Congratulations, you just bought your first laptop! As you roam the aisles of your favorite electronic store looking at all the applications available, you become overwhelmed by all there is to offer.

Software applications are available by many vendors trying to make your life a little easier. Here is a quick look at a few products computer owners feel they can’t live without:

- Financial Software
Do you need to keep track of personal finances, banking, spending habits, and budgets? Financial software such as QuickBooks and Quicken for home or business will keep you balanced and organized.

- Adobe Creative Suites
The suites package includes Adobe Photoshop, Acrobat, InDesign, Illustrator, and Dreamweaver Flash Professional. This is everything you will require to produce print and digital media, including interactive, mobile, web, and e-book devices.

- Utilities Software
Protect your investment by purchasing utility software to backup, manage, diagnose, and protect your system.

- Office Suite

You can download a free open source software suite called openoffice from the website openoffice.org. In it you will get a spreadsheet generator, word processor, presentation creator and more.  All of these come packaged and all are free.

- Antivirus Ware
One of the main reasons to use a computer is to access the Internet. This opens the door to your computer obtaining viruses and breaches to security. Antivirus ware is designed to guard your system against Trojans, viruses, rootkits, worms, and other spyware threats. Computer users say stick to trusted vendors of antivirus ware such as Norton, McAfee, and CA Internet Security that have instant online upgrades to keep your system clean from newer viral threats.

- Microsoft Office
The core package contains Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook.
o Word allows the user to develop mailings and templates, but more importantly create professional looking content documents using comprehensive tools.
o With Excel the user creates spreadsheets featuring tools for graphing, calculation, tables, and formatting.
o PowerPoint allows you to create visual slideshow presentations featuring sounds and animation.
o Outlook is the perfect informational manager keeping track of calendar events, correspondence, tasks, and contacts.

Consider purchasing a few of these applications to make owning a computer a technological pleasure.