Here are 4 free CAB file maker software for Windows. These software allow you to create a CAB archive in Windows by adding multiple files in that with folders and these software also generate the correspondence DDF file in plain text format as well. These software simply take folder from you and then compress all the files inside into a CAB file. However, some of the following tools cannot add folders in the CAB file. Using them you can only add files in the final CAB file.
CAB files are special archives that are supported by Windows and used at many places. CAB files use the lossless compression and then you can easily extract them using any archiver software. If you are SharePoint or Infopath developer then you have an idea how important CAB files are. Also, Windows use them to store the drivers and the information of different certificates. And that is where the following software come in handy. You can easily use them to compress desired files and folders in an easy way. They use the Windows’s built-in Cab maker utility to compress files and generate the corresponding Diamond Directive File.
Free CAB File Maker Software for Windows:
CabMaker
CabMaker is one of the best free CAB file maker software that you can use on your PC. It simply takes a directory from you and then use all of its contents to create the final CAB file. And after generating the CAB file, it also saves the corresponding DDF file that you can keep safely as it contains the essential information about the generated CAB file. Using this software, you can generate the WCS file which is kind of CAB file that can be useful in your development work. It offers a very simple interface where you just have to specify the path to input files and begin with the CAB creation process.
Getting started with this free software is very simple. It is portable too and you can easily get started with it. Open it and then specify the input folder that you want to use for the final CAB file. Next, specify the name for the target CAB file and then start the process by clicking on the “Make CAB” button. It will save the final file and the corresponding DDF file in the target folder. It also shows the log of operations in the bottom pane. See the screenshot above.
Cab File Maker
Cab File Maker is another free software that you can use to create a CAB file in Windows quickly. It simply takes a list of CAB files from you and then generates the final CAB file. However, here it cannot add folders in the CAB archives that it creates. You can only add multiple files inside a CAB file and get the corresponding DDF file as well. Also, if you only want to get the DDF file then you can get that. This software is portable and you can use it whenever you want.
Get the software from above and then start using it to create a CAB file. Add the files in it using the Add button that you want in the final CAB file. After that, select the DDF generation operations according to your needs and start the process. It will quickly save the final CAB file to the specified destination and the time to create a CAB file depends on the number and size of the input files.
Cab Pack
Cab Pack is another free CAB file maker software that you can try on your PC. It helps you create a CAB file by simply taking some input files from you to pack them. This tool works more like a file archiver software. It only generates the final CAB file. Here it doesn’t allow you to generate the corresponding DDF file along with the CAB file. Just specify an input folder and it will create the CAB file from its contents. Before generating the archive, you can opt for different compression types. It supports MSZIP and LZX compression methods to create the CAB file. Additionally, it allows you to specify options to create cabinets for 16 bit extractor or 32 bit extractor.
Just get this software from the above link and then simply run it. Next, specify the input folder from which the files to be packed in CAB archive. Next, specify the compression options and then simply start the process of creating the CAB file. You can see the progress of the CAB creation at the bottom of this software and when it finishes, you can find the CAB file in the destination folder.
Use Windows Command Prompt or PowerShell
Apart from above software, you can use Windows’s built-in utility, “makecab” to create a CAB file. There is simple command that you can run on your PC to instantly pack a single file to CAB. But in common scenario, you cannot generate the CAB file using this utility by compressing multiple files of specific folders. For that, you will have to run some scripts and use other approaches. But you can easily convert any single file in Windows to CAB.
Using this tool is very simple. And the best part is that, you won’t have to rely on a third party tool or internet connection. Open command prompt in the folder that contains the target file that you want to convert to CAB. After that, just run the following command to get the work done.
makecab "Input file" "Output CAB file" /L "Destination to save CAB file"
In this way, you can use this simple command line tool to easily convert any file in Windows to CAB. And you can do that by just running a single command. And “makecab” utility is available in every version of Windows and it is automatically added to your Windows path.
Final thoughts
These are the best free CAB file maker for Windows that you can use. Use them to create a CAB file by adding multiple input files and folders in some cases. Though, you can create CAB file using the built-in Windows “cab maker” utility. But having a GUI to do the same is really advantageous. So, if you are looking for some free software to create CAB file then this list will be really useful.
