The standard Windows desktop clock doesn’t exactly come with many configuration options: you can set the date and time, and add a couple of extra clocks for other time zones, but that’s about it.

If you need a little more versatility, then, you’ll have to look for some third-party help. And there are few options quite as configurable as DS Clock.

Initially, for instance, the program will display both the date and time in the top right-hand corner of your desktop, but you can configure this to show whatever you like. You can choose from multiple date and time formats; add the time in selected time zones; select custom separators and more, creating a format string which defines exactly what you’d like to see.

If the default look of the clock doesn’t appeal, then you can customise it with your choice of font, background and text colours, and an optional 3D border.

The clock may be positioned anywhere you like, then either locked or left movable. It can be set to display on top of application windows. And if that’s sometimes an issue then you can also make it transparent.

DS Clock includes some fabulous default sounds, including genuine Westminster chimes which play every quarter, full and half hour: very atmospheric, in a dusty, old English sort of way. But if you’d prefer something else then you can always point the program at your own MID or WAV file, or turn off the sounds altogether.

If all this seems a little, well, unnecessary, then you might have a point – but DS Clock does have some more practical benefits, such as its synchronisation features. The program knows about almost 40 internet time servers (considerably more than Windows) and can synchronise your PC’s clock with any of them, just as often as you like.

And right-clicking the clock reveals the ability to launch a stopwatch, another tiny clock which enables you time on-screen events at a click.

Not bad for a lightweight program which, most of the time, required less than 1MB RAM on our test PC. And so if you’re looking for a desktop clock which delivers a little more than the standard Windows offering, the free DS Clock could be ideal.