What is the standard file manager for windows. File managers

I present the TOP 10 best file managers for the Windows operating system. When compiling the list, only file managers with a graphical interface were taken into account, which are convenient for most users to work with. Therefore, there are no file managers with a text interface, for example FAR Manager or Midnight Commander.

Not included in the list of the best file managers are programs that have not been updated for a long time, for example, EF Commander, ViewFD, or lesser-known applications: FileVoyager, Tablacus Explorer, muCommander, One Commander, etc.

The file manager program (“file commander”) is designed to work with files, disks and folders on a computer. Basically, such programs perform routine operations such as copying, moving or deleting files, opening folders and files, and launching applications.

The default file manager in the Windows operating system is Explorer. Many users are not satisfied with the functionality of the standard file manager, so they use other alternative file managers to work on their computer.

Most of the presented programs work only on the Windows platform, but there are also multi-platform applications among them.

One of the best, most popular alternative dual-pane file manager for Windows (Android is also supported). Total Commander was formerly called Windows Commander.

In Total Commander you can perform various operations with files, the application has a customizable menu and appearance, a built-in FTP client with support for a secure connection, working with archives using your own tools, batch mode, advanced search with the ability to use regular expressions and many other functions.

The capabilities of the Total Commander program are significantly expanded with the help of scripts and numerous plugins.

Total Commander works in Russian, the program was created by a developer from Switzerland - Christian Giesler. The program is paid, but can work for free.

A two-panel file manager with a huge range of capabilities for working with files. The SpeedCommander window can be split into two parts, either horizontally or vertically.

SpeedCommander comes with full Unicode support, multi-tab support, virtual folders, batch operations and macros. The file manager has a built-in viewer for more than 80 file types, a client for connecting via FTP, FTP-SSL, SFTP, a built-in text editor with syntax support, and supports plugins that expand the capabilities of the program.

The program works with 13 types of archives (unpacking, packing), the application has a built-in powerful encryption system and password protection of files. SpeedCommander can sync data across folders, compare data between folders and files, the file manager has tools for grouping and filtering, etc.

SpeedCommander is a paid program developed in Germany (SpeedProject). To support the Russian language, you need to install a Russifier.

A powerful file manager with many useful features. The application's capabilities are expanded using plugins. oMega Commander has a friendly, fully customizable interface.

Main features of oMega Commander: ribbon interface, moving, renaming, formatting ribbons, opening files in different programs, color grouping of tabs, pinning and saving tabs, file flags, highlighting files by type, multi-window interface, list of favorite windows, smart copying, working with archives, as with regular folders, secure deletion of data without the possibility of recovery, cutting and merging files, multifunctional search, built-in editor, free space control and much more.

oMega Commander is a paid program with Russian language support (developed by Pylonos.com LLC).

Free two-panel file manager with extensive functionality. The program is similar in operation and appearance to Total Commander. Unreal Commander supports plugins created for Total Commander (except file system plugins).

Unreal Commander can synchronize folders, supports batch renaming of files, supports the main types of archives, has a built-in FTP client, an advanced search panel, a media player, previews files in the form of thumbnails, quick viewing with built-in tools, checking file checksums, the application has built-in utilities for downloading and backup and much more.

Unreal Commander developer - Max Diesel. The program supports Russian language. To enable the full-featured mode, you must obtain a free license key.

What was the name of your first file manager? If in the last decade you could safely expect the answer "Norton Commander", today acquaintance with the file structure most often begins with Windows Explorer. 2xExplorer largely replicates the concept of a standard Windows tool, while having a lot of additional useful features.

It is immediately worth noting the small size of the distribution and the free status of the program. Both of these factors make 2xExplorer extremely accessible.

The file manager, having support for many hotkeys, allows control only from the keyboard. You can assign your own keyboard shortcuts to frequently used folders. The developers paid close attention to viewing and changing files, including a good editor in the distribution. 2xExplorer allows you to create thumbnails for BMP and HTML files for easier viewing.

The main part of the functions is placed on the toolbar located at the bottom of the application working window.

The use of the program is overshadowed by only one fact. Development of 2xExplorer stopped several years ago, there are no prospects for improving the product.

Do you use programs from the Windows Store? Most likely not, because their functionality usually leaves much to be desired. This statement is especially true for file managers, whose capabilities do not even reach Windows Explorer. This is why today you can find quite a lot of desktop file managers. Let's look at ten of the most popular ones.

