For some time now, Sun Microsystems have offered a wealth of software free to the public for private use. PDF files have become a standard sophisticated text viewer on the web and off. Fortunately Adobe makes the viewer available as freeware. Mind you, the viewer will not edit PDF files, but it will read them, and that's all most people need anyway. It runs in the background, with hot-key support.
System requirements are extremely modest yet the pay off is a superbly useful utility.
Check it out. YourSpell can check your spelling with a customizable dictionary, it loads quickly, can open large text files, and has a status bar. If you use Win95 or Win98 First Edition, check out Spell Checker for Edit Boxes , listed above. YourSpell takes up the slack beautifully though, so spelling faux-pas are covered in all Windows installations. K Used in conjunction with Notepad, it should satisfy all your writing needs except for all out word processing.