When I started GamersRevenge.com, Jero, Richard and I had two rules: 1) Unbiased reviews and 2) limited advertisements. We all hated going to IGN.com or Gamespot.com and being bombarded by advertisements…fly-overs, pop-ups, pop-unders…the ads were so bad, we could hardly read what we came for. So this list will start with Adblock Plus.
7. Adblock Plus – click to add to Chrome
So when I first heard about Adblock Plus, I was intrigued. Adblock Plus will block those pesky YouTube video ads, Facebook ads, various web pop-ups, and any intrusive banner you get sick of seeing on your favorite websites.
One nice feature of Adblock Plus is the ability to turn it off for sites of your choosing. If you install Adblock Plus, I ask that you disable it on GeekConfessions.com. I keep the advertisements to a minimum; however, this site is in the ad-supported publishing space, so tools like Adblock Plus actually keep some dollars out of my pocket. I depend on those ads to help pay the bills.
6. OneTab – click to add to Chrome
Jero once made the comment I needed to be in “Tabs Anonymous.” At any given time, I would have 20-25 tabs open in Chrome, another 20-25 open in Firefox, and a few more in Safari; let’s not even count the tabs I have open in Edge (yes, I use Edge).
Every tab shows up in Task Manager as a seperate process, so my computer would run slow. Once I installed OneTab, things were vastly different. OneTab converted all those nasty tabs into one easy-to-manage list. It’s simple to use and will get rid of all the resource draining tabs you’re used to.
5. LastPass – click to add to Chrome
Speaking of Jero, he’s the reason I use LastPass. You can’t imagine the number of hours I spent filling out the same credit card number, the same shipping address, phone, email, and password information again and again and again.
LastPass makes “form life” easier. The free extension stores this information locally on your machine, where it is encrypted, meaning not even LastPass knows what’s being entered into those forms.
4. Turn Off The Lights – click to add to Chrome
Watching videos on Netflix is so much nicer than watching them on YouTube. Why? Because there’s no white background! With this great extension, you can set Turn Off The Lights to automatically dim your window background when using YouTube or other video sites.
If you’re a power user, you can customize the add-on to set custom colors to your screen while playing videos, set atmospheric lighting, and fade effects. Probably one of my favorite features though is to turn on “night mode” and experience a “home theater” on my laptop.
3. Synata – click to add to Chrome
Storage space. This is the one area of tech that sees more of my dollars than any other, even video games! Synata is sure to become your one-stop shop when it comes to managing your cloud storage.
Simply create a Synata account, link your Dropbox, Box, Google Drive, or any of a number of other service, and then use the Synata extension to quickly search for documents, photos, and other files.
2. Ginger – click to add to Chrome
When your mom is a grammar tyrant who checks all of your blog posts before publishing, you begin to hate corrections. I’ve gotten better and my posts don’t require a lot of editing. My secret? Ginger.
Ginger goes beyond mere spell-check and provides a grammar-check as well. Potential errors appear marked with underlines, much like they are in Microsoft Word. Users just have to right-click on marked words and select a suggested correction.
1. Write Space – click to add to Chrome
I’m not a big fan of writing my blog posts in Microsoft Word, so I typically just open Notepad. Well, I did. That is, until I found Write Space.
Write space gives you a blank editor window completely devoid of distractions. It auto-saves what you write with every key press, so even if Windows crashes or reboots after updating (I have lost a LOT of stuff this way), you wont lose anything.
I have a few more suggestions, but will leave them for a later post. Please let me know in the comment section below your suggestions.
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