Jim Lynch: Tech Tips, Opinions and Reviews

Life is full of surprises, some of them good and some of them bad. This week I got a great surprise when a Debian version of Linux Mint was released. I wasn’t aware that the Linux Mint developers were even working on it, so the release was quite unexpected. I did a full review of [...]

When I was a kid, I used to watch the Creature Double Feature on channel 56. The Creature Double Feature was something I loved tuning into every Saturday, it was basically a double blast of monster movies. What could be better than two monster movies for a kid to watch on a Saturday? One of [...]

What a bunch of namby pamby whiners. You know the people I’m talking about, the ones bitching up a storm about the iPhone 4’s supposed “death grip.” These types of people are always looking for something to complain about. If it were a movie it would be called “Attack of the iPhone Hating Idiots”. Let’s [...]

I got my iPhone 4 last week, but I wanted to hold off writing about until I’d had some time to actually use it. Since last week I’ve spent a fair amount of time using the new features and I took my iPhone 4 on a long hike up Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire. Before I tell you the ten reasons why I love my iPhone 4, let me tell you how it performed on my hike.

A little while back I wrote a comparative review of iBooks and Amazon Kindle for the iPad. One of iBooks biggest weaknesses back then was that it did not have an iPhone version, unlike Amazon’s Kindle app. The release yesterday of iOS4 for the iPhone & iPod Touch has finally remedied this problem. So I thought it would be a good time to look at iBooks on the iPhone and see what it has to offer.

Well it’s that time again, folks. Another iPhone is almost here and today is the day that Apple and AT&T are accepting pre-orders. It should be a joyous occasion, right? We should all have placed our orders by now and should be eagerly awaiting our new iPhone 4 deliveries.

Unfortunately, it hasn’t turned out that way. Again. Today’s pre-order situation has turned into an absolute fiasco.

Last week I caught a lot of heat for my column about Safari 5′s Reader feature. The column seemed to go a bit viral and I got quite a lot of visitors, many of whom were angry. They felt that they were entitled to a quiet reading experience, totally free from web clutter and ads.

Steve Jobs gave his usual keynote address at WWDC today. The iPhone took center stage, as expected. But there was another announcement that web publishers should take note of and should dread: Safari 5. The release of Safari 5 does not bode well for web publishers. Specifically, the inclusion of a feature called “Safari Reader” [...]

Amazon’s Kindle applications are one of the most popular ways to read ebooks. Oh sure, some people actually own a Kindle reader but quite a lot of people don’t. They simply use the Amazon Kindle application for their particular hardware. To date, Amazon is supporting the following platforms: iPhone iPad Blackberry Mac Windows Hmm. It [...]

It’s been quite a while since I last wrote a roundup of free iPhone apps. Much has changed and there have been many new, free apps added to the iTunes store. So it’s a great time to do an updated list. If there’s another free iPhone app that you really like that isn’t in this [...]

Let’s face it, folks. Gaming on the Mac has sucked for a long, long time. Oh sure, Mac gamers get ports of Windows games here and there. But usually it takes forever for them to appear and, in some cases, they never do. Mac gaming has been a sad, sad story that has gone on [...]

In addition to Ubuntu, Canonical also produces or recognizes a number of Ubuntu derivatives such Kubuntu and Edubuntu. These derivatives offer different desktop environments or a more focused selection of software, geared toward a particular purpose. But Canonical has a big problem with these derivatives. Ever hear the phrase “red headed stepchild?” The Urban Dictionary defines [...]

I don’t know about you but I’ve been amused at the amount of coverage in the media about Sony pulling the plug on alternative operating systems on the PS3. Have you been following this mess? Talk about a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing whatsoever of importance. If you read any of the media [...]

By now I’m sure you’re familiar with all the inane blather being spewed about the iPad. Questions such as “Will it replace a laptop?” and “Is it the end of netbooks?” have been beaten to death in columns and reviews across the Web. Who cares? Could there be more meaningless questions to analyze? There will [...]

I have bad circulation in my legs. It’s been getting progressively worse over the years, and I know exactly why. I sit too much. I’m in front of my computers a lot, and my favorite place to sit is in the living room in my beat-up recliner. This chair is a piece of junk I [...]

In the last roundup I wrote, I took a look at the 25 Best Free iPad Apps. But there’s more to life than just regular apps. A guy (or gal) has to have some fun too, right? So here’s a list of the 25 best, free iPad games. These suckers don’t cost a dime but [...]

You might have noticed that a new Apple product launched recently. I’m not going to name it here, because the presstitutes have already flooded the Web with coverage of it to the point where people are suffering from the-Apple-device-that-must-not-be-named fatigue.

But an interesting controversy has arisen as a result of this release: Adobe’s Flash doesn’t run on it. People have been weighing in on article comments and forums, mocking the product and pointing out that “without Flash you don’t have the real Internet experience.”

Is that really true? Do you need Adobe Flash to actually enjoy being online?

As some of you may know, I’ve been a devoted Kindle user for quite a while now. I have a Kindle 2 ereader and I use the Kindle iPhone app quite frequently. Since I heard about Apple’s iPad, I’ve been wondering how Apple’s iBooks would compare with Amazon’s Kindle app for iPad. This review is [...]

The iPad is finally here and there are already a bunch of apps available for it. Here’s a list of the 25 best free apps for the iPad. That’s right, these apps won’t cost you a dime to download and install onto your iPad! So start clicking and start enjoying these great iPad apps. And [...]

As you may have heard, Apple’s new iPad tablet is coming out on Saturday. Some places already have reviews up. And, predictably, Apple freaks are already swarming, waiting for the chance to waste more of their money on yet another piece of overpriced crap. Yep, here we are again with yet another overhyped Apple product [...]