I haven't made the full Linus switch for several reasons (iPod bein one of them) but I am an avid user of free alternatives to Microsoft products (Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird, etc.) but I have yet to find a free application that emcompasses the utility of Microsoft's Outlook. Are there any free, Windows compatible, alternatives out there? My needs are the three basics - email, calendar, and to do list. Beyond that is gravy in my book.

Well, I finally decided to order an iPod after the announcement that the 20GB model was now available for $299 (tack on a 10% student discount and it's mine for $269). The new model has a lot of new features http://www.apple.com/ipod/ and extended battery life which is nice. Anyone else that uses the calendar and contacts list extensively? As a student that is part of my plan - as well as possibly recording lectures.

Since switching my promary email account from Yahoo! to Gmail, I can't help but feel that my email is becoming more disorganized - thanks in big part to both the search function and the massive amounts of storage offered by Google. With only 6MB of space available on my original Yahoo account, I was a veritable organization machine. When emails came in I read them, then either immediately deleted them of they were of no more use or filed them in the appropriate folder for easy location later.