Here are some essential tools that traders might find useful.
Multimedia Players
VLC Media Player
This nifty piece of software will pretty much play any kind of video or audio file you load without any additional codecs. Great for playing DVD’s, especially ones that aren’t properly authored and may have problems.
Media Player Classic
Alternative to VLC, plays pretty much any media file. Might require a codec pack for more exotic file formats.
Foobar2000
Popular music player with lot’s of features and almost endless customisation. Also has built-in encoding and decoding of popular audio files.
File Compression
7-Zip
One of the best file compressors in the world, supports all popular compressing formats as well as it’s own 7z format which is highly superior to anything else at the moment.
WinRAR
Popular file compressor, best used for rar files. It also supports other formats.
WinZip
Popular file compressor, best used for zip files. It also supports other formats.
Tools
MP3Gain
Can be used to normalize MP3 files without altering the actual sound quality.
Mp3Tag
The universal tag editor. One of the best tag editors that supports nearly every audio file format.
Lossless Audio Checker
Nifty little program to check whether an audio file is actually lossless or not.
MP3 Validator
Fixes common errors in MP3 files.
HJSplit
Common file splitter used to split up large files in parts.
dBpoweramp
One of the best and fastest music converters of all time. Supports pretty much every audio file format there is. Also includes dedicated CD ripper.
Exact Audio Copy
The standard in audio ripping. It’s really for advanced users but you’ll get the best results.
Trader’s Little Helper
Encode/decode audio, test and verify files, displays audio information and more.
Audacity
Best free open source audio editor available today.
Medieval CUE Splitter
This little app will split your single FLAC files into multiple files using cue sheets.