internet connection.

During the lickety-split installtion, you can set the program language and installation folder and enable the FDM Community Options or the BitTorrent protocol. These give you interesting additional possibilities; for example, by enabling FDM Community options you get to share opinions about downloads and warn other users about malicious ones. If you were too lazy to opt in during installation, you can do it later through the Options menu.

When you run the program for the first time, make sure to spend some time reading the Help guide so that you learn about the little things tricks that help you manage your downloads. Don't get me wrong, the interface is very simple and not overloaded at all. However, those who have never used similar applications (like me) can feel a bit frustrated at first from the sheer amount of tabs and colorful buttons, whose use only becomes evident a bit later.

FDM allows for downloading files in different formats, and if you're downloading a ZIP archive containing several files, you can choose which of its included files should be downloaded. There's also a tab called HTML Spider, which has everything you need to download whole websites; basically, if you have a lifetime to spare, you could download any site you want.

Free Download Manager also offers you a lot of ways to tweak its abilities: you can schedule downloads, control the program remotely, assign additional mirrors, change the interface language (about 30 languages are supported) and do lots of other things. It is by far one of the best download managers that I've come across.

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Download Master

Integrated in Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple Safarie, Mozilla, Opera, Netscape Communicator et al, replacing the standard module of beginning to swing. In addition, the program watches after the buffer of exchange, finding out references. Download Master allows to load, save and look over video from such videoservices: YouTube, Google Video, RuTube, Видео@mail.ru, Rambler Vision.

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Orbit Downloader

Orbit Downloader can manage and accelerate your downloads. This application supports various communication protocols, such as HTTP, FTP, HTTPSW, RTSP, MMS and RTMP, which allows downloading not only standard binary files but also streaming media, including HTML5. You will also be glad to know that it also supports P2P protocols.

The program has an intuitive interface, very similar to that of uTorrent, in which a tree-like organization of the tasks helps you filter them with ease. One of the distinctive features of this program is that it integrates with most popular browsers. Thus, it installs browser plugins that detect downloadable contents. Then, a list is shown from where you can simply check the items to download. Unfortunately, the Google Chrome extension seemed not to work appropriately and generated lots of error messages.

The program features other advantages. For instance, you can integrate it with your antivirus software so that all your downloads are scanned for viruses before you actually open them. In addition, the scheduler helps you program download times so that the use of this application does not interfere with other browsing tasks.

The program now includes a software updater function, which can check your installed programs’ versions and suggest updates for them. However, the results can be a little messy, and sometimes what appears to be a newer version is not. Therefore, you have to be cautious when using this feature.

In general, Orbit Downloader is a fine application, and its developers seem to be committed to its permanent improvement, because new versions are constantly being launched. However, there are still some aspects that need further polishing.

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YTD Video Downloader

YTD Video Downloader is a simple application that allows downloading videos from YouTube, Facebook and other websites and converting them to various formats.

Its interface is neat and intuitive.

Anyone can use this program without any problem, including beginners. It automatically detects the URL of the video and adds it to the download queue. Furthermore, it supports downloading videos from many websites, from popular ones like YouTube and Facebook to less known ones like Youku. HD and HQ videos can also be downloaded. Another nice aspect of this tool is the fact that it includes a simple yet handy video player.

YTD Video Downloader also allows converting videos to common formats like MP4, MOV or AVI. It can also extract the sound track from video files and save it to audio files such as MP3.

Unfortunately, batch processing multiple downloads at once is possible only with the Pro version. Moreover, the interface cannot be resized or customized. Anyway, these are minor downsides that can be easily ignored. Overall, YTD Video Downloader is a handy YouTube downloader and converter that works fine, is fast and easy-to-use and comes with an affordable price.

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FlashGet

Flashget is a well-known downloading utility. The new version provides support for multiple languages, enables to apply skins and includes the XP enhancement tool to optimize downloads.

Flashget is more than a download tool. It also acts as a bit torrent client with batch file download facility. This application replaces other bit torrent clients and download managers. The new version is attractive but it lacks a lot of features compared to the 1.x versions of the same application.

There are some missing features, such as the site browser, managing downloads database, torrent creating, applying downloading rules and the speed limit mode. The developer seems to be more focused on the appearance and multiple language support for the program, but neglecting the features that were available in the older versions.

I have been using FlashGet for about two years and consider it to be the best combination with Firefox Browser. Also a great tool for Torrents. But I am not quite happy with the latest version of this application.

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