I used to use Arc, Lzh, then pkzip and eventually Winzip came along.
Then came PowerArchiver...
They are all great, but they all became commercial.
However, now there is something free and relatively easy/powerful to use for everyone, and it is free. It's called IZArc - visit their website at http://www.izarc.org/
Give it a try - we would love to hear your comments about what you think about this free tool.