Stumble Upon: http://stumbleupon.com Great website that compiles random website, images, videos, gifs, you name it. Perfect for inspiration or perspective. The Android phone and tablet apps work great as well. I use it every day on my Xoom2.
Quick and free way to resize images, for when you don't want to fire up PS/major app, the Image Resizer. http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/Downloads/powertoys/Xppowertoys.mspx Some semi-usefull other tidbits in there that I never tried
If you've got an iPad then you'll want Air Display : http://avatron.com/apps/air-display It'll turn your ipad into a second wireless monitor, works on Mac and PC. Very useful to have reference images or maxscript debug window on.
I feel ya. It's hard when you don't have a starting point as a newbie or see how exactly an app will help you. I think that would be a great place to start on this site. A thread dedicated to how to organize what a newbie might like to use.
CrazyBump LINK Space age normal maps from the future. $100 for personal licenses. FileBox Extender LINK Nice little app to tweak a few basic windows ui things, very usefull. Xnormal LINK Xnormal, bitches. Use it, its fucking free and awesome.
I haven't used it much yet, but Picturenaut seems to be a useful and free HDR editing app. There are also a bunch of free filters/plugins available, one of which is the Diffuse SH filter which can do a diffuse convolution of a full sized HDR image nearly instantly.
Samurize I love this tool! You can customize your desktop with "apps". For example a box where a textfile is shown and updated when it is changed. I love to use that for logfiles of the games i work on. So i can run the game and see instantly when there are reported error in the log.
ACME Brick Designer http://www.acmebrick.com/md/index.htm Great little program for laying down a base image of bricks and then building up your texture from there after in PS. Possible to set amount of rows of bricks, change mortar colour and brick style. Some great little apps here people, cheers.
Appwise komodo edit, for music I use shoutcast Google add on for chrome.. For anatomy on Android I use real body works they have two apps in the playstore. There's a free version of ace project on Google Chrome which allows you to clock your productivity.. Stay focused is awesome to block out Facebook, twitter, etc.
CADTOUCH for Android and Ios - a good cad for touch https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cadTouch.androidTrial Cadtouch - ARCHBOX new library of 3d-2d models https://archbox.cadtouch.com this new library will work with the new cadtouch application for pc and tablets. 3d viewer and editor. it has already (its…