We recently published an article with a collection of useful tools for QA/Test Engineers, highlighting tools that are sometimes overlooked or that you probably don't know about. If you get a chance please check that list too: Collections of Useful Tools for QA/Test Engineers.
On the same lines, this time I'm writing this article geared towards Performance Test Engineers. Whenever you work with JMeter, Visual Studio, LoadRunner or any other IDE, these tools help in the areas of scripting, debugging, performance analysis, etc.
Parts of this list has been circulating inside of the Microsoft Test Team for years. An earlier version of this list was originally put together by Geoff Gray (100-level wizard of Testing if you ask me). Taking that list as starting point, I moved things around, updated old links, replaced with newer versions were applicable and added other tools I find useful and have used throughout the years. I hope you find this useful:
TOOLS
PERFVIEW
Performance-analysis tool that helps isolate CPU- and memory-related performance issues
https://github.com/microsoft/perfview
PAL:
Performance Analysis of Logs (PAL) Tool. Reads in a performance monitor counter log and analyzes it using known thresholds.
https://github.com/clinthuffman/PAL
SYSINTERNALS
Manage, troubleshoot and diagnose your Windows systems and applications.
Powerful text editor, features applying different encoding options, language formatting, macros, external plugins and lets you perform many string manipulation operations
https://notepad-plus-plus.org/downloads/
**There are many others text editors such as https://www.editpadpro.com/index.html, PSPad, Charny Notepad, etc. but wanted to feature at least one.
Beyond Compare
Powerful comparison tool that allows you to compare two files or folders, merge changes and visualize everything using different viewers.
https://www.scootersoftware.com/download.php
BareTail
Log File Monitoring Tool that lets you trace a log file in real time and view the tail of the file as information keeps coming in, without blocking the file for writing. Also lets you highlight filter information by color.
https://www.baremetalsoft.com/baretail/
Telerik Code Converter
Convert code from C# to VB and vice versa
https://converter.telerik.com/
WebTest Power-Editor (Serializer)
Power-Editor extension for Visual Studio WebTests (VS 2017). Allows you to modify multiple items inside a single Webtest or several WebTests and change values that are time-consuming to change one by one, such as Request properties, Transactions, etc.
While this list includes mostly free tools, there are a few freeware or only trials. Also if you think I missed an important tool please let me know in the comments.