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Note: Most of these apps do, indeed, use less than 10MB of hard drive space when installed, or use that much when they're running in the background. Some will scale in use as you demand more or less from them—DisplayFusion or UltraMon, for example, when handling very high-resolution backgrounds or a wall of monitors—but all should have an almost negligible performance impact on a modern system.

10. Taskbar Shuffle

You don't open your programs in the order you want them neatly arranged on your taskbar, you open them when you need them. Taskbar Shuffle knows this, and makes it easy to quickly swap windows around, along with system tray icons. It also allows you to close out windows with a simple middle-click, which alone could make it worth the roughly 6MB price of admission. You won't know you wanted to fling windows out of your cursor's way until you try it.

9. Everything

It's probably smaller than your desktop wallpaper. But Everything is more useful and efficient than applications 25x its size. Everything only searches through file names, not inside the contents of them, but it does so stupid-fast as you type. You'll usually find your file with a few keystrokes, and Google fans will appreciate the boolean operators that enable and/or elegance. Definitely an app you'll want to right-click and create a keyboard shortcut for. There's also Locate32, which does a bit more, is portable, and has more user-friendly features—we just like Everything for its single box that searches, uh, everything.

DisplyFusion or 8. UltraMon

If you're rocking dual, triple, or even quadruple monitors at home or at the office (and, let us just say, lucky you on that last bit), these apps have a relatively small system footprint, but make a big impact in how your system looks. They both manage separate or split wallpapers across multiple monitors, and can grab and rotate images from your computer, Flickr, or other sources. With DisplayFusion's recent update, they also both maintain your Windows taskbar across all your monitors (or don't, if that's how you like it). Our resident multi-monitor enthusiast Jason still keeps both apps on his system for the little things, like multi-monitor screensavers in UltraMon, but both are among the very select paid apps we'll admit to being worth shelling out for (although both have restricted "free" versions as well).

7. Texter

I know, it's like we never give up on promoting this, right? Well, what can we say—we (the royal "we," really) wrote it because it filled a need in our half-breed lives of alternating text and HTML. Turns out, though, that folks ranging from power emailers to military writers have found dull, boring text they can automate, misspelled words to catch on the fly, or perhaps powerful, seriously secretive acronyms they'd occasionally like to spell out. For less than 2.5MB of RAM on most systems, this one packs a pretty hefty punch.

6. Revo Uninstaller

In a magical world without computer stress, we're all running virtual machines to try out software we might not want, and we simply uninstall it there, keeping one system nearly pristine. For the real world, Revo Uninstaller scrubs an application and all its traces off your Windows system. It can also turn off programs that are starting up with Windows, and uninstall applications with a crosshair "Hunter Mode" that doesn't require you to know what it's named.

5. NirSoft's password recovery tools

Nir Sofer has contributed a wealth of great applications to the Windows world, but his Lifetime Achievement award for free software could be granted on his password utilities alone. Need to share your network password, but haven't actually typed it in forever and a day? Network Password Recovery to the rescue. Need to unlock an Outlook PST file? Hit up PstPassword. Nir's got you covered for email clients, IM apps, and, for every other app in your system that you can only see asteriks for, Asterisk Logger. Use them with the light side of the geek Force, and you'll own Nir a beer after he saves your unlucky day.

4. CCleaner

With good reason, this tiny, powerful little app has remained our readers' favorite Windows maintenance tool. With a few clicks, it guns through your web browser remains, Recycle Bin, temporary system files, registry, and unnecessary application left-behinds, clearing them out and, in some cases, freeing up at least a DivX movie's worth of space. It also offers a startup program analyzer and disabling tool, and can be run on a schedule for that light, regular crap-free feeling (ew, but good, right?)

3. Process Explorer

Windows Task Manager isn't a bad tool, necessarily, but it only gives you a layman's view of what's eating up memory or pulling serious CPU cycles. Process Explorer expands on the vagueries of "rundll" or "svchost" with a double-click, links background services to applications, and points to the folders they come from. You might not need it all the time, but when you're rooting around and trying to free up system memory, it's like a finely-tuned metal detector.

2. Replacements for built-in Windows utilities

There are a lot of good reasons to keep on rockin' Windows XP, but some of the built-in utilities can feel a bit, well, dated—and that goes for a good number of Vista tools, tool. Notepads without tabs? A Paint app that can't really resize or undo more than one action? Skip the headaches and work-arounds and run down our list of power replacements for built-in Windows utilities, almost all of which are tiny litle buggers that do their work a whole lot better than Windows' own stuff. This editor, for instance, tries not to think about what file copying was like before TeraCopy came along—or, if he does, tries to keep himself calm about that 4GB transfer that failed out for no reason, overnight.