The #1 file manager is, of course, Total Commander. The application is shareware and has the following features:

Two-panel interface;
Support for many plugins;
Built-in archiver;
Perform almost all file operations;
Folder synchronization;
Setting your own file associations;
Integration of portable programs, etc.

2. Q-Dir

The small free program Q-Dir is somewhat inferior in its capabilities to Total Commander, but its 4-panel interface with a custom panel layout will appeal to even the most staunch adherents of standard Windows Explorer.

3.Double Commander

A free multi-platform open-source file manager with a Unix-style interface. It has wide functionality and is compatible with some plugins for Total Commander.

4.Multi Commander

In terms of its capabilities, the Unreal Commander manager is practically a copy of Total Commander, but with a different interface. There are also additional utilities: the ability to backup data and a download manager.

7.EF Commander

Another long-liver among file managers is EF Commander, the Windows version of which celebrated 20 years since its introduction in 2016. The application has all the necessary functions for operations with files and is quite worthy of the attention of users.

8. Directory Opus

This file manager boasts a user-friendly, customizable interface. Supported functions include:

Built-in archiver and FTP client;
Search files;
Monitoring duplicate files;
Multimedia viewer;
Graphics converter.

9. oMega Commander

Among the various programs used when working on a personal computer, file managers occupy a special place. For many users, they have become an indispensable tool that combines a number of useful utilities and allows them to effectively organize work with various files and all kinds of documents. The Frigate file manager, discussed in the article, is a very successful example of a competent combination of flexibility and functionality that meets the needs of a modern user. For comparison, a brief overview of two other well-known programs of this class is provided: FAR manager and Total Commander.

File managers

File managers are a class of programs that are used for all kinds of work with files, including support for operations such as creating, editing, copying and deleting, to ensure flexible and convenient launching of other programs designed to work with these files. They are often accompanied by additional utilities that make the user’s life easier. For many users, their favorite file manager often acts as a shell, replacing some of the standard file management tools available in the operating system.

The famous Norton Commander, which freed users from the need to work with the MS-DOS operating system through the command line, with its ingenious two-panel interface, took a place in their hearts for many years. Subsequently, the DOS Shell was included in MS-DOS, but it did not gain popularity among users.

Norton Commander was replaced by the no less famous Dos Navigator, which can confidently be called the first professional file manager. The new program made it possible to simultaneously open several file panels and text files, had convenient keyboard shortcuts and a powerful text editor. The file manager now has several useful utilities, including a calculator, a phone book, and even a CD player.

However, Dos Navigator was written for DOS, and the developers did not port it to the Win32 platform. Released for Windows, Norton Commander was not particularly popular. Many file managers that appeared after Dos Navigator claimed its laurels as the best file manager. But some, with all their advantages, worked in text mode, others were unreliable in operation, and the interface of others was not flexible and convenient enough.

It should be noted that in recent years the need for such programs has also changed. If earlier file managers were almost the only way to conveniently work with the operating system, then gradually, thanks to the efforts of Microsoft, most users found that the tools available in Windows were sufficient. The other part of users, whose needs continued to grow, began, on the contrary, to place new, increased demands on the functionality and appearance of file managers.

The Frigate file manager, which will be discussed below, is a good example of the broad functionality and flexibility provided by its rich customization and configuration capabilities.

Frigate 3

The history of the third Frigate (http://www.frigate3.com/) begins in 2002, with the release of the first public version of the file manager. The program developed the concept used by the developers in previous versions, but was developed almost from scratch, taking into account the shortcomings identified during its support.

The new modular architecture, based on ActiveX technology, made it possible to make Frigate truly modular, thanks to which almost any part of the system, with the exception of some core, works independently and can be disabled if necessary. This approach to the program architecture had a positive impact on its performance and reliability.

The frigate has a modern interface (Fig. 1), which is easy to configure. The program supports color schemes that allow you to almost completely change its appearance in order to achieve maximum comfort and efficiency. The file manager has a multilingual interface with support for 10 languages, including Russian.

The program supports the concept of bookmarks and allows you to open several file panels, editing and viewing windows for files and switch between them using the mouse and hotkeys.

File operations are carried out in the background. There is a special copy queue that allows you to organize the corresponding operations so that they begin only after others have completed.

The main advantage and advantage of Frigate is the close integration of all its modules and additional utilities, due to which it is possible to achieve high efficiency and ease of use. The user can perform almost any action without switching from the keyboard to the mouse, since the focus remains in the program all the time, which helps to increase productivity.

