Jim Lynch: Tech Tips, Opinions and Reviews

“Only gay guys and women run Macs, Jim.” Huh? Did I hear that correctly? Did somebody actually say that? Yep, somebody did. One of my friends actually, who is an IT drone. I’ll keep his name secret but for the sake of this column we’ll call him Goofball IT Drone. Goofball IT Drone’s attitude toward [...]

Back in June, Steve Jobs took the stage at WWDC 2007 along with Bing Gordon (an executive from Electronic Arts). The two execs promised a number of brand new EA games for the Mac platform. Shortly after I wrote a column asking if Apple had, in fact, lied to Mac gamers by not answering some [...]

Ever since I bought my Power Mac and PowerBook, I’ve fallen in love with OS X. But eventually, even the most beloved hardware needs to be replaced. I skipped the first batch of Intel based Macs, but last week I finally decided to upgrade. As always, things are never as simple as they seem, and [...]

At this year’s WWDC keynote, Steve Jobs pointed out ten great features of the upcoming Leopard OS. Well I thought I’d take a slightly different tack and point the ten things I didn’t like about Jobs’ keynote. Now come on, admit it…there were things that you didn’t like about this keynote either. So I’ll list [...]

One of the most intriguing announcements made at this week’s WWDC 2007 keynote address was the return to the Mac by Electronic Arts. EA is a huge powerhouse within the gaming industry and its presence on stage with Steve Jobs should not be taken lightly by anyone interested in Mac gaming. But was the announcement [...]

It’s a tough thing when you’re doing a review of a distribution that you want to like but end up having to pan it. The latest version of Ubuntu Linux is called Feisty Fawn, and about all I can see it being good for is venison. We found it to be a real stinker in [...]

A few years back, I remember hearing someone talk about “online word processors,” I thought it was a silly idea, since I couldn’t imagine having to be connected to the web to use an application. Well times change, and in the days of broadband and web-based applications, it seems like the online word processor’s day [...]

Ubuntu is an African word that means “humanity to others” and Ubuntu Linux was created to pass that spirit onto computer users around the world. Ubuntu is based on Debian and is released roughly every six months (you can get more background information about Ubuntu’s development history and its founder Mark Shuttleworth from Wikipedia). In [...]

It’s been a while since I looked at Xandros. True to form, it has remained one of the easiest to use and flat out slickest Linux distributions available. This version of Xandros focuses on the “digital lifestyle” and includes wireless network profiles, a music manager with iPod & MP3 support, photo manager, video players and [...]

A lot has been said about the upcoming Lindows OS. Most of it has been either overblown hype (it will let you run ALL Windows programs! Yee-ha!) or anti-hype (it’s not a real Linux distro, it’s for Windows losers!). Lindows has polarized opinion in the Linux community while simultaneously setting up huge expectations for non-techy [...]

I’ve always wanted a Mac. There, I said it. I’m out of my Mac closet. I’ve secretly longed for one but could never really justify buying one. OS 9 and its predecessors held no real interest for me. But when OS X—really a version of Unix under the hood—came out, suddenly the idea of buying [...]

One of the more common questions experienced Linux users get asked by those considering migrating from Windows to Linux is, “Will my Windows applications run under Linux?” Thanks to the folks at CodeWeavers, the answer to that is yes–for some applications, anyway. The company’s CrossOver Office lets you run many important Windows applications such as [...]

In our previous “Taste of Linux” feature, we looked at some “Live” Linux versions that allow you to run a full-blown Linux OS right off the CD, with no installation required and without affecting your existing operating system. In this follow-up, we look at three live versions from major Linux distributors SUSE, Lindows and Mandrake. [...]

The modern PC is a marvel of technology. One of its more useful capabilities is the ability to use the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive as a boot disk. Many Linux distros use this feature to launch their installers, but if you can boot off the CD, why can’t you run off the CD? In fact, [...]

When you think of Linux, certain names spring to mind: Red Hat, SuSE–even Libranet. But you almost never hear someone say “Hey, did you download the latest version of Ark Linux?” Well, it’s too bad, because Ark Linux might someday be a viable contender for the Linux desktop crown and it surely deserves some recognition [...]

SuSE has always been one of our favorite Linux distributions and this release is no disappointment. It fine-tunes SuSE’s offering and bundles a lot of value into one package. Experienced Linux users will appreciate the powerful bundled tools, while newbies will like the ease of use and stress-free installation. This version comes with five CDs, [...]

I’m known as a relatively thrifty guy. I make it a point to save and invest as much of my money as I can. I try to live by the “live below your means” philosophy espoused by the folks at Motley Fool. As I recently discovered, however, one can sometimes take this concept a bit [...]

Some of you might be wondering why I’m writing about TiVo. After all, it’s old hat right? Well, not everybody has had direct experience with TiVo or PVR technology. Some folks haven’t decided whether or not they even need one. But if you spend any time watching TV and don’t have TiVo yet, the time [...]

John Dvorak, one of my colleagues at PCMag, is off on another rant about blogs. He seems to have skipped his prune juice this week and the constipation is causing him to write some nasty stuff about blogs again. He couldn’t be more wrong. As a blogger, I completely disagree with his comments. John’s criticism [...]

In the process of changing its support and development model for non-enterprise desktop Linux, Red Hat has given a gift to the community: Fedora. Fedora is essentially a tweaked version of Red Hat 9 — or Red Hat 10 — that the company has opened up to outside developers to extend and support. This is [...]