Well, the big surprise news from the last day or two (at least to me), was the sudden surprise announcement of the beta for the new web browser from Google, called Chrome.

Based on the WebKits rendering engine and boasting improved performance and stability by launching each tab as its own process, I was suitably intrigued, and being a sucker for these kinds of beta tests, was quick to grab the beta first thing yesterday morning.

So far, I must admit, I’m very impressed. The cutdown interface takes a bit of getting used to, but focuses your attention on the webpage you’re reading. A welcome change in these days of being flooded by toolbars for various things. The fully draggable tabs are incredibly cool as well. The way they undock and re-dock with the main window is very smooth.

However, the main thing, is the speed. Its helluva fast. There are various benchmarks floating around, but basically it smokes even Firefox3 by a considerable margin. Despite its beta tag, its also been pretty stable for me as well. I’ve been using it since yesterday morning, and so far no crashes.

Since getting my iPod Touch, I’ve been enjoying using the calendar application to try and be a bit more organised (I’m great at double and triple-booking myself).

However, the issue I’ve been having problems with is regarding syncing. While I like the iPod’s calendar, it’ll only sync with Outlook. And I don’t have MS Office.

I ended up downloading the 60 day trial of MS Office to see what it was like, and I’ve been investigating the various different licenses and purchasing options etc. What surprised me, is that I actually really like the new Outlook. I like the “To-do” pane beside your email with upcoming calendar events, and I like silly little touches, like the pictures in your contacts being displayed in the email you’re reading.

However, it also costs a lot of money, and up until this, I’d been using Thunderbird and Open Office happily.

So I decided to look into Calendaring in Thunderbird. I installed the Lightning plug in, and was very impressed. The To-do panel I liked so much from Outlook was present and correct, and it all seemed pretty polished and nice (apparently its going to be built in as of Thunderbird 3 I was reading).

Last night, I decided to check out my other options, so imported my details from Outlook (I must be getting close to the end of the 60 days I think) into a Google calendar. And it was also pretty painless to get this Google calendar syncing with Thunderbird (via another easily installed plugin).

I’m planning on getting a Blackberry at the end of my current mobile contract, for my home email etc, and it turns out that Google also provide a Sync application for Blackberries.

While I do like the new Outlook, I just can’t justify the expense for an email client, when Thunderbird and Lightning do the same job for nothing. And while I also really like the iPod Touch’s calendar, the fact that its currently locked to only syncing with Outlook is a huge issue for me as a home Windows user.

At the moment I’m really happy with Thunderbird and Lightning alongside a Google calendar, and with the Blackberry syncing as an option, I can really see it as the way forward for me. By keeping the calendar online, it means I can easily access it on my laptop as well, when I’m gaming on my main PC, or view it from my Linux installation with a minimum of fuss.

The moral of the story? I suppose that prohibitive costs and locking things down scores another victory for free software. My hope is that Apple opens up the calendaring options in a future update to allow it to sync with a Google calendar (or directly with Thunderbird), or that Google provides a sync application similar to the Blackberry one (if that’s possible). Outlook I can leave or take, but it would be really nice to keep using my iPod calendar. However, as things stand, I just don’t think its going to happen.

I guess the other moral of this fairly pointless tale, is that people should try out the lightning plugin for Thunderbird. Its ace