Microsoft has made a beta version of Windows Vista available for download. Be warned, these are pretty large downloads at around 3GB. I don’t recommend this download for novices as it is geared mostly towards developers that would like to get a head start. You will need an activation key for your download and you can visit Microsoft for more information on how to get that key.

With the recent hubbub about Adobe not allowing Microsoft to allow the Microsoft Word to convert PDF to Word I thought we would take a look and see what other products are out there that can do the trick.

According to CNET, the second most popular request they receive is “save to PDF”. I found a little tool here at Myzips that can accomplish this task for us: PDF to Word Converter. Sounds easy enough right? This company actually has a wide variety of PDF tools. Their PDF to Word product will run you around $40 but according the site it will “enable export the text, images and other contents from PDF document into word document, so you can reuse your PDF content, PDF to Word software will preserving text, layout and bitmap images in the generated word document.” Sounds like a winner to me!

Bluetooth Technology is a technology that allows computers, PDA’s, mobile devices, and other devices to connect to each other via a short range wireless network. This allows users to sync and coordinate their varied mobile and stationary devices. Bluetooth wireless technology is robust, powerful and affordable. Bluetooth technology is a globally accepted standard available for free to all product makers. It is currently the only short range wireless technology available and will be available in up to 500 million devices by the end of 2005.

This is one of the many printers in the 180 series. This is a far superior printer.

Let me first list the pros of the HP Photosmart 4180 printer. This is a color inkjet printer, and uses two ink cartridges, one for black and the other for tri-color, the colors are not separated into different cartridges, which could be a downside for some people, but for me it was fine. It has a brilliant 2.5” display, great for printing photos; it even has a separate holder for 4×6 photo paper. I was also impressed with the speed that the printer prints at. It will print at about 30 pages per minute on black in draft mode, which is pretty good for a sub $200 printer.

I could only find a few cons, the software takes about 15 minutes to load in and I could not get the OCR software to work, but it does sound very good on the package if you do get it to work. I also wasn’t that satisfied with the quality of the scanner, the photos look a bit dull, but text is great. I contacted them and they said the 5180, the next model up, produced much better looking photos, but I decided, it wasn’t worth the money. Overall I was satisfied with this AIO, except that I couldn’t get the OCR software to work, as I stated above and the scanner was a bit on the low-end side. I would also like to mention that the inks are quite expensive to replace if you can’t get them on sale. Overall, this is a great printer for the average home user, but probably wont suit a small businesses needs. On a scale of 1-5, I would rate this printer a 4.5/5.

When one first logs onto a Mac OSX after a great many years of using Windows, one might be dazzled by the visual and functional appeal of the Mac Docker.

You may be surprised to find that you can also have it on your desktop PC. There are many PC third-party dockers, but the best so far are StarDock’s Objectdock and Punk Software’s Rocketdock. Objectdock’s premium version gives users the ability to create multiple docks, so you can have one on each screen. Objectdock and Rocketdock great appeal is that they can show opened windows in their docks and also a preview when windows are minimized. I found Objectdock more appealing because it can show notification area (the icons on the rightmost side next to the time clock of windows taskbar) on its dock. Objectdock seems to be the only one who has this cool ability. Rocketdock can utilize Windows Vista’s live preview (on minimized windows), which appears unique to Rocketdock. So whether you’re looking to emulate the look of a Mac on your PC, or you just want that cool dock look and feel, take a peek at these quality software products.