In the past McAfee Antivirus has lived up to messing up. Time and time again there are reports of a computer locking up during basic PC health refinements such as scandisk and drive defrag. The newest version doesn't differ much from its predecessor. McAfee Virusscan 6.0 does the same things. From causing Internet Explorer to crash to causing the dreaded blue screen of death with a Vwin32 error, when you are running scandisk. This very bugged version would even cause a shell32 error thus rendering a normal safe shut down of windows impossible. In conclusion, to all those people reading out there, do not buy this product unless you want to experience extreme frustration and a loss of about 40 bucks. If you must have an antivirus program go with the much more proven Norton Antivirus 2002 edition.

"Free edition of StarOffice provides budget alternative office suite for Linux, Windows, and Solaris."

"OpenOffice.org 1.0 provides a selection of software nearly identical to Microsoft Office's. Both suites feature word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation programs" OpenOffice.org 1.0, however, "supports more operating systems" than Microsoft's Office.

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"A prominent Internet privacy advocate says Microsoft Corp. should have warned consumers that the media player that ships with its new Windows XP operating system connects to a server operated by the software giant and reports what DVDs customers insert into their PCs."

According to an anonymous reader on newsforge.com, "Arend van Beelen jr. reviews SuSE 8.0 and finds it to be 'great software' -- but with some disappointing installation and initial configuration bugs. But wait -- don't get the wrong impression. Arend fully expects SuSE version 8.1 to be 'the ultimate distribution' once the wrinkles in 8.0 get ironed out. Read the review at DesktopLinux.com."

According to a newsvac post, "a kuro5hin.org post describes a potential method of using Microsoft Network (MSN) without running Outlook Express. Might be useful for people who bought (or whose relatives bought) computers on one of those 'sign up for MSN for three years and get a big rebate' deals."