Picassa is useful, but the biggest problem I found with it was that it didn't handle colour management properly, so if you have a wide gamut monitor, picture colours tend to come out somewhat 'funky', especially reds.
Lightroom 2 noise reduction pretty much useless, BUT, the new Lightroom 3 is way better, so much better that I purchased it earlier this week. If you haven't used v.3, I'd suggest you give it a try.
It's a naive, domestic operating system without any breeding, but I think you'll be amused by its presumption.