The ideology of plugins that expand the capabilities of Frigate is to implement some minimum reasonable functionality needed by most users. Moreover, instead of only a few of them, it is necessary to use more powerful external programs.

In fact, Frigate is not just a file manager, but an entire office that has a lot of capabilities and can replace dozens of other programs. The professional package includes more than 25 modules and various plugins, as well as a number of other operations that are supported by the core of the program. Let's look at the main features of the program.

File functions

Frigate supports work with 11 common archivers: ARJ, ACE, JAR, CAB, HA, LHA, RAR, PKZIP, ZOO, LIM and HYP. Working with them is carried out transparently for users and outwardly is almost no different from operations with ordinary files and directories.

The module for comparing and merging text files makes it easy to see how two text files differ and what changes were made to them, and using directory synchronization you can track and process changes to a group of files at once.

The multiple file renaming utility allows you to perform a bulk operation to change file names. You can remove part of the name, add a date, create a numbered list, or change the extension.

The built-in console makes it possible to conveniently work with the command line. Search and the ability to conveniently work using hot keys and a context menu with a clipboard are supported.

The size manager will help you quickly assess the fullness of your hard drive or other storage media. Using graphs and tables, you can not only find missing free space, but also decide how to split files when copying to other media.

Working with images is Frigate's strong point, which will be appreciated by those who often deal with graphic files. The program supports working with files in BMP, JPG, ICO, TIF, TIFF, PNG, WMF, EMF, PCX, TGA and GIF formats. The built-in image viewing (Fig. 2) allows you to “scroll through” images located in the current directory, scale, rotate by 90° and flip relative to any of the axes.

The thumbnail view mode (Fig. 3) provides quick preview of a large volume of images on one file panel in the form of thumbnail images.

http://www.farmanager.com/) was created by Evgeny Roshal, the author of the famous WinRar archiver. The initial idea to write a console RAR for Win32 like RAR-DOS transformed into the decision to create a full-fledged file manager.

FAR allows you to perform most of the necessary actions: view files and directories, edit, copy and rename files, has convenient functions for setting up user menus and has a number of other useful features.

The program has tools for searching files, quickly jumping to certain directories using hot keys, and the function of creating “text screenshots”. In addition, it is possible to create keyboard macros to override standard FAR keys or create new ones.

Despite its text-based appearance (see picture), similar to Dos Navigator, FAR is a 32-bit application and supports the NTFS file system. FAR Manager has a multilingual interface and allows you to change your appearance using editable color schemes. In addition, color highlighting and file sorting groups are supported. Since June 2000, FAR Manager has been developed by the FAR Group, but its author, Evgeniy Roshal, continues to monitor the project.

The program supports working with archives of most known formats: ARJ, ZIP, JAR, AIN, UC2, HA, LZH, TAR, GZIP, Z, BZIP and, of course, RAR, authored by Evgeniy Roshal. In addition, the program allows you to work with Microsoft CAB archives.

Like many other file managers, FAR gives you the ability to switch between its own open windows, which allows you to use both open panels and windows at the same time to perform different tasks. However, file operations such as copying are not performed in the background and completely block the program.

FAR allows you to work with a local network and network drives, and has a good FTP client. The built-in modules include: a temporary panel, a list of system processes, a system registry editor, and a tool that allows you to change the case of letters in the names of file groups.

In addition to the built-in modules, the program has many additional plugins that are connected through a set of special interfaces Plugins API. Thus, there are modules that allow you to automatically highlight files on the panel whose names are on the clipboard, highlight syntax in source texts, check spelling and manage WinAmp. Some modules, such as working with a local network and FTP servers, as well as editing the system registry, are included in the standard FAR package. On the website http://plugring.farmanager.com/ alone you can find information about more than 600 plugins that expand the functionality of the program.

It is the presence of a large number of additional modules that is the determining factor for many users who continue to use FAR Manager. But you should pay attention to the fact that in the last few years the program has practically not developed, and even its author admits that the current functionality suits him quite well and that he cannot imagine what else really needed could be implemented in the basic modules.