1. Rainlendar

If you feel like you've heard this one before without really knowing why, you probably saw it listed as the best calendar application, or listed as one of the tools used to create a Featured Desktop. This customizable little guy gives you a floating, tiny, yet informative calendar on your desktop, along with a to-do list. It integrates with Outlook, Google Calendar, and most other iCal-supporting scheduling systems. The full app with offline Outlook, GCal and shared calendar support costs €10 (or about $14-15), but could totally be worth the price for anyone who doesn't like to have to open a browser, or flip up Outlook, just to see what's going on Monday.

As we've learned from reading our comments over many years (collectively, at least), any Windows power-user has their own stash of little helpers that can move the rock down the road. Which teensy-weensy little apps get past the velvet rope to your system tray, or into your must-install list? Share your links and the reasons why they win in the comments.

Designers embraced their inner Cleopatras and Tutankhamens this season, offering fresh takes on Egyptian costume (click for slideshow). At Anna Sui, hieroglyphs provided the basis for elaborate prints, while Sophia Kokosalaki worked in a pharaoh-worthy palette of lapis lazuli and gold. Andrew Gn amped up tunic dresses with embroidered metal collars, and Sophie Buhai and Lisa Mayock of Vena Cava accessorized with slinky silver breastplates. “Fashion is about escape. It makes sense to fixate on a historical era that no one can get to,” says Mayock. “I think everyone just wants to dream right now.” We’re all for that, but it’s probably best to leave Orlando Pita’s “Nefertiti-chic” hairdos at Christian Dior to the ancients.

See a gallery of Egypt-inspired looks >

Everything you need to know to make sure you get a signal after Feb. 17.

In Pictures: 10 Tips For Switching To Digital TV

At the stroke of midnight on Feb. 17, 2009, the analog transmissions that have beamed free television over the air in the United States for over half a century will disappear for good. They will be replaced by digital signals, many of which are already broadcasting, in what will be the most significant change to television since the introduction of color.

The "digital switchover" brings with it higher image quality, better sound and a level of versatility and flexibility previously unattainable through free television. It also brings with it a number of significant headaches, as confusion over exactly who will be affected is inspiring panic in viewers fearful of being left behind in a haze of snow and static as the rest of the country moves into the future. Many of those who will be affected know that the deadline is fast approaching, but are unsure of how to prepare for it. Thankfully, a solution is simple, easily attainable and won't cost you a dime.

There are two major reasons for the switch from analog TV broadcasts to digital TV. First, digital signals offer superior image quality and allow for the transmission of high-definition signals over the air. This means that a properly equipped HDTV can receive local high-definition broadcasts that will look about as good as what you'd get from cable or satellite television.

In Pictures: 10 Tips For Switching To Digital TV

Second, switching from analog to digital frees up real estate on the broadcast spectrum for other uses, as digital signals are more efficient and take up less bandwidth. Telecommunications companies like Verizon (nyse: VZ - news - people ) and AT&T (nyse: T - news - people ) have spent nearly $20 billion to secure the rights to the frequencies that were previously occupied by channels 52 through 69, in the hopes of using that airspace to improve their wireless communication networks.

What the digital switchover is actually doing is changing the language that TV broadcasters use to communicate with your television. Since 1941, televisions in the U.S. have utilized a set of broadcast standards laid out by the National Television System Committee. Big broadcast towers sent out information over the air using these NTSC standards and were picked up by the television antenna in your living room. Inside your TV, an NTSC tuner interpreted the information and properly displayed it on screen.

The digital switchover is introducing a new language, a new set of broadcast standards, this one designed by the Advanced Television Systems Committee. On Feb. 17, those broadcast towers are going to stop speaking NTSC permanently and start speaking ATSC. But unfortunately, your old television set doesn't know how to translate ATSC into moving pictures and sound. Just about all televisions manufactured and sold after Mar. 1, 2007 feature ATSC tuners, but if you purchased a television any earlier than that, chances are your TV won't be able to pick up over-the-air broadcasts once the switchover occurs.

The solution: A digital converter box, essentially an external ATSC tuner that sits on top of your existing television and is linked between your antenna and your TV. The ATSC signals are grabbed by the same antenna you've always used, then passed to the digital converter box that translates the ATSC signals into something your NTSC television can understand. They are easy to hook up and available at a wide variety of stores, including big box stores like Best Buy (nyse: BBY - news - people ), Wal-Mart (nyse: WMT - news - people ) and Target (nyse: TGT - news - people ), as well as online retailers.