While most users won’t find Ninite all that useful (there is one exception which I’ll be writing about later today), the “computer friend” or family technician will probably love it.

Instead of sitting around while you wait for a dozen of your favorite apps to finish installing on a pal’s computer, just check off what you want on the Ninite web site, launch your customized installer, and sit back while the magic happens. Or raid your buddy’s fridge – hey, even free work deserves some kind of compensation, right?

The list of available apps has increased since Volery debuted, and now includes more than 50. Among them are favorites like Firefox, Google Chrome, Skype, VLC, OpenOffice, Microsoft Security Essentials, ImgBurn, 7-zip, and many others.

As Brad mentioned before, pay-only pro options are coming but details are still a bit unclear. According to the site, they may include things like local and network share download caching, as well as a totally silent mode.

Now, as freeware or donationware I think Ninite makes sense. I’m not sure users who would find the advanced features useful will be all that excited about paying. After all, you can pull off this kind of kung fu with Ketarin and a little bit of elbow grease — and Ketarin is completely free.

Pro tip: when you launch your customized installer on Vista or Windows 7, you may need to right-click and run as administrator for Ninite to install properly.