Text editor

In terms of functionality, the built-in text editor (Fig. 4) is not inferior to many well-known analogues. It supports spell checking based on Microsoft Office dictionaries, quick templates for inserting repeating text fragments, highlighting vertical blocks, has useful features like changing the case of letters and, of course, syntax highlighting. The program comes with 35 color schemes, which include support for various syntaxes from AWK, PHP, C and SQL to HTML and CSS. If necessary, you can create your own diagram in a special editor.

The editor supports several additional layouts for environments and programs such as Windows, Borland, Visual Studio, Brief and Epsilon, and allows you to work with text files in Windows, UNIX and Mac formats. The following encodings are supported as standard: Windows 1251, DOS, KOI8-R, Mac, ISO and Unicode.

Internet and local network

The built-in Internet browser allows you to view websites and local HTML files without the help of external programs. The Internet Explorer engine is used to display pages.

The frigate has a full set of tools for working with a local network. With its help you can work with available network resources, copy, create, edit and delete files. There are additional utilities, including working with network drives and searching for a computer on the local network.

The file manager contains a built-in FTP client. Working with it is transparent to the user and is not much different from working with local disks. The “passive mode” mode, often used by FTP servers, is supported, as well as secure operation via SSL and the SFTP protocol.

Utilities

Quick Notepad is essentially a simple text editor with the only difference being that it is launched using a special key combination. Can be used to store temporary notes or as a temporary editor.

The built-in calculator will help out in situations where you need to quickly calculate something. For convenience, digits in numbers can be separated by spaces, and both a comma and a period are supported as a separator between the integer and fractional parts in decimals.

Startup Manager utility that allows you to manage startup programs. It can be useful both to make sure that nothing unnecessary is loaded when Windows starts, and, if necessary, to manually add the desired program.

Structural notebook (Fig. 5) is a tool for storing various notes or organizing tasks. Presentation of the list of categories in the form of a tree allows you to conveniently group and easily navigate through posts. Each note can be edited in an editor that supports images, text formatting, and color highlighting.

Another useful tool is an image converter, with which you can not only change the image format, but also its size. The utility supports work with the eight most common graphic formats.

The frigate contains built-in audio and video players. Of course, they are not as powerful as some programs, but they are quite suitable for finding the desired media file without calling an external program for each candidate.

Additional utilities

From the Frigate website you can download Frigate 3 Extension Pack, which contains nine additional programs that further expand its functionality. After installing it, the Tools item appears in the file manager menu, providing convenient launch of these tools.

The Image2Ico utility is designed for creating and editing icons.

Using ImageBox, you can create a slideshow or presentation from images and music files.

CDuke allows you to burn CDs and DVDs and has an optimized interface for different types of discs. So, for example, when creating a disk with photographs (Fig. 6), the standard list of files is replaced with thumbnail images.

EasyDVDCopy allows you to copy DVD movies.

The SecureWallet utility is designed to store passwords and other personal information, such as program serial numbers and credit card information.

VisualRenamer allows you to rename groups of files and folders.

The PrintMaestro module is indispensable for those who need to quickly print or translate directory structures and their contents into PDF or HTML files.

The FolderShine utility makes it easy to assign icons to your most important folders. The set includes over 200 beautiful, professionally designed icons.

AudioConverter program is designed for converting music files.

Every PC user had to work with files: create, move, copy, view, play. This is not always convenient when working in Explorer. What to do? Use a file manager. This is special software that helps make work more convenient. Let's look at the best file manager for Windows 10.

What is it for?

The main task is to increase work productivity.

The reader will think more carefully about which file manager is built into the Windows OS. This is the Explorer. Many people miss the opportunities provided by Explorer. What to do? Specialized software will help. Let's figure out which one to choose the best file manager for Windows.

How does this work

File manager is a program that works with files. Using special algorithms, it creates a list of files and sorts them. Therefore, searching for information is faster. How to choose the right file manager for Windows? Look at its capabilities, ease of use, and the ability to expand functionality. Is it supported to install additional plugins to make your work easier?

Total Commander

The official website is located at: https://wincmd.ru/. The application interface consists of two panels.

There are also versions for Android.

Peculiarities:

FTP client running over a secure connection;
Working with archives using the built-in archiver;
Search (use regular expressions);
Installing plugins to improve functionality.

Conclusion

We reviewed the TOP 8 applications that can replace Explorer. I'm working with Total Commander. Its feature is the ability to expand functionality using plugins. If you frequently move and edit files, pay attention to Q-Dir. Its feature is a four-panel interface. Changes to 3,2 or 1 panel. If you care about security, install SpeedCommander.