FastStone Image Viewer - Free and Fantastic!
FastStone Image Viewer has been around for more than 3 years. Yet, I am amazed how many photographers don’t know about it.
The name is deceiving as it’s real strength is as a thumbnail browser and image organizer. What convinced me to switch over more than a year ago is the ease of viewing and handling RAW image files. Previously, I was using ThumbsPlus which required a plug-in and numerous updates to handle RAW files. And, ThumbsPlus is not free.
FastStone Image Viewer supports all major graphic formats (BMP, JPEG, JPEG 2000, animated GIF, PNG, PCX, TIFF, WMF, ICO and TGA) and popular digital camera RAW formats (CRW, CR2, NEF, PEF, RAF, MRW, ORF, SRF and DNG).
Yes, FastStone can convert RAW files to TIFFs and JPEGs. However, I usually don’t use it for that purpose. It’s easy to setup links to external programs. When I have selected a photo for editing, I right-click on it and choose Bibble Pro, PhotoShop, or IrfanView Viewer.
One very cool feature is the ability to create a fully portable (no-install) version of the program which can be run from a removable storage device. You can carry slide shows in your pocket!
FastStone Image Viewer is totally free. However, if you use it and like it, be kind and donate a few dollars to the development team.
Robert’s Rating: 
Fast stone viewer is indeed a fast, stable, user-friendly image browser, converter and editor. I do agree that a lot of photographer have no idea of this great software. It has a lot of features that will surely help them . I tend to used it sometimes and it really works great.
Thanks for this just got it .. let me check it L:D
Thanks for the heads up on this. I’ve been wanting a RAW image browser that let me view images without having to go through an extra import process.
That it’s free is a nice bonus!