Application Download Folder

Here is a huge, no wait, a huge time-saver for me, so I felt I must share it:

I keep a folder called “Downloads” inside the My Documents folder. Inside “Downloads” I’ve created three subfolders:

1. Applications
2. Drivers
3. Operating Systems

Most people wouldn’t need all three of these, but everyone should use both the “Applications” and the “Drivers” folders.

Anytime I’m downloading a new application, driver or operating system, I keep the install file (.exe, .msi, or .zip). This saves a ton of time waiting for downloads, but in my experience the real time-saver is not having to go out and find the download again. It is just right there in my downloads folder whenever I want it again. This is especially helpful when it comes to drivers.

If you are good about keeping it organized, you can get quite a collection of applications going. My current tally puts my collection at close to a gigabyte of applications (not including operation systems).

If you just use one PC, you may not think you would need this. But after you have to reinstall a program or two, you’ll find this shortcut can really help. What’s more, if you keep this folder on the network, you can use this for any PC you are using!

I’ve found that these three sub-folders have kept it pretty well organized after having been doing this for several years.

Bonus Tip: Don’t include version numbers on folder names. Instead of “Adobe Reader 8.0”, name the folder “Adobe Reader”. Then keep the most current version in the root of that folder, and old versions I move to a sub folder called “Archive”